Richmond Borough Schools Chat 6

[BayJay2]

Hello! This is the latest thread in a series originally triggered by Richmond Council's Education White Paper in Feb 2011. We chat about local education policy, the local impact of national policy, local school performance, and admissions-related issues.

Please do join in. There’s a bunch of us who’ve been following the thread for a long time, and we sometimes get a bit forensic, but new contributions are always welcome.

If you have a few hours to spare and want to catch up on 4 years of local education history, then below are the links to the old threads. We have to keep starting new threads because each only hold 1000 posts. The first two run in parallel, as one was started on the national Mumsnet site, and the other locally:

1a) New Secondaries for Richmond Borough? (Feb 11 - Nov 11)
1b) New Secondary schools for Richmond! (Feb 11-Nov 11)

1. New Secondary Schools for Richmond 2 (Nov 11-May 12)
2. New Secondary Schools for Richmond 3 (May 12-Nov 12)
3. New Secondary Schools for Richmond 4 (Nov 12-Oct 13)

1. Richmond Borough Schools Chat 5 (Oct 13-Nov 14)
2. Richmond Borough Schools Chat 6 (Nov 14 - ????) : This thread!

Good one.

The proposal is more than hypothetical and is at an advanced stage. I think it is excellent that the wider community are engaged in this and making their feelings known, rather than the behind closed doors approach currently being taken.

Whilst people in Teddington and Fulwell will have been 'involved' in this for a long time, the vast majority of people in Whitton for obvious reasons had no idea anything was being discussed, let alone something on this scale.

Hence the fact I now have a mumsnet account.

Whittonvillage

The Whitton petition has nothing to do with class or denying the need for a new school in Teddington. it is simply a question of getting the best location for a school that children in Teddington and Fulwell desperately need.

Unfortunately that is not the way that the campaign is branding itself. Aside from it's name "Whitton against Turing" and the rhetoric on it's pages about Chelsea tractors etc. the petition is worded "You may as well paint the words “Class Divide” on the A316 at Hospital Bridge Roundabout". The emotional and subjective rhetoric your campaign is resorting to really is unnecessarily divisive. Evidence based and rational argument based on facts that you can support is far more likely to win support, and actually getting down to the minutiae of the planning and legal process and identifying workable solutions more likely to help achieve the best solution for all concerned. I recommend that you look at the past models of the TRAG, RISC and Save Orleans Park groups who largely avoided negativity and mud slinging, other than that which Lord True rather set himself up for, though I don't see any evidence of him having a personal stake in this, and tried to generate compromise solutions. It is very depressing to see this us against them mindset.

The problem is that there are not enough school places, not even at TA or HA, to accommodate the numbers of pupils coming out of primary schools in the coming years, and there are few sites for new schools. There is no magic process that can make landowners give up their land for schools rather than more profitable developments. So there needs to be pragmatism and compromise on whatever site or sites are identified that the EFA can deliver.

I get that, but I think people need to look beyond 'brands' (not that it has one) and look at the substance of the issue and what people from Whitton through to Teddington, Fulwell and Strawberry Hill are all saying.

The best proposal for all (in bold) concerned is Udney Sports Ground. It's there for all to see. The Whitton proposal is unworkable and a silly idea.

I think it's great that people are getting emotional about Whitton and starting to get their voice heard. That's what local democracy should be about and far more interesting and democratic than legal processes.

The fundamental truth is that Udney Sports Ground is the only logical place to build this school. We all know this, so lets all agree to contact cllrs and MPs to drive this forward, united as one!

Let's fight for the best solution for the children and parents of Fulwell and Teddington.

Whittonvillage, I agree that community engagement is good, but those that lead that have a responsibility to get their facts straight. If something is conjecture (e.g. the assertion that LBRuT has "withdrawn support" from UPR) then make that clear, and investigate the truth, rather than building an entire campaign on the assumption that it's true.

