Compromising on dance studio problem

Over the past months, we have met with East Devon District Council and a users’ group regarding the future of the Leisure East Devon-run dance studio facility hosted on our premises, Colyton Grammar School.

Together we have discussed options by which the facility remains open for the local community while at the same time addressing the needs of our growing school.

Further to this discussion, we have today written to East Devon District Council to inform them that there will no longer be public access to the changing rooms during school hours.

The reasons for our decision are three-fold: as the school grows we need to maximise the use of the space available to us, to continue to provide a learning environment which is safe and which has student wellbeing at its heart – additional changing space for sports provided by these changing rooms is therefore a key requirement; the users’ group understood the challenges facing the school and indicated that they could manage without access to changing rooms; the school is under no legal obligation to provide changing facilities to the general public.

Safeguarding legislation and requirements have changed considerably since the dance studio was built, and clearly it would be inappropriate for students to change for curriculumrequired sport in the same space as adults.

Therefore, in order to provide the school with the space our students need to change in a suitable environment, removing public access to the changing rooms during school hours is the best solution.

Student safeguarding is a priority for us and is a process, which requires the monitoring of visitors who enter our site.

By allowing community use outside of school hours, we protect our students while at the same time maintaining community use.

The compromise arrived at with the users’ group is a good one, and one which both parties can see working.

We now need East Devon District Council to act within this spirit of compromise to achieve a workable balance.

Tim Harris

Headteacher, Colyton Grammar School