To All Parent Council Members

Minute of the Bucksburn Parent Council Forum Meeting 7th April 2008 – 19:00

In Attendance: Bucksburn Parent Council, Bucksburn Parent Representatives, Representatives of Newhills School, Bucksburn Teaching Staff, David Leng – Head of Service(Culture and Learning) for Aberdeen NS Area North, Cllr Mark McDonald, Rt Hon Malcolm Bruce MP, Cllr Barney Crockett

Apologies: Frank Doran MP, Brian Adam MSP

1. Welcome – Lynn welcomed those in attendance and made the introductions. She read the email sent by Brian Adam MSP and gave a short introduction as to why the meeting was being called. The two items on the agenda were the Estates Strategy and it’s effect on the Bucksburn area and the proposed budgetary restrictions being imposed on schools by Aberdeen City Council.

2. The Estates Strategy – David Leng explained why Bucksburn was being included in the estates strategy. All schools in the city are taken into account and the assessment made is “is this school building fit for purpose?” There are 2 stages in the implication of the strategy. Stage 1 were the schools involved in the 3Rs project, including Bankhead Academy. Stage 2 schools are the remaining schools in the city, of which Bucksburn, Newhills and Stoneywood schools are part. Aberdeen City has a maximum capacity of 30,000 school places. It’s current roll for the whole city is 22,000 and this number is falling. This is why every school in the city is taken into account for the strategy development. It was felt by ACC that having an excess of empty places was using money in an inefficient manner.

The proposal of an amalgamated school for Bucksburn will be based on a projected roll using Central Government figures. The optimum roll for a primary school is deemed to be 400 pupils for efficiency and satisfactory delivery of service. The timescale for a new school would be between 2 and 5 years. A detailed proposal will be produced from ‘formal consultation’ meetings. Bucksburn is not yet at the stage of formal consultations, instead the earlier ‘informal consultation’ with the community is about to begin, estimated for June ’08. Formal consultation should be ended by Sept ’08.

There is no preferred site for a new school yet. The informal consultation processes will include siting requirements and availability. David did mention that a new school would probably not be built within the new Bucksburn Campus complex.

Concerns were raised about the placing of children during construction. David gave examples of existing building developments in the city schools where the children have been placed in temporary buildings and alleviated concerns by explaining it seems to work well in those places.

David also told the meeting that teachers are employed by ACC and not the schools themselves. This means that teachers follow pupils where there is a need. He concurred that small class sizes are beneficial to children’s educations but stated that the council try where possible to get close to full classes at the very upper limits of numbers allowed by government.