Re-think needed on small school funding
Sir, I have been reading with interest the cost to the council to send a child to school in Argyll.
It is no surprise islands cost more and this cannot be helped.
However the article does not compare the cost of the small schools in Argyll that are within 5/10 minutes drive to the next school, which something can be done about. In other rural authorities in Scotland villages are well and thriving without a school in every village. Take, for example Barcaldine primary. It has four pupils and it would also be cheaper to send them to an expensive private school than the cost of running a school that is only a six-minute drive on a good road to the next school.
Even with adding school transport from Barcaldine to Benderloch it would save the education budget tens of thousands of pounds per year.
Barcaldine, like many other villages, has many international regional companies in the village and would not suffer any loss from closing the school.
Every parent pays taxes. Why should most children in Argyll suffer education cuts while providing exceptionally expensive education to such small schools with a small number of children when it is possible to come up with a solution?
There are many other schools that fall into this category and a long term fairer solution needs to be considered. All children in the authority need to be considered not just the preference of a couple of families. It would not put me off buying a house in a village that did not have its own village school. A 5/10-minute school transport journey is still under the average amount of time it takes for children anywhere to get to school.
I myself had my children moved to a larger school when the council were more efficient. They moved from St John’s primary to Park primary in Oban and although we loved St John’s it was for the greater good of all children in Argyll. The will of a few families should not be allowed to hamper education for our future generation. John Sandwell, Ardconnel Road, Oban.
Balanced approach vital in the media
Sir, Three times in recent weeks, my Oban Times has contained