Blueprint for education consultation

[jaydee67]

They are suggesting closing Olnafirth, but in this week's paper there is an advert, placed by the schools service, for an artist to spend a month creating art works for the playground at a cost of £3000! Where is the money coming from?

[judgeknott]

Any councillor voting to close his local school need not bother trying to be re-elected.

[MuckleJoannie]

They are suggesting closing Olnafirth, but in this week's paper there is an advert, placed by the schools service, for an artist to spend a month creating art works for the playground at a cost of £3000! Where is the money coming from?

 

From the Scottish Arts Council. See the left hand column on page one of this document.

 

http://www.shetland.gov.uk/education/documents/CreatvieLinksNewsletter3.pdf

We have recently secured £56,000 from Scottish Arts Council towards a Cultural Co-ordinator to increase amount of cultural activities

happening in Schools.

Watch press for details.

 

Possibly the left hand doesn't know what the righet hand is doing, but then I hardly expect the Olnafirth school will be buldozed as soon as it closes so the artwork will remain on view for some time.

[humptygrumpty]

What lunatic has come up with this ????? Are we to have children barely out of primary education facing an hour and a half bus journey from say Sandness to lerwick each morning and the same at night ?? How safe would that be in the long winter nights with gales / snow / frost and ice ect ?

We have the Aith school which is amongst the top performing schools in Scotland and the sic are to attempt to discard that fact and send these bairns to what ? A broken down heap of crap in lerwick with no where near the splendid record of Aith. No parent is going to be willing to do that !!!

I do agree that maybe some schools would have to close , these with a very low school , roll but only where practical !

 

Why dont the sic close bells brae and sound schools and send these children to the Anderson , or this new school , if ever it gets built ? This would make at least some sense , whats the point of two primary schools less than a mile apart ???

 

There should be savings made elsewhere in the SIC that would save untold hundreds of thousands....

1. Abolish Island allowance , we all live here but only a few get it. It means effectively that anyone working for the sic gets their council tax paid free , while we all have to pay our own and no doubt subsidise theirs. eg:- Say £1400 per year Island allowance X approx 3000 employees = £420,000 per year !!!

 

2. Cut all councillors expense accounts , £10,000 for taxies to get to work is a joke. no one else would expect their employer to pay it and would be left to fund it themselves. All travel expenses to be cleared by the council and fully accountable.

 

3. Stop all county vans and trucks from being taken home saving shed loads on fuel , tyres and wear and tear. we all have to travel to work and pick up our work vehicles , and pay for our own fuel , so should they.

 

4. Cut down severely on the top heaviness of the SIC , I mean we are in effect a tiny Island with 22.000 population , the sic employes around 3000-3500 staff. Orkney has a pop of 18000 and employ around half of that. WHY ? What are they doing that we arent ?

 

Theres an old saying in Shetland that " Du better sweep dee ain brigistanes first " I think that applies here with full justification.

[paulb]

i heard that the kids from sandness will be expected to stay in the halls. don't know if its true but its a shame if it is. transport costs are going to be way higher. aith could easily be expanded to fit a full high school role. if all the junior highs did there would only be a need for a smaller anderson. personally the kids prefer aith.

[Shoogler]

^^ well said humptygrumpty, keep going with this list because there are dozens more areas that savings/cutbacks can be made in the SIC - and that is before any thought of actually diminishing the level of service provision - see my previous post about 'extras' in the education budget and also suggesting a close look at Education Dept management/admin costs.

How many millions could be saved from streamlining departmental admin functions. Far too many departmetns have their own internal admin.

 

Mucklejohnie - I hear what you are saying re non academic v exams focus and personal development. However, I am suggesting that all these things need to be evaluated in a time of looking to get best value out of the service.

[stephen]

The subsidy for education is paid to SIC by the Scottish Government. The subsidy is being cut. The council have two options:

1. Cuts accross the board - ie. lowering staff in current schools, cutting back on resources and buildings maintanence

2. Merge schools

 

I think we all like things as they are, however, we do need to realise things will have to change. I am sure we all have different opinions on what should happen.

 

We all have little choice over the funding cuts, but the Blueprint meetings should be interesting.

 

On a similar note I think council staff spending should be cut - but that would mean Shetlanders out of work. I also could be really selfish and say there should be no ferry services on sundays etc... all saving money too!

[paulb]

yes there has to be cuts but the impact is going to be worse than just fewer schools. take skeld you have all the support staff from caretaker to cook to secretary. losing even these three posts will impact on the community. what is the cost saving going to be from shipping kids an extra 18 miles a day. there must be some calculation on this cost.

 

i find it odd that they were planning for anderson to be a lot larger than now needed for a number of years. so how is this consultation going to change anything.

 

the merged schools on the westside are going to need a fit for purpose building and the staffing bill will probably stay the same. were the smaller schools manage with one or two teachers this new one will need one teacher per year or two.

[MJ]

now paulb I was wondering where you were tonight.

You didn't miss much in aith.

Did you realise that school transport doesn't count as education budget therefore not taken into consideration when looking at education budgets? So it may actually cost more to send your youngest ones to aith (transport costs, admin etc) but as it doesn't come out of the education budget it's a saving!

