Consultation report is out

Last proposal for closing school

A public consultation into permanently closing a mothballed Perthshire school has been made public.

Perth and Kinross Council published its report into the closing of Forteviot Primary School earlier this week, outlining its plans to permanently discontinue education at the school on June 28 next year.

Pupils within the Forteviot catchment will be sent to the nearby Forgandenny Primary School, which has been teaching the children in this catchment since the school was mothballed in October 2016 when the roll fell to only five pupils, despite having a capacity of 50.

It was agreed at a meeting of the council’s lifelong learning committee to formally close the school down in January this year.

The report said: “Future pupil projections have been considered using aggregated GP registration data and at both Forgandenny Primary School and Forteviot Primary School pupil numbers are projected to remain static over the next four years.

“There are very low numbers of pre-school children in the Forteviot catchment area over the next four years with no house building planned in the area.

“Pupil projections in the catchment area do not indicate that the potential pupil numbers will increase in the future and there is no suggestion going forward that this is likely to change.

“The highest projected occupancy level, including house building, for future years at Forteviot Primary School is eight per cent in 2020/21 and at Forgandenny Primary School is 79.1 per cent in 2020/21.”

The report said the proposal to permanently close the school was widely supported, adding only two written representations were received, both of which were incorrectly filled out.

The report continued: “The council’s proposals have been generally supported by parents/ carers, staff and the wider community.

“There has been very little opposition to the council’s proposal.

“The report from Education Scotland acknowledges that the proposal would lead to clear and well-founded educational benefits for pupils.

“This includes the larger number and wider range of peers in Forgandenny Primary School allows increased opportunities for socialising and making friends as well as enabling children to access learning with groups of learners at all stages within a primary school and to develop their social and interpersonal skills in a broader range of appropriate contexts.”

The report recommends the council approves the plans to cease education at Forteviot Primary School at the end of June 2019 and permanently subsume the catchment for the school into the nearby Forgandenny Primary School.

The paper will be published until Friday, October 5, before the council’s lifelong learning committee makes a final decision on the school on Wednesday, October 31.