Can schools reorganise classes at this point in the year?

[IHatePerfume]

DS is in P2. In P1 there were 25 children in his class, but two left. The other P1 class was round about the same size.

Now the council have knocked down a big block of housing and obviously the families have been moved. This has affected lots of children at his school- the two P1 classes now seem tiny and DS' class seems to have gone down to about 17.

The school hasn't commented on this but it's obvious when you stand in the playground that numbers are way down across the board. What are the chances of them losing teachers and having to reorganise everything?

They agree a budget in the new year and generally stick to it

However if teachers feel their jobs are at risk they may leave for security

The school may find it difficult to replace them (as opposed to retaining them)

The maximum class size in Scotland for P1 (and maybe P2) is 25 so they wouldn't be able to join 2 classes of 17 to make 1 big class

I've just checked ; it's 25 for P1 and 30 for P2 on

Yes but the maximum class sizes can be flouted if there are "exceptional circumstances". DD was in a class of 32 in P2. Lots of parents queried it and were not happy. Head said that the Council's interpretation was "more kids in the intake than would ordinarily have been expected". So in other words, not exceptional at all.

Result was that DD went through the rest of the school in a class of 32, and the Head kept accepting placing requests willy nilly.

34 might be pushing it. Far more likely that they make a straight P2 and a composite P1/P2 if it comes to that.

I've never known it to happen. Staffing and budgets are normally agreed April/May for the following school year. Depending on the school role for next year they may composite a class/es, I've seen that happen when a particular year group is low in numbers.

I think there are now around 35 P1s and 40 P2s, so I was wondering if they would have one full P1 class, a p1/2 of 10 and 15 and a big P2 of 25.

The council houses are to be rebuilt, which I suppose must be taken into consideration.

I very much doubt that they would change things now. Changes tend to happen at the start of the school year

We've had to reorganise mid session. We had to take in a few pupils for SW reasons and the entire school was reorganised to fit them in. When my class of 33 has tipped into 34 another teacher has been employed. My best year was 2 of us and 40 pupils.

It’s happened in our primary school this year. The predicted numbers gave an allocation of teachers which meant the classes were set at the end of June for 18/19. But we were notified in sept that the school role had fallen ( only by a bit ) but we were now considered overstaffed and they took a teacher away. I think in the past the council would have left it but as they are now so financially constrained they don’t allow any slack in the system. Even if they have to go back up in staff next year, it saves 6 months of salary. In our case the classes were reorganised and the classes started again after the Oct holidays.

I don’t think they would change it now but I don’t think he’ll be as lucky with class sizes next year.

We once had to reorganise due to extra children joining the school, to avoid overly large classes.

It was considered as an option when my current school had a teacher shortage crisis but was very low down the options list.

Another school I worked in went down to a 14 and 11 P1. They were then "merged" for some activities freeing up a teacher.

Seems highly unlikely in your situation.