Students will be ‘left in lurch’ by college closure
TEENAGERS’ education hangs in the balance after it was announced Stockport Technical School will close a year early.
The school will shut in July leaving many pupils mid-way through courses including GCSEs and HNDs needing to find an alternative place to learn.
Earlier this year it was announced the school would shut in July 2016 because it had failed to attract enough students.
Now a lack of suitable premises and funding problems have brought the date forward 12 months. The plan is for Stockport College, opposite the school on Wellington Road South, to take around 22 youngsters left in the lurch.
But students and parents are worried there will not be room at Stockport College and their progress will be disrupted or even delayed for a year.
Jack Walker, 17, of Romiley, is among those left in the lurch and is studying an engineering HND.
Dad Alan said: “It beggars belief, just a few years ago they were championing this school from the rooftops.
“Jack’s had three or four maths teachers since September so they must have known it was a sinking ship. He is now facing disruption for his course’s second year.
“Worst case scenario is he doesn’t have a new place and defers a year. He wants to join the RAF so that would be put on hold. It is deplorable.”
The free school opened in 2013 financed by the Government’s Educational Funding Agency (EFA) and described as ‘ground breaking’.
It offered vocational and academic courses for students aged 14 to 19 who could acquire apprenticeship skills as well as traditional qualifications.
But governors wanted to move to better premises at the former Hillcrest Grammar site.
Alan chose it for his son as a smaller, more family environment to help with his dyslexia, fearing Jack may ‘slip through the cracks’ at a larger place like Stockport College.
This month Principal Ollerhead sent a letter to parents saying cash had run out and the governing body had made the ‘sad decision’ to close in July.
Wayne Jones, chairman of governors, said “This school was the first of its kind in the country.
“We feel severely let down by bureaucracy and lack of flexibility within the EFA, which hasn’t supported this unique style of education by providing suitable accommodation in the first two years of opening.”