Good to hear Whitton voices. There have been judgemental and patronising comments from all sides, probably including me, but it's understandable from those directly affected (BayJay is always admirably polite and restrained). RISC arguments were about a particular aspect of unfair admissions but there are now other people with a lot to lose in a specific area who haven't had as much exposure.

The petition doesn't state that LBRUT has withdrawn support for Udney Sports Ground? It does say that that Richmond are in advanced talks regards the Whitton site.

Research and responses from politicians and newspaper articles amongst other things tell us that this is true and that negotiations are taking place behind closed doors.

The petition site is accurate in the information provided and given that people in Whitton found out about all this a week ago they have acted very quickly and responsibly. You may not agree with everything said and in places its tone could be different, but the core arguments and information on the site is fair and accurate.

If you spoke to Lord Beaverbrook today he'd be fully supportive of the idea of his land being a site of education, whilst maintaining the large proportion of it for sport and recreation.

The last statement is conjecture, I've not spoken to Beavers for years.

Well the wording of the petion has evolved quite a bit since it was first created (interesting feature of change.org that that's allowed by the way). However, the bit about Lord T spearheading a Campaign to build in Whitton surely needs some evidence to back it up?

True, but he is ultimately responsible for all decisions his council makes.

The petition remains an accurate reflection of the core issue and people's views towards it.

Politicians are doorstepping for the election and getting flak about the proposal. Without the petition or social media everyone would still be in the dark and I suspect many people are now considering how they vote in the election. I certainly have.

You may question how well informed people are, but at least they now know what's going on.

I agree Whitton that local people should stand up for their interests and views, I hope from my comments it is clear that I support you in doing that if it is constructive, not misleading and minimises negativity. If the campaign is moving towards being more constructive then that is a good thing. Obviously the supporters of any campaign cover a wide spectrum of views and motivations, every campaign has it's outliers but it is alienating to reflect the extreme views and perceptions in your name and official content.

If it is the first time you have noticed that the Council keep us in the dark when it suits them you obviously have been very lucky not to be affected so far. It keeps happening here down by the river, and it has been with your money

Looks like the primary offer day press release is out: www.thisisourtownrichmond.co.uk/primary-school-national-offer-day-today/04160719#more-7132

Agree with Heathcliff above. You have every right to run a local campaign expressing your opinions and the time to do it is definitely now before the final decision is announced. Just bear in mind that the Teddington site is not ideal either for some of the same reasons e.g. it's entirely surrounded by residential roads that are already overcrowded, the construction phase in particular would be enormously disruptive and probably result in one of the two entrances to Collis Primary having to be shut just at a time when it's already unable to cope with the volume of people going in and out of the site and this has been flagged as a problem for expansion to 4 form entry, the price demanded by Imperial College may be excessive because they want to sell it for housing development (god forbid!). The original opposition in Teddington was partly based on the threat that housing could be built on the Udney Park fields and Imperial College refused to rule out selling it for that purpose so until that threat is averted people will be campaigning on that point too. Plus the original TH proposals were rumoured to contain unsympathetic features such as ugly high security fences and lighting disruptive to wildlife. Not every scrap of opposition is because everyone in Teddington is posh!

Also in Whitton don't forget to get people to write personally to their local councillors and go to see them at every opportunity including at their surgery times, especially Tories who voted for the Tory ones as they presumably have a bit more influence on the leadership!

"Plus the original TH proposals were rumoured to contain unsympathetic features such as ugly high security fences and lighting disruptive to wildlife"

Well that's news to me LP. It seems Teddington isn't averse to a few Chinese Whispers too!

Wherever the school is located, it will need to go through planning processes to sort out issues like access etc, so there will be plenty of opportunity for people to get involved in the detail of that when the time comes.

p.s. And UPR neghbours certainly know that, as they've been involved in planning issues in relation to the site before, e.g. here.

