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Widespread consultation on plan to expand school
• THE letter (Is this a fait accompli on plans to expand school? April 2) contained a number of inaccuracies which I would like to correct.
The governors of Emmanuel Church of England Primary School are working with Camden Council and the Diocesan Board for Schools on a proposal to enable 30 pupils a year to be admitted to the school instead of just 15.
This would help address predicted pupil places pressure in the area and secure our popular and successful school’s long-term future as part of the borough’s primary capital programme.
The proposal is that the school (pictured) is expanded and a new school building is built adjacent to 160 Mill Lane open space. However, no decision has yet been made.
The process is as follows:
A full six-week public consultation has taken place and now ended. This involved publication of our consultation document which set out the proposed changes, along with their benefits and a questionnaire.
The document was sent to all parents of Emmanuel School and neighbouring Beckford Primary School as well as 500 homes in the area, local amenity groups and stakeholders and statutory consultees.
A public meeting, which was widely publicised in the consultation document and in covering letters to parents and stakeholders, was held last month. About 50 people attended. The proposals had previously been discussed at a local area forum.
The governing body will review responses received during the consultation process. Should the governing body of the school decide to go ahead with the proposals there would be a further six-week notice period for further comments. The final decision would then by made by Camden Council’s executive (councillors) at their meeting in July 2009.
The drawings on the school’s website were developed as part of a feasibility study on how it might be possible to expand the school by using the proposed new site and the existing one, which would still be used for younger pupils and the proposed new nursery.
The images are just a representation of how the school could look. If the governors decide to proceed to the next stage then architects will review the feasibility study and produce detailed plans and designs.
These would then be submitted to the council at a later stage for planning approval if the executive approved the proposed changes in July.
We would like to make it clear that Mill Lane Open Space is not under threat.
The expansion plan may involve reorganising a small part of the open space to extend the area of land available for the proposed new school building, while using the current reception class site as public open space, in effect, a “land swap”.
As far as traffic generation goes, most of the additional pupils would continue to come from the immediate area, or be brothers and sisters of existing pupils and would be encouraged to walk to school where possible.
More information about our proposals is on our website at www.emmanuel.camden.sch.uk
We are trying to be as transparent as possible in this process.
JOHN WARD
Chair of Governors
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