Currently council meetings are taking place in-person (not virtually) with Covid safety procedures operating in the venues. However, members of the public who wish to speak at this meeting can attend the meeting ‘virtually’ through an online connection. While you can ask to attend the meeting in person, you are strongly encouraged to attend ‘virtually’ to minimise the risk of Covid-19 infection.
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Minutes:
Ms Debbie List attended the meeting and made a public address in relation to Agenda Item 6 - Overview of Home To School Transport In Oxfordshire.
The Committee was informed that Ms List lives in the village of Standlake. She has three children, two of which attended the local primary school. When applying for a secondary school place for her eldest son, they applied to the catchment school, Bartholomew School but was told that they would have to pay for transport as there was a closer school, although it was not their catchment school.
When applying for Bartholomew School for her second son, they were told there would be no transport. This was obviously a blow as there was no transport. Her son was offered transport on a community bus, a 16 seater minibus, which was run by volunteers.
Ms List questioned the policy as her sons would get transport paid for if they attended a school which was closer, although not in catchment. Ms List questioned the inequality of the policy.
Mr John Christie attended the meeting and made a public address in relation to Agenda Item 6 - Overview of Home To School Transport In Oxfordshire.
The Committee was informed that the Council is wrongly denying free school transport from children from Middle Barton to their long established catchment area partner school Chipping Norton because it claims there are places available at a nearer school Heyford Park.(HPS)
When Heyford Park Free School opened (HPS), it became the nearest school for Middle Barton. This appeared unlikely to affect free transport to Chipping Norton School because HPS is a small 2 FE all-through school and so would not have places for all or any Middle Barton year 7 students. Its website indicated that it did not plan to admit any year 7 students.
However, because the school is undersubscribed it now states it will admit pupils to a small number of places it has in year 7, although the admissions policy confusingly still states that ‘there will cease to be a formal entry point in year 7’.
In 2018 there was one vacant year 7 place at HPS. 12 children from Middle Barton were to go to Chipping Norton School, but because there was one place available at HPS, OCC deemed that the nearest school with places available was HPS and none of the 12 were entitled to free transport. This is at a cost of c 700 pounds a year per child.
This decision appears harsh and unreasonable. This is because there was not a place for each Middle Barton child at HPS, but just one, leaving the 11 children who did not have a place at HPS still without free transport
A second unreasonable decision by OCC occurred in 2021 when 11 places were available at HPS and 20 children in Middle Barton did not get free home to school transport. All the children who were part of the year 7 intake for the previous 2 years had been given free transport, as no places were available at HPS, leading parents to reasonably conclude that this would also be the case in 2021.
Paragraph 25 of the statutory guidance makes it clear that:
" At the point when transport eligibility is considered, the prospect of being able to secure a place in an alternative (usually nearer) school must be a real one. “
Parents in Middle Barton think that their children did not have a real prospect of a place at HPS because as an all through 2FE school is not designed to have an intake at year 7 and that there are far fewer paces available at HPS than the number of potential applicants from Middle Barton.
They also consider that HPS is not a suitable alternative school for entry at year 7 because their children would
- be isolated from their peers that they have been educated with at primary school, and placed in a through-school environment where the HPS children have been together since nursery.
- have never taken part in any partnership activities with the school as they have with Chipping Norton School.
- have to attend an unviable small 2FE school which cannot offer a full broad and balanced curriculum and full range of extra-curricular activities
- have to attend a school which has been rated as inadequate by Ofsted partly due no doubt to its inadequate size
They request that OCC decide that free transport should not be refused to Middle Barton parents unless there are places available at HPS for all Middle Barton children. This would be a correct and reasonable application of the statutory guidance.
OCC should be facilitating the best education for their children rather than looking for loopholes to avoid paying for home to school transport, especially in these times of financial hardship.