@LProsser: you are saying that: "the Teddington site is not ideal either for some of the same reasons e.g. it's entirely surrounded by residential roads that are already overcrowded, the construction phase in particular would be enormously disruptive and probably result in one of the two entrances to Collis Primary having to be shut just at a time when it's already unable to cope with the volume of people going in and out of the site and this has been flagged as a problem for expansion to 4 form entry"

No site that is surrounded by residential roads is ideal for building a new school, especially for the residents who live on those streets...

However, I don't think the roads surrounding the playing fields are overcrowded now. I live 300m away from the Udney site and I find the area rather quiet - most people walk their children to Collis.

Also, the main entrance to the playing fields is in Udney Park Rd, I'm sure they could use that for construction, and I don't see the need to temporarily close the Cromwell Rd 2nd entrance for Collis - but perhaps I'm missing something here.

I really hope TH gets this site, but looks like chances are slim :(

Incidentally the plans for the rebuild of St RR Primary, College and Strathmore are out on the LBRUT website, that would be the Clifden site that is accessed via narrow residential roads, already congested with rat runners at peak times, totally unsuitable for three schools, oh wait.......

This week’s print RTT has (p 3) Plans to place free school in Whitton ‘narrow-minded’ illustrated by a picture of the Sempervirens nursery next door to the proposed site.

Schoolsweek reports Free school pulls the plug as site search fails: A “chaotic” search for free school sites in a north London borough has ended with a proposed school for 700 pupils folding and another forced to delay opening for a year. Gateway Academy and Gladstone School were both supposed to open in Brent in September last year, but both have struggled to find suitable sites – a situation that local campaigners and politicians call “chaotic” and a “shambles”. . .

Attempts by campaigners to find out how much has been spent at both schools – before a pupil has walked through the doors – have proved fruitless.

I live close to the site aswell foursquare and my daughter went to Collis so very familiar with the daily battle up the back passage from Cromwell Road, and the constant battle to stop parents from driving to school which leads to danger for kids and traffic congestion at drop off and pick up time, although most walk. I would imagine access to the building site would have to be from Cromwell Road for heavy machinery, cranes etc. during construction as it's the widest road with easiest access to the main road at Kingston Road? That would be very hard to combine with small children all over the place on foot and on scooters if Collis continued to allow access via the Cromwell Road passage. I heard about concerns about the previous TH application from a reliable source BayJay but obviously rumours abound - that's the nature of the situation where there is no open consultation on using either site in advance of a decision being made. Personally I would far rather the site became Turing House than housing or a private school and certainly won't be joining any campaign against TH in Teddington if one emerges which it may not. I hope if TH get the site in Teddington they will be imaginative about the design of the building and other facilities and sensitive about the location as I've said before.

"I hope ... they will be imaginative about the design of the building and other facilities and sensitive about the location as I've said before"

LP, I can't imagine Richmond residents allowing an ugly box on any site, can you? And those involved in setting up the school wouldn't want that either. Of course, budget will be the limiting factor, but with planning processes as a counter-weight a balance will need to be found.

Unfortunately I don't suppose we'll see the level of school-building budgets available for the BSF programme ever again (but as I've said before, they had the disadvantage of being sparingly allocated, when they might have benefited more schools).

@LP: Good point re the road widths, but that is a non-issue if planned carefully - builders could work around the the 8-9am and the 3-4pm timeframes... anyways too many unimportant details now.

I'm curious where Imperial is re the bidding process, has it started? BayJay, do you know when IC will reach a decision?

We were told at the TH parents meeting in March that we should hopefully know by the end of April, but that it may well be after that...but that sounds like sometime during the next few weeks, rather than months.

Foursquare, I'm afraid I can't answer your question because the only info currently in the public domain about the UPR sale process is on the Space to Play website.

Deer Park School has today confirmed that London House will be its permenant site

Oh FFS.

In other fresh news, Collis has a new headteacher starting September: Kevin Hogston.

Forgot to post this re the new headteacher:

www.independent.co.uk/news/education/schools/licence-to-chill-the-primary-school-taking-learning-to-another-level-1691527.html