Agenda item

Sarah Phillips (School Place Planning Project Manager) and Dan Kennedy (Director - Housing, Environment, Education, Performance, Health & Wellbeing) introduced the most recent quarterly update on school places planning.

It was highlighted that demand for places in secondary schools would continue to increase for the next 7 years, due to parental preferences and the pattern of movement in and out of the Borough. Primary places remained high but stable, with adjustments being made to reduce Planned Admission Numbers (PANs) at primary schools with excess capacity, where agreed by the Council. Cabinet had recently approved the reduction of the PAN at Ruislip Gardens, and this was now being consulted on. 

The need for more permanent secondary places was being delivered by the Department for Education (DfE) funded new secondary free school and rebuilding of Harlington school and special free schools. The Council had already expanded a number of existing secondary schools within the Borough. Work was also ongoing with the SEND team to develop more places for SEND pupils within mainstream schools.

Members asked a number of questions, including:

A number of schools had large PANs, with places unfilled. Did the Council feel that they had miscalculated the required places at these schools?

At the time, PANs were put in places based on forecasted need, which nearly all then happened. Some changes to parental preferences had been seen, together with the willingness of parents for pupils to travel further, to their chosen schools, which left a shortfall in others. Work was underway to review PANs, where required. The Council tried to direct pupils to schools to fill up places to have classes of over 26 pupils, and there were now only a small number of schools with uneven very large or small classes.

Could the officers share detail of SEND demand?

Such data would be shared once available. It was clear that demand was increasing, with higher numbers of parents applying for Education and Healthcare Plans for their children. With the overall growth in pupil population, it was expected that there would also be a higher number of SEND children within that population. 

Did the forecast modelling take into account the distribution of pupils? For example, many pupils in the south of the Borough were being forced to travel large distances to attend school due to lack of available choice. 

Forecasts looked at all patterns and trends. It was recognised that people were willing to travel further due to the Borough’s transport links, parental preference, and the fact that older pupils were able to travel further. It was also recognised that Hillingdon was the second largest London borough by geography, but had comparatively fewer schools, which inevitably led to, at times, fewer choices for parents.

Apart from bulge classes and the new school to be built, how was the Council planning to manage demand?

It was important to recognise that the Council had always ensured that all children had been offered a place at a school, even during mid-year, with some degree of choice. It was agreed that there was a high demand for school places, but Hillingdon was better prepared than many other local authorities. Officers were attempting to help schools to improve their offer, which in turn would increase demand at schools which were currently less desirable.

The DfE recommended 5-10% of unfilled places as best practice. The forecasts showed that Hillingdon would be retaining substantially less than this. There was also a danger that demand would outstrip places. How was the Council aiming to resolve this?

The new free school was expected to be delivered in 2022 or 2023. Meanwhile, bulge places were considered appropriate as a way to resolve demand and work was underway with head teachers, many of whom desired more places at their schools.  The Council aimed to be closer to the recommended 5% spare capacity. 

It was noted that currently several special schools were overfull and the schools had agreed to take these pupils above their normal capacity on the basis that plans for expansion and new special free schools would deliver 273 spaces between 2020-24.

How could more SEND pupils be suitably accommodated within mainstream schools?

Currently there were investigations to see if some unused primary spaces could be repurposed for special provision where schools were interested in this and had expertise.  In line with the views of the DfE, this would require specific adaptations, and included the allocation of distinct groups of large, separate classroom spaces, modified bathrooms, etc. 

Members requested that the outcomes of discussions on performance be included in a future report to the Committee.

RESOLVED:  That the report be noted.