THE Education Department has announced dates for the public meetings in the second round of consultation for special educational needs in the Forest area.
They are Monday, November 26 at Whitecross School, Lydney; Monday, December 10 at Lakers School, Berry Hill, and Wednesday, December 12 at Forest View Primary School in Cinderford. All meetings start at 7.30pm.
From recent media reports the general public might be under the impression that Dean Hall School has been saved from the hatchet. I am sorry to say that it hasn't. We still have the threat of closure hanging over us.
It seems that despite massive support from all sides, the LEA have still not listened.
Oakdene School has inadequate facilities and needs urgent attention, that is agreed by all, but the authorities want to move Oakdene, which is a school for children with severe learning difficulties, into the Dean Hall site, a takeover bid. They intend to make alterations and a new build, spending up to £2 million.
The Dean Hall site would still be a school, but not in its present format. The children in Oakdene need and deserve the best, but so do the moderate learning difficulty children.
The facility for significant full time placements for this group of children would be lost forever. The policy is that all MLD children be educated in mainstream, no matter what the consequences. We cannot foresee the future but one thing is absolutely certain, there will always be children who, despite the best efforts of the professionals involved, will not cope at a mainstream school. We need to retain Dean Hall as a school for children with MLD and have more referrals.
In the first round of consultation, the public meetings were extremely well attended and I am asking all those people to try and get to one of the meetings this time around.The results of these consultation meetings will go to the cabinet in January 2002 and our future will be decided.
This really is our last chance to save this brilliant and much needed school. You have all been so supportive in the past, please help us again for the children. Thank you. – Mrs Gill Dovey, parent governor, Dean Hall Special School.