Concerns raised on pupils' education

Howard Sykes

LIB DEM leader Councillor Howard Sykes raised concerns about the education of children within the borough.

His concern was based on the number of children in the borough who miss out on the attending a secondary school of their choice.

Councillor Sykes said Oldham was "bottom of the class" when it came to the number of children who miss out not only on their first school but also on their second and third choices.

He said: "In this borough almost 9 per cent did not secure a place to start any of their preferred schools in September, which is nearly 1 in 10 pupils or approximately 300 of them.

"So now we have another mark of failure against our education system as according to the Department for Education, Oldham was the sixth worst performer in the country and the worst in the North West for school choices."

He went on to say that the borough is also the second worst in the region for the percentage of pupils being offered a place at their first preference school, 74.8per cent compared to 83.5per cent nationally. It is scandalous ­- we can do better, much better and we must do better, for the sake of our children."

He said: "What is being done now to ensure that every child in our borough receives a secondary school place of their choice in the future?"

Responding, council leader Jean Stretton said: "I absolutely agree that it is desirable that a child gets their first choice place choice. It is not possible at the moment in time. Two schools have now closed. It is appropriate that they have closed but that does create an issue for us. We are bringing forward plans for a further secondary school and we are doing everything we can to make sure that it is being built as soon as possible."