Scotland School Closures

COUNCIL ADMIT THEY GOT IT WRONG!!!!

2009-10-19T12:46:00.000-07:00

On one of my many searches online I found this posted on a Glasgow based website to my amazement this information has not been shared with the parents the council have so badly let down.

Posted on Glasgow Based website:

In an embarrassing gaffe by members of Glasgow City Council, revealed over the weekend, it was shown that the principal reason put forward for the closure of nearly two dozen schools in the city earlier this year could not now be supported by official statistics. In April this year leading Labour politicians within the country's largest local authority revealed that they intended to close a significant number of city schools because of "falling school rolls". However, it has since been found that school rolls in Glasgow are actually on the increase, although city council planners and politicians claim that the rising number of children attending schools in the city has taken them by surprise.Councillor Stephen Curran, the politician responsible for overseeing service reform within the council, confirmed the rise in pupil numbers when he said that there were "more children in Glasgow than we had been expecting". In an added development the councillor intimated that the rise in school rolls would now mean that politicians would have to make an extra £2million in cuts to the city's education budget to accommodate for the increased number of pupils in city classrooms.Although pupil numbers are on the rise, the council has appeared to rule out any possibility of a reversal of the controversial, and deeply unpopular, closure of 20 city schools earlier this year. In a number of cases - as with Barmulloch Primary School in Glasgow North East (shown below) - the school has already been demolished, despite the fact that the term has only recently started.

It is an appalling situation that our council have left us in but I can't help wondering if these are in fact new figures to the council or just another cover up by our city council officials as they begin to look at the rising costs of the repairs to the few schools that were keep open. Glasgow City Council has failed again whatever way you look at it but surprise surprise its not the councillors who are paying for the mistakes NO ITS OUR CHILDREN AGAIN!!!.

We cannot let this mayhem within our city continue if you can write, email or hound your local councillors ask them to explain why our children have to suffer for there never ending mistakes, make sure you have a voice and make sure it is heard before more of our valuable schools are lost.

Lynn Scott

Update and Shelia mckechnie awards

2009-10-11T14:44:00.000-07:00

Hi All

Well since my last blog post it has been a busy month with trips to London for the Sheila Mckechnie Awards interviews and awards ceremony. I was nominated for the consumer Action Award on behalf of the parents and the school closures campaign and out of thousands of applicants I made it to the final three people winning a finalists position this has given some well needed publicity to our campaign to keep this campaign in the limelight as much as possible so now that the awards ceremony is over we will be working with the sheila mckechnie foundation to gain as much help and advice as possible.

I will hopefully be attending some campaigning workshops and networking with some hopefully very influential people who could possible help us and anyone else out there who is needing support on this issue. Please get in touch if you need advice on school closures or if your school has already closed but you are still angry and want to send out that message to the public we would love to here from you but remember this site may be accessed by children so no fowl language please.

Thanks Again
Blog Administrator

FIRST DAY DISTASTERS

2009-08-19T08:58:00.001-07:00

Today saw our children face there first day at the new school in Germiston and yet again Glasgow City Council have let our children down.

we have constantly highlighted the problems with safety on the new route to school yet Glasgow City Council had NO Crossing patrols on the roads apart from the one man left standing outside our old school building clearly to cross over the hundreds of children that won't be going there today.

Not only did we not have crossing patrols but our support teachers were left standing outside our old school building phoning round to find out why the school they were sent to was closed. Glasgow City Council is a disgrace and the councillors should hang there heads in shame over these blunders. God only hopes it improves by tomorrow.

Well done Mr Purcell your right we have all forgotten what you have done because of the smooth transition to our new school YEH RIGHT!!!

Lynn Scott

Stop Taking Start Giving

2009-08-16T00:14:00.000-07:00

some of the parents from Barmulloch Primary are arranging a meeting with the Candidates and Councillors in Glasgow North East and doing a demonstation on the Road they children will now have to walk down to get to the new school we want to ask our politicians to stop taking resources from Barmulloch and start giving back to our community by building us a new school.

