Community Action: Secondary Education

The loss of secondary education for the area wasn't accepted without a struggle and a proposal for another solution.

In 2015 I attended a packed public meeting hosted at the Dunes Complex with a panel of representatives from parties involved in the proposal to close the Mablethorpe site of Monks' Dyke Tennyson College.  I spoke at the meeting and strongly challenged the proposal.  I was asked to follow this up by leading a steering group to put a strong case during the required consultation process and explore solutions that could preserve and enhance secondary school provision for the community.  Past experience of being involved in the closure of a primary school in North Hykeham, which my daugher attended and where I was a teacher, told me that it was highly unlikely that the proposal would be dropped.  A Plan B was required.

Plan B was a twin-track approach to secure either:

1. The support of a local standalone secondary academy or Multi Academy Trust (MAT) to take over the school.
2. Failing that, to apply to the Department for Education (DfE) to open a new secondary school in the form of a 14-19 'Studio School' offering specialist subjects, a mainstream 11-16/18 Free School or a combination of these.

A small team, which I co-ordinated, was assembled to hold discussions with existing local academies and MATs and the Local Education Authority to explore this, whilst local support was further gathered from parents and local businesses.  Parents secured an 8,500 signature petition, which was delivered to a meeting of the County Council. We also secured the involvement and support of our MP, Victoria Atkins, and our journey was reported on Look North and BBC local radio.  Progress was shared at a second public meeting. It eventually became clear that the first option was not going to come to fruition, so attention became focused on the second.  I gave a presentation at the LCC Children & Young People Scrutiny Committee in January 2016.  Sadly, this did not sway the committee to drop the proposal but it did approve for retention of the land for 12 months and that the community be supported by LCC in the bid to secure a free school.

During the car journey back to the coast, the Coastal Free School project was born.

Coastal Free School was registered at Companies House and a board of directors and trustees was appointed, with members of the former steering group at its core.  They were joined by a local education professional who had been following the appeal against the school closure closely.  We were accepted by the New Schools Network (NSN) to develop a bid to the DfE and received modest funding to support this.  Fourteen months of meetings around the country negotiating with various MATS followed with regular reporting to and feedback from NSN on how the development of our written application was progressing.  A Service Level Agreement was offered by one of these potential partner MATs to provide the professional and back office support that would be required prior to and in the early years of a school opening.

Shortly after this, the professional who had joined the project went rogue and supplied the MAT with spurious data purporting a highly inflated level of parental support to substantiate pupil numbers.  A resignation was received less than an hour prior to a company board meeting to remove this person as a trustee and board member.  Our efforts to re-negotiate an arrangement with the MAT, based on the true level of projected pupil numbers was unsuccessful.  In April 2017, after consultation with New Schools Network, the trustees and directors determined that the project, at least for the immediate future, was not viable.

In the last few months a group of around a dozen people have been working to get a secondary school for the area onto the agenda once more.  The Sutton Trusthorpe and Mablethorpe Project (STaMP) group has a page on Facebook.   I have shared with them my experiences gained with Coastal Free School and provided advice and guidance.  I will continue to support the return of local secondary education to the town.