Nick Binfield shares this latest news on behalf of Save Brading School Group. Ed
Those in support of saving Brading School have become increasingly frustrated at the proposals launched by the Isle of Wight council. It is becoming more and more obvious in our view that the process to date is fundamentally flawed.
Be it the failure to consult with the academies, the failure to use appropriate planning areas or as this release shows the nonsensical conclusions that the council have drawn in relation to Brading School.
The Isle of Wight council has placed this school unfairly in a position where by the end of August 2025 it will be closed for good, depriving a disadvantaged community of a valued local resource.
Ignore important criteria
The Isle of Wight council in consulting on closure for Brading is ignoring the very criteria that its own document say makes a closure more likely, which are:
- Quality of education;
- Quality and sustainability of leadership and management;
- Financial sustainability;
- Flexibility to respond to future demographic need; and
- Quality of the school estate. If we take each one at a time we soon begin to see the council’s case unravel.
Quality of Education
Whilst attainment at Brading looks poor from the data that the Isle of Wight council uses, ie. raw attainment, when we look at progress data, Brading is painted in a much more favorable light.
By using raw data the Isle of Wight council is taking a simplistic tool to measure effectiveness. All secondary schools use progress data as a measure, as it is more equitable.
Why have the council not adopted this as a measure so equalising between advantaged and disadvantaged schools? By not doing so they run the risk of discriminating against the most disadvantaged in terms of economics and Special Educational Needs and Disabilities.
Quality and sustainability of leadership and management
Brading is a well run school with a ‘Good’ OFSTED report and an absolutely glowing SIAMs inspection in which the inspector notes that no child is unseen.
This does not paint a picture of a school with a leadership and management problem.
Financial sustainability
Brading is financially stable with over £250,000 in reserves and an in year surplus. The Bay who are earmarked to take our pupils are having their admission number reduced from 60 to 45. This is still two classes yet the school will only receive 75% of the required funding, as classes are more sustainable with 30 pupils in them.
This is a school that is already in debt by over £1.5 million in their strategic reserves and running an in year deficit. How will placing further financial stress onto The Bay drive up standards and help it to become financially more sustainable?
Flexibility to respond to future demographics
Brading is on the train and bus routes between Ryde and Sandown not isolated in the very disconnected East Wight.
If what has been seen on the mainland happens here, which is that population increases after this dip, it is very well placed to cope with population expansion in Ryde and Sandown.
Quality of the school estate
Brading has had a recent large investment. Yet despite this, our council wishes to place our pupils in temporary classrooms in other schools. One of these schools has no working kitchen with meals driven in from over five miles away.
Solutions
The council is asking for solutions. There are of course solutions such as federations, of which there is already a highly effective one operating with Newchurch and Nettlestone.
The saving of pooled resourcing that these can bring is of course significant. This is our preference in order to maintain sustainable education in Brading. According to the Government this should be explored before any closure. I have seen no evidence from the Isle of Wight council that they have done this due diligence.
Alternative options
However if the council is really intent on closing schools then this must be this option. The final recommendations must be to: keep open Brading, reduce the pupil admission numbers at The Bay to 30.
This would ensure a fully funded class and no further debt.
Close St Helens Primary School
The second and most controversial is the closure of St Helens Primary School.
A school with no working kitchen, multi-year group classes as opposed to the single year groups at Brading (the council’s own document notes that dual year group classes are not ideal- why keep a school with this provision and close one that they council’s own documents say has a preferable model), limited strategic reserves of £1,600, as opposed to Brading’s £250,000 and St Helens is in an area that its own governing body acknowledges has a very low birth rate, compared to a younger population with a likely higher birth rate of Brading.
There would be, using the council’s own data, enough capacity by 2028 for St Helens pupils within the main building at Brading with no need for additional temporary accommodation as the current proposals detail.
By refusing to acknowledge these options and consult on either federating Brading or reducing the admission number at The Bay still further, the closure of St Helens and the maintaining of education at Brading, the Isle of Wight council runs the risk of being accused of ignoring its own criteria and therefore placing the integrity of this whole process at risk.