[paulb]

i wanted to go. the wife had the car in lerwick. thats just the stupid think that they need to sort out. just because its not there budget does not mean that they are saving. really they do need to get into the real world.

 

what were the views of the meeting. one of the girls was on the student council meeting today and they were talking about a full transfer of the older children to lerwick.

 

by the way do you think we could function like that. sorry your food budget is needing cutting so heres a grand to nip to the nearest asda.

[MJ]

I had to leave early so didn't hear the outcomes. Most of it was discussing the "viable" and "not viable" I did notice that sandness closing was a given. No choice even in the not viable options. To be honest I would prefer my one to go straight to anderson if it weren't for the fact they don't provide enough school bus seats for those already going. Or the 10minute wait in the evening in wiesdale.

[MJ]

i heard that the kids from sandness will be expected to stay in the halls. don't know if its true but its a shame if it is. transport costs are going to be way higher. aith could easily be expanded to fit a full high school role. if all the junior highs did there would only be a need for a smaller anderson. personally the kids prefer aith.

the subjects studeied in shetland are basic enough, you're going to limit your children's higher education further by limiting them to the subjects available in Aith? Already for standard grades children are limited by not only what is taught in aith but by class numbers for their year and timetabling issues.

But one thing that doesn't seem to be covered is moving teachers. Why can more teachers be split between schools. May solve some of the lack of subjects at schools. Also why isn't brae high school an option, same distance/journey time?

[paulb]

probably just historic that the kids just get sent to lerwick for year 5 and 6.

the road is a bit iffy getting north unless your going via tingwall bad weather the trip could become very slow. thou like us you would be snowed in if that was to happen.

 

its a pity about sandness school. i just think they are going to need to spend a whole load on waas before the kids could go there. still i bet that is not counted either.

 

skelds school is newish so that's money down the tubes as well but there is the option of it being the new hall.

 

as you say i don't like the sound of the kids being shifted for their exam years. it would be better for them to either do the full time at aith or go to anderson. we should be glad that they are wanting to keep waas open. after all they are going to have space at aith,

 

i still think teleteaching should be looked at.

aith are willing to fit in with the kids wishes if they can anderson is stricture on what they can do.

 

the next question is what happens to the couple of hundred kids heading into lerwick when the school wont be built.

 

my son start aith this September so i am a bit worried about this as he has special needs and it takes him ages to settle.

[soljey]

the subjects studeied in shetland are basic enough, you're going to limit your children's higher education further by limiting them to the subjects available in Aith?

 

In Shetland as a whole, subject choice is not particularly limited. Go to any large school down south and they do not teach every Standard Grade/Higher/Advanced Higher/Access or Intermediate course. That would be totally unfeasible.

 

Already for standard grades children are limited by not only what is taught in aith but by class numbers for their year and timetabling issues.

 

There is no school whatever their size, wherever they are that doesn't have some timetabling issues. Being able to provide everything that pupils want to do would necessitate more classrooms and more teachers.

 

The standard grades that the AHS provides are: Biology, Chemistry, Computing, English, Geography, History, French, German, Modern Studies, Music, PE, Physics, Teachnical and RMPS. I know of at least one Junior High that provides all of these apart from German & RMPS. Not bad!!!

 

one thing that doesn't soem to be covered is moving teachers. Why can more teachers be split between schools. May solve some of the lack of subjects at schools.

 

Using ICT to allow teachers to teach using video conferencing between schools if one thing, but if this means teachers travelling between schools it is a different matter. At the moment, a secondary teacher has say 8 different classes he/she teaches at say 3-4 periods for each class each week. Actually standing up in front of a class is only part of a teacher's job - granted the biggest part of it.

 

Lessons have to be prepared, familiarisation with new books/equipment/software, units written, departmental/staff meetings conducted, training undertaken, work marked, classrooms set up for the next class/experiment/lesson - and so on.

 

If a teacher is constantly having to drive back and forth between schools, the above time will be eaten into. Materials will have to be carted back and forth leading to them being lost or damaged. Creative and interesting classes for the children will not happen because the teacher has not been there to set up the class. It could lead to a narrowing of the subjects available - not a widening.

 

Finally, much of the debate seems to have centred upon the financial aspects of education. Surely a model for the education for our bairns is the priority - then see how it can be most efficiatly carried out.

[mclaffalot]

Yes the Skeld school is relatively new and the Sandness school had a major refurb around 16 yrs ago. What about these falling school roles ? If thats the case then why is Walls school having to teach at times in a corridor ? Were ALL the corridors full when the school roll was higher ? How could this be the case ?

 

Yes massive savings could be made throughout the council , and lets face it they are telling us that savings have to be made , but it seems to me that its always at the sharp end and never at the offices / twiddling thumbs end !!! Lets see them cutback on all these uneccessary jobs first before coming along and say we are going to screw around with your schools but please dont cut our office jobs. If tough choices have to be made then let them be made from the TOP and down and NOT the other way around.

 

Heard tonight that there are 93 staff employed at hayfield house What do these people all do ? do you know ? Do THEY ?

 

Its high time this bureaucratic monster was cut down to size and IT was made fit for purpose.