Hope its a sucess so far had a reply from almost every candidate to say they will be attending just one to go.

Need to make sure the press are aware of who will be there.

Lynn Scott

Chat time this week

2009-08-10T12:14:00.000-07:00

Hey all our chat time this week will be wednesday night 8PM. Join us if you can have a chat about anything you like not just school closures but anything you like. all chat rooms have admins for your saftey.

Log on and we will see you there.

Lynn

Calls for a change in law

2009-08-04T05:28:00.001-07:00

Today I have been writing to some of the committees in the scottish parliament to ask for there support in progressing with a change of law which allows us to give our children adequate space in the classroom to learn.

Health and Safety currently have no legislation that we can find that dictates how much space is needed per child and we are trying to have this changed currently councils go on outdated capacity levels when they are looking at schools for closures and if adequate space was provided per child forcing these capacity levels to be re addressed the council would find it more difficult to close schools with higher roles.

The petition is available for signature at http://www.thepetitionsite.com/8/stop-school-closures.

thank you

Chat with parents

2009-08-03T08:16:00.000-07:00

next time time this tuesday 8pm join us with any questions or just general chit chat. come along.

VOTES FOR WORK

2009-07-23T10:21:00.000-07:00

If you are struggling like we are in Glasgow to get your council to listen too you over your school make sure the leading party know about it in the next election. In Glasgow the Labour council have been running scared for some time now and as parents manned polling stations during the European Elections handing out Labour Out not Our kids leaflets to people as they entered and journalists out for photos of angry parents it kept our fight in the public eye.

Vote for people who work for the city not against what you believe in make sure the city council know your feelings and make sure you are there as a strong front on polling day!!!.

Will our children suffer on new route to school

2009-07-22T10:33:00.000-07:00

Hey all Just had an interesting email from a group called Sustran who specialise in getting children to take healthier options of transport to schools e.g walk, cycle etc.

Do you think our new route to school will encourage people to use cars more to transport our children to school or will the longer route mean our children walk more.

Give us your ideas and leave comments below all comments will be added together on the 31st of July and information facts will be passed on to Sustran and possibly used in our fight against the City Council so tell us your opinion now!!.

Join the debate

Lynn
Site Administrator

Chat Time

2009-07-19T11:12:00.000-07:00

Just a note of our next chat time available at 8pm this Wednesday night just click on the chat link and choose a nickname then chat away this chat time will be administrated by Lynn Scott.

Hope to see you all there

How to organise a Protest March

2009-07-18T11:28:00.001-07:00

To organise a protest march in your town first thing to do is contact your local police station and ask who organises the march's in the city they will put you in touch with the right people and they will talk you through the legal side of the march. Once you have a date and route set for your march you NEED TO PUBLICISE IT and drum up a crowd theres no point in marching through the city on your own now is there. Make sure you give yourself enough time to prepair eg banners and costumes if required make it bold and bright the more people look the more your message is heard and if you have some particularly loud friends invite them along the louder the better.

Dangers to our children

2009-07-17T09:46:00.001-07:00

One of our main fights was the danger's our children face on there Route to the new proposed schools. In Barmulloch we have to walk past Europe's Largest Asbestos removal site not to mention the building site that lines the other side of the road.

We felt that this was one of the best ways to make our feelings know. So we done a photo shoot for the press advertising Barmulloch Primary's New School Unifom of Asbestos suits and masks and school bags.

we protested locally at the present Barmulloch Primary Site and these photos were taken and published in the local newspaper.

During our protest we highlighted other dangers that face our children including severe flooding and gang violence that are ever present on the only available road to the new school site.

If you want to get in contact with parents that took part in these protests leave comments on the website or log on to our chat room at the regulated times (to be posted).

Keep us to date with our progress and keep in touch by visiting regularly and tell family and friends to log on.

