To Our Many Supporters

THROUGH SCHOOL UPDATE

We are very pleased to let all of you who continue to support our valiant efforts to become a Primary School that a meeting of the Executive took place on 8th April 2008 at County Hall and that our proposal was on the agenda.

The school's case was more than adequately made by Chris Elson. Representations were made by the Chair of Governors of St Bedes and by Cllr David Davis (Shere) on behalf of St Bedes, in the form of a question as to whether the Executive would consider changing the proposed implementation date from September 2008 to September 2009. The reasons for this were explained as being due to the short notice that would be given to St Bedes if the proposal is agreed for the next academic year, and the probability of there being an inevitable redundancy situation as a result of the proposal. Catherine Lowry, Headteacher of St Bedes, also expressed a view that SCC admissions had informed her that 14 children would be joining St Bedes from Ripley Infants in September 2008, and that should they not appear, there would be significant disruption to St Bedes given that school budgets have now been set for the coming academic year. Surrey have now confirmed to us that in fact 13 pupils are down to attend St Bedes however since that number was published there have been departures which brings the number down to 11.

Of the 12 Executive Members present, five made comment on the proposal and expressed excitement and support for it (with particular support from the Executive Member for Children, Schools and Families, Dorothy Mitchell (Cobham). All agreed that the formal public consultation should now proceed, but stated that it should explicitly address the contentious issue of timing, and not only whether the proposal should actually go ahead.

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT … TIMESCALES

Our proposal will therefore move to the formal public consultation stage on 23rd April 2008, with a public document to be issued by the Governing Body in partnership with Surrey CC for all the community to review and, as is right and proper in such circumstances, the opportunity for any representations to be made by individuals who wish to do so. The public document will be available on our website, however please note that public meetings have been arranged as follows:

Ripley C of E Infant School: Monday 28 April at 7.30 pm

Our plans have been in the public domain for long enough that it is deemed reasonable to have a public consultation of 4 weeks. At the conclusion of the public consultation, any representations will be analysed by Surrey Schools Planning and presented to the Executive. Then, statutory notices must be published for a period of 6 weeks, before the Executive make a final decision.

The last meeting of the Executive before summer recess is on 23 July 2008. It is unlikely that final approval will be reached until this date. Any lobbying (of our local councillors, for example) that can take place in this direction would be of great assistance.

There is nothing more that we, as a group, need to provide in terms of financial or other documentation. We have been so lucky to have such huge support from the local community and would encourage you to come in large numbers to the public meetings. Any individual letters of support can also be issued once consultation is opened and this can only help to further promote the cause.

Once again, thank you for your continued support … fingers crossed!!