The city council has confirmed that an independent inquiry into school closures will commence after the summer holidays. Continue reading PPP school closures: independent inquiry confirmed
Tag: Rowanfield
A time to make new friends
School closure offers unexpected opportunities
Last month’s closure of 17 PPP1 schools caused much anxiety – for council officers, for school staff and particularly for families and for children. And while the saga rumbles on, many local parents and carers still don’t know when their child will return to his or her own school. Continue reading A time to make new friends
Closed schools: Wednesday latest – we’re halfway there
Exciting adventures for Rowanfield
Half of displaced pupils now have temporary new homes
The majority of the pupils affected by school closures have now been allocated new school places by the city council. Arrangements made today now mean that over 4,400 pupils have alternative education provision in place.
Among these are Rowanfield Special School pupils, who will move from Drylaw and will be based at Pilton Youth & Children’s Project tomorrow and Friday.
Plans have also been put in place for Rowanfield pupils to have a full day of outings tomorrow thanks to offers from various Edinburgh organisations. They will be visiting Edinburgh Castle and Dynamic Earth in addition to a trip to the National Museum of Edinburgh (above).
Craig Fletcher, Senior Learning Manager at Historic Environment Scotland, who run Edinburgh Castle, said: “We were recently approached by Rowanfield to ask if we could accommodate a visit to the Castle for their pupils. We normally require 10 days notice but due to the exceptional circumstances our bookings team were able to accommodate them at short notice. We are happy to welcome them and hope they have an enjoyable time exploring this iconic place.”
Details for where Rowanfield will be next week and what they’ll be doing will be confirmed as soon as possible!
Other arrangements conformed include: S1, S2 and S3 pupils from Drummond Community High School will join their senior pupils back at the school tomorrow (14 April). This means all Drummond pupils are now back in their school.
S3 pupils at both Firrhill High and Royal High Schools will return to their schools tomorrow (14 April) and join senior year pupils.
Craigour Park Primary pupils will be going to various other primary schools from Friday (15 April).
All Craigroyston Primary pupils will now be going to Craigroyston High School on Friday.
Braidburn pupils will be relocating to several locations from Friday (15 April). Staff will be contacting parents directly to update them on the arrangements for their own individual child. Transport arrangements are being put in place that will allow children to be taken directly from their homes to their host schools.
Further information on nursery pupils from Craigroyston Primary will be put on the Council website and the Council is hoping to have arrangements for nursery pupils at Castleview Primary in place from Tuesday.
In the past three days the Council has now put in place alternative arrangements for the majority of pupils, with all the arrangements for the schools having been communicated to parents directly and are available on the Council website.
Work is ongoing to identify alternative arrangements for the remaining pupils. The Council anticipates all affected primary and special school pupils will be allocated new school places by Tuesday (19 April) next week as Monday is a Spring Bank Holiday.
Positive discussions have been taking place with the Scottish Qualifications Authority who have agreed that verification and examining visits for all subjects that were due to take place this week will be rescheduled with individual schools.
SQA continues to work with the five schools to provide advice and support, if they require any additional resources. All pupils taking exams will be in their schools with their teachers by tomorrow.
Council Leader Andrew Burns said: “Having rightly prioritised arrangements for those children taking examinations in the coming weeks, the two special schools were next to be addressed and I’m pleased that these are now in place. I want to pay credit to the Chief Executive and his team for their work since Friday on what has been a huge logistical challenge for the Council.
“We have now put in place alternative education arrangements for the majority of pupils, and work continues to identify alternative options for other primary and S1 to S3 pupils. We will communicate to parents as soon as we have further information.
“I fully recognise the significant inconvenience to parents caused by these closures and I want to thank them for their patience as we continue to work through this issue. I’m sure they understand the steps we have taken to ensure the safety of their children.
“The SQA have been very supportive to our situation and I must thank them for the steps they have taken regarding verification and examining visits and help with additional resources.
“I also want to pay tribute again to the response from the organisations, both public and private sector, who have come forward with offers of help and accommodation – most recently Historic Environment Scotland who have today agreed to give a tour of Edinburgh Castle for the children of Rowanfield Special School.”
The programme of structural surveys arranged by the Edinburgh Schools Partnership is continuing this week.
The Council will update parents directly, via text message, the Council website(www.edinburgh.gov.uk/
Closed schools update: Scottish government offers ‘full support’
“Public confidence needs rebuilt as well as school walls: and fast” – Green Candidate Andy Wightman
The Scottish Government’s resiliency committee has met to discuss the emergency closure of seventeen PPP schools across Edinburgh – but The Scottish Greens say the ‘fiasco’ highlights the need to expose private finance failures. Continue reading Closed schools update: Scottish government offers ‘full support’
Local schools to remain closed on Monday
Parents advised to make childcare arrangements for next week
Craigroyston, Forthview, Pirniehall and St David’s Primary Schools are among seventeen city schools which will all remain closed on Monday, the city council has announced. Continue reading Local schools to remain closed on Monday
Tree-mendous: Christmas arrives in Muirhouse!
Tonight’s the night at Muirhouse Shopping Centre
Dull old Muirhouse Shopping Centre will be transformed into a local winter wonderland tonight when Community Action North (CAN) kicks the Christmas season off in style!
Why are we doing this? During the first phase of the Community Action North project we spoke to dozens of local groups and hundreds of local people – and one of their biggest complaints was about the state of the shopping centre. Everyone agrees it’s not the most welcoming environment, so we decided to do something about it – even if only temporarily. And when Urban Union kindly offered to donate a real Christmas tree we thought: if places like Corstorphine, Morningside and Stockbridge can have public Christmas trees, why not Muirhouse too?
It’s taken a while to organise and has presented a number of challenges – I’m sure Santa’s Christmas present run is easier to plan – but we’re almost there and tonight we hope local people will join us to celebrate our community at a very special time of year.
We’ve been working away to make the Centre look a little bit brighter – children from the local primary schools created some brilliant snowflake stencils and these are now being painted on the walls by a team from Tomorrow’s People, supported by Austeja from North Edinburgh Arts.
Our Christmas tree, a mighty twenty-two foot Norwegian Spruce, was delivered and erected yesterday and will be decorated today. We’ll also be adding some more lights around the Centre to give it that festive feel. There’s still a lot to be done, but we’ll get there!
So what could possibly go wrong? Well, quite a lot – as many local people have been quick to point out! However we’ve looked at all the possibilities, we’ve weighed up all the risks and we’re giving it a go. Christmas is a time of hope, of new beginnings and more than anything it’s about children – and we believe our local children deserve to have their own tree, here in their community.
Among tonight’s highlights:
- Christmas Tree lighting ceremony
- Music from Craigroyston Community High School
- Free festive food and drink at North Edinburgh Arts
- Sweets for the children
- A visit from Santa
- An opportunity to hear about CAN – what CAN can do for you, for groups and for our community
The festive fun kicks off at 5pm. Santa Claus is coming to Pennywell tonight – we hope you will too!
Andy and Dave, Community Action North CAN
