Good morning everybody. I am here to ask for your help and your signatures on our petition. www.change.org/p/save-maxilla
Our beautiful Kensington and Chelsea is one of the richest boroughs (if not the richest) in London and they are currently trying to destroy Maxilla a wonderful and outstanding Children Centre and Nursery School where it is most needed - in north Kensington (actually just under the Westway)
I actually chose it for my children because it is by far the nicest and also educationally best place in the area, better than all those private nurseries around here.
Maxilla has been rated outstanding by Ofsted, it has a huge garden, the children can spend the whole day outside if they want - for children living in tiny council flats an exceptional opportunity. The staff is amazing, they really care about each individual child and support it in its individuality.
The Borough knows how good the place is, they use it as a model of good practice for others. But now they want to close it down.
Officially they are "moving" it to a federated nursery, over half a mile away and it will simply get out of reach for many people. And as other nurseries in the area are merging or closing down we are actually loosing free nursery places in the area, while private ones are expanding. The Children Centre services will be spread over many locations and it will loose the character of a one stop centre with integrated services.
The building is in a bad state, the funding has been cut, they can not operate anymore but instead of investing in the future of these families and children, the borough just says, they do not want to invest in a place where they have to pay rent, the funding is calculated using the national formula, sorry. At the same time they are investing in other places in the south of the borough. I think it is a disgrace to see that they simply do not care about this community. Of course they would have the money, they could easily shift it around. RBKC is a rich borough, yet it has some of the poorest wards of London (and even the country). They claim to invest here but not really for the original communities.
By closing down free nurseries and building more expensive flats in the area, the communities who are living here since generations can actually not afford to live here anymore. This is social cleansing even if it was hopefully not intentionally.
Maxilla had a very healthy impact on many families, the place is really needed. And it would actually be an easy and cheap option to use it to help a socially deprived area to get better.
You can find the whole story on my blog savemaxilla.wordpress.com
but please go, sign and share our petition www.change.org/p/save-maxilla
If we do not try to stop them now, they will just close the next one.