October 2009 Parents Meeting
The presentations made at the October 14 meeting are in the ‘Useful files for download’ section of the website. They are called “Opening Presentation”, “Revised Herts CC presentation with comments”, and “Parents presentation”.
The actions agreed at the meeting are towards the bottom of the page. They will also be added to the Action List on the “Useful files to download” section of the website. If you feel you can undertake any of the actions listed here or in the Action List, please contact us on: wd3school@yahoo.co.uk
The meeting agreed that some short- and long-term objectives need to be clearly set. The following were either mentioned within or after the meeting (the latter as part of individual conversations amongst attendees).
Short-term objectives suggested:
1) Get Hertfordshire County Council’s admissions procedure revised to allow parity of school preferences with applicants from Buckinghamshire and Hillingdon (this could assist with appeals, etc.).
2) Make parents of children at other WD3 primary schools aware of dire situation and working together as an integrated community. (This would then permit the next steps of presenting to these parents at their school and involving them in cross-school action group activities such as picketing 3 Rivers District Council, local selective school governor meetings, etc.)
3) Get Hertfordshire County Council to guarantee Westfield Community Technology College as the nominated local community school for Mill End and Maple Cross children.
4) Start engagement with joint 3 Rivers District Council and Hertfordshire County Council representation over planning a new WD3 secondary school.
5) Investigate if worth petitioning for removal of sibling access rule for out-of-county applicants to any Hertfordshire school (selective and community).
6) Investigate if sibling access could be removed for all applying to Hertfordshire selective and community schools except for those who are within a 5-mile radius of the school irrespective of county borders.
Long-term objectives suggested:
1) Build a new WD3 secondary school (partly funded by local authority and partly by the church?).
Actions agreed at the meeting (not all actions have yet been collated from those taking notes at the meeting):
a) A committee needs to be formally set up so that actions can be coordinated and delegated without all of the effort being centred one or two individuals only. Mark Sutton to arrange a process for this.
b) Mark Sutton and June Gili-Ross to set up a meeting between Hertfordshire County Council (e.g. Cllr Richard Thrake – Cabinet Member of Education) and 3 Rivers District Council (e.g. Anne Shaw – Council Leader) to start planning sites for a local, secondary school.
c) All attendees to look out for and report potential local secondary school sites.
d) Jo Duxberry to ask contacts at Arnett Hills, Rickmansworth Park, and Maple Cross schools about those in the schools who would wish to join cross-school action group activities.
e) June Gili-Ross to ask contacts at Rickmansworth School, Stag Lane about those in the school who would wish to join cross-school action group activities.
f) Guy Anstiss to ask contacts at Shepherd school about those in the school who would wish to join cross-school action group activities.
g) Faye Frater to ask contacts at St. Mary’s school about those in the school who would wish to join cross-school action group activities.
h) Faye Frater to review the 9 points to Ofsted and Audit Commission letter and suggest points that could be included in a follow-up letter to Ofsted (e.g. Why, when asked by ourselves, does Hertfordshire County Council still not publish its intentions on how to resolve its own forecast that demand for school places will exceed supply by 2014 when resolving this issue is its duty and obligation as Local Education Authority? Why, when it agrees we need a new local secondary school, does it expect us to resolve its differences with 3 Rivers District Council instead of doing this itself in its role as the Local Education Authority?).
i) Mark Sutton to provide a summary of 6 bullet points that state the dilemma facing WD3 children for further publication to WD3 parents.
j) June Gili-Ross to produce fliers of the 6 bullet points for sending to St. Peters school parents, and then other local primary school parents as links with those schools are forged.
k) Mark Sutton to look up 3 Rivers District Council meeting minutes on 3 Rivers District Council website to find the recorded reasons as to why the LibDems rejected the Conservative proposal regarding a school site.
l) Helen Gili-Ross to contact press for support.
m) Kim Ormsby to research Hertfordshire County Council and 3 Rivers District Council websites to obtain contact details for councillors (actions 3 to 6 of the Action List attached to the “Useful files to download” page of this website).
Topics covered during the meeting included:
1. How many children got in on appeal to the local schools and how (what was their appeal based on).
Answer given to second part of this question: each appeal is a closed account and there is no way to find out unless the family involved are asked and are prepared to give the reason. But this is very personal to the family involved.
2. How many children historically get into which secondary schools from which primary schools?
3. What other groups of people are there doing the same as us?
4. What is Father Nicholas’ view, action, intention, ability, vision, backing?
5. Can/has Father Nicholas met with the vicar @ St Mary’s to work anything out with the headmaster at Joan of Arc?
6. (Statement from the floor) Only about 15 or so children from St. John’s go to Joan of Arc each year; the rest go to St. Clement Danes (some to Watford boys/girls Grammars). How come? Is there an agreement between the heads?
7. Can Westfield Community Technology College be secured as our local community school?
8. Can any of the schools’ entrance criteria be changed?
