• Carden Primary School saved from forced reduction of entry places after vibrant local campaign.
• Hollingbury-based school had been facing a loss of 30 places (one form) from 2023 before Council’s u-turn.
• Carden’s positive campaign led the way, with other impacted school communities following its approach.

Patcham & Hollingbury ward Councillors have today welcomed the news that Carden Primary will remain a thriving two-form entry school after a backdown from the Council.

Carden Primary School had been earmarked for a reduction in its entry level primary school places from 60 to 30 in changes proposed by the Council as part of its review of city-wide Published Admissions figures.

However Carden Primary School decided to stand up to these proposals and through its Keep Carden Thriving campaign, set up a petition, deputation, friendly protest and social media presence; in an approach that led the way for other impacted schools to follow.

The petition attracted 1,628 signatures, the highest number of any local school, and the Council has now announced it will not be proceeding with the proposed changes.

Conservative Councillors for Patcham Ward, Alistair McNair, Anne Meadows and Carol Theobald welcomed the news.

Councillor Alistair McNair, who is also a Governor at Carden Primary School, thanked everyone who played their part in the positive school-led campaign ‘Keep Carden Thriving’.

“This is a fantastic result for Carden Primary school, and especially for the children, the teachers, parents, governors and the community of Hollingbury & Patcham” Cllr McNair said.

“Parents, pupils and teachers ran a phenomenal and heartfelt campaign which highlighted the strength of feeling of a whole community. 

With this result, Carden Primary remains a school able to serve everyone in its community, many of whose children require and deserve the specialist support only their local school could provide.  It has been an absolute privilege to witness and be a small part of this outpouring of community feeling and belief.

“Carden Primary has made its voice heard - it wasn’t easy having to fight to have petitions heard - and many thanks to the Argus, Brighton & Hove News and Latest TV for taking note and amplifying that voice to a roar - they couldn’t possibly have ignored such passion, and neither, in the end, could the city” Cllr McNair said.

Councillor Anne Meadows said that Carden Primary should never have been targeted for the changes.

“Carden Primary School is well-run, financially viable school that is very much in-demand from the local community in Hollingbury.  It should not have been targeted by the Council to solve its city-wide problems with school demand.

“The proposal would have led to children being bussed to other schools elsewhere in the city, which would have been counterproductive to the council’s policies of walking to school.

“Thanks to this campaign the Council will now be aware of how valued this school is by its community and we would hope that it is never targeted again as an easy fix to Council’s problems with declining demand for schools elsewhere” Cllr Meadows said.

Councillor Carol Theobald said that she was pleased that the school could now continue with its specialised work in Special Educational Needs.

“Carden Primary school is well known for its work with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities pupils and those needing an education and healthcare plan” Cllr Theobald said.

“It also has an excellent speech and language centre for struggling pupils.

“It would have been such a shame if the community had lost access to these important facilities and I am pleased that this will no longer be the case” Cllr Theobald added.

Conservative Schools Spokesperson Vanessa Brown said that the Council would now need to look at its ‘Family of Schools’ policy which had broken down.

“As a member of the cross party working group looking at the published admission numbers for our schools I am delighted that we will not be making any reductions for 2023. I believe this is the right decision after hearing the results of the consultation. I would like to thank all the parents and carers who took part in the consultation process.” Cllr Brown said.

“The schools that were being proposed to be reduced were all community schools serving a distinct area. Two had specialist facilities, one for speech and language and one for children with a hearing impairment and both are highly regarded. All these schools also take a number of disadvantaged children.

“Unfortunately it still leaves us with the original problem of falling roles and empty spaces in our schools. This means that some schools will sadly find it difficult to manage financially. The larger schools can make economies of scale but for the smaller ones it is more difficult.

“What we need is a proper long-term solution to these problems not this piecemeal cutting back of numbers each year which causes so much turmoil and is so unsettling for the schools.

“We need to work with all the schools in an open and transparent way, including working closely with the faith schools and our academies and free schools.  Sadly  the whole “ family of schools” idea is not working as it was  intended. We must all co-operate and work together to find a more sustainable solution to this problem for the future.” Cllr Brown added.

ENDS.