Lynn Scott

april fools who's the fools

2009-07-17T08:53:00.000-07:00

This was one of the most fun protests I think we were involved in April Fools day. Loud Proud "were no fools save our schools" was the chant and as we stood outside the city chambers onlookers joined in and tooted horns in support. Make your protests interesting in anyway you can the more eye catching the more news worthy.

Remember Its your protest and your message get it across in a way that suits you and get it HEARD!!!!.

Occupations of schools

2009-07-17T08:28:00.000-07:00

Some of the parents involved occupied buildings in protest over the closues Wyndford and St Gregories buildings were occupied through the easter holidays and wyndford again after the close of schools in the summer. These Occupations gained worldpress and interviews with programs such as GMTV broadcast throughout the UK.

It took a lot of courage for these parents to give up there time for such a protest but we are proud that they did.

As part of a strong campaign your council needs to know you will not back down and nothing is too much.

Protests like these will get support for your campaign and help it gain momentum. Although not all protests need to be as dramatic as this a quick reminder to local councils that it is the people they serve and they need to listen to us if they want to keep there jobs.

Keep up the fight you are not alone out there, Join our weekly online chats. Look out for regular updates on times chat is available and talk to parents and protesters, gain access to information on how to move forward in your own campaign.

Lynn Scott

Site Administrator

Use the media and local politicians

2009-07-17T07:35:00.001-07:00

For anyone who is involved in school closures or any other campaign we know all too well the press is one of the best ways to get your voices heard.

Contact Local papers, radio stations and local politicians these people are useful to get to know as we found out the more people who know who you are the better and the more help they are willing to give so get out and about contact news rooms email TV news channels etc it does work and your local council can't hide from there bad press forever.

Links to some of the papers and local politicians can be found under links and resources.

2009-07-17T06:59:00.000-07:00

This was one of the many marches we did through Glasgows streets in protest over the decision to close schools.

Freedom of information Act 2002

2009-07-17T06:38:00.000-07:00

During our campaign we began to find it difficult to gain information from authorities on some of the issues that related to our schools and our rights we found that if you quote you are asking for:

information on (whatever your subject is) under the freedom of information act 2002 and state under this act they now have 20 days to comply (please note it is 20 working days and will exclude all public holidays and weekends) but the information must be given for more information on laws in Scotland click on the link for scottish laws.http://www.scottishlaw.org.uk/

Please use our links to some of the councillors in Glasgow and as we progress we will put more links on here to other councils across scotland.

Lynn Scott

Whats this all about

2009-07-17T06:09:00.000-07:00

Hi

My name is Lynn Scott I am one of the administrators on this site and im here to tell you a little about what the site is all about.

In January 2009 Glasgow City Council announced its intention to close 25 schools and nurseries across the city one of which was our local school Barmulloch Primary. Parents across the 25 schools and nurseries then grouped together to form a united front against the council in a bid to stop closures that made no real sense, parents protested gained some of the largest petitions against school closures in Glasgow within days of the announcement and staged sit ins at some of the schools involved. We fought long and hard parents gave up a lot of time and effort to try to make Glasgow City Council see sense but unfortunatley on the 23rd April 2009 a decision was made to close 23 out of the 25 schools and nurseries.

Our fight was not over in fact it is far from over we are still challenging the councils decisions by seeking legal advice on the flawed consultations and fighting for new schools to replace the ones taken away. We are looking for laws to be changed to stop this type of situation happening again to so many of our children across the city and indeed Scotland.

We have created this website to help others through similar situations and share what information we can that helped us in our fight and we hope you will join us by leaving messages of support and questions post pictures of your own campaigns against school closures in your area and chat at our regulated chat times which will be announced weekly with other parents to share ideas on how to campaign against such unlawful acts ever happening to our great city and country again.

Be strong we can win if we stick together.

Lynn Scott
School Closures Campaginer