Farley All Saints is a very special school. All village schools are special – and that is part of the problem. The easy bit is to identify the problems. The hard bit is to find the right solution. Sometimes the solution is closure. Sometimes it is federation – to spread the overhead costs. Sometimes it is to find for the school a new lease of life – perhaps by converting a first school to a primary school. And sometimes the answer lies in a vision and a challenge that is only achievable if all the partners really believe a bright future is a practical proposition, not just a dream.

Education policy

The Government has pronounced that for village schools the presumption, as far as they are concerned, will be against closure. That’s all very well. They don’t accept responsibility for prioritising the taxpayers’ money they divert to Local Education Authorities (LEA’s).

The Education Authority, Wiltshire County Council, in its School Organisation Plan, recognises the Government’s presumption and will not normally bring forward proposals to close a village school unless it can be demonstrated that one or more of the following criteria apply:

1. There is only very limited demand for places at the school from children coming from the designated area.
2. Standards are low and there is low confidence in the likelihood of improvement.
3. Recruitment of a Head Teacher has not proved possible.
4. The necessary improvements to the school accommodation are neither possible nor cost-effective.
5. The school has a deficit budget without realistic prospects of recovery.

Our LEA’s policy is that all proposals to amalgamate or close foundation or voluntary aided schools will be brought forward in consultation with the governing bodies concerned. Furthermore, for all schools with fewer than 90 pupils on roll, the LEA will actively encourage the governors at such schools to consider further collaboration and, ultimately, federation with one or more neighbouring schools.

Depressing reality

Recently I was sent a personal account of the demise of Saint Mary’s School, Steeple Ashton near Trowbridge, written by the last Chairman of Governors. It was a harrowing catalogue of missed opportunities, mistakes, personality clashes, village rivalries, spurious confidentiality and secrecy – all leading to the closure of the school. ‘Our discussions on federation were bleak. No one was interested in us. Why should they be? We were a school in trouble, with under 20 children left and in financial difficulty’. She went on to say that at this stage, already on their knees, they had an Ofsted Inspection. The feedback ‘was heartbreaking and crucifying’. ‘Ofsted could do little more than place us in special measures, even though they knew the consequences of such a finding would be severe’. ‘Leadership and management were poor’. ‘Monitoring was barely in existence and Key Stage 2 children were not achieving the expected standards’.

The Governors of the school had been informed (by the LEA) that it really was a case of geography (too many small schools) and that closure would come to whichever school in the area failed first’.

Locked in a box?

Let me declare at this stage that education is in my bones, if not my genes. What I’m trying to say is that I’ve been there and got the t-shirt. I felt there was something missing from the equation in the case at Farley. And we seemed to be locked in a box.

This was confirmed when, a day ahead of an important meeting with the County Director for Children and Education and the Diocesan Education Director, I received an e-mail with a ‘matrix’ of options for Farley. It set five possible ways forward for the school judged against three criteria – is it achievable, will it provide an effective education, and will it meet the aspirations of the community? I was implicitly invited to tick the boxes. I did not oblige.

We are very fortunate in Wiltshire and in Salisbury Diocese to have two outstanding educationists to administer our schools. We really are. I have complete confidence that they have not got where they are today by wishing to close a single school. Like parents and teachers, that is the last thing they want to do. They have to operate within the policies set down by Diocese and County – who must in turn conform to Government policy.

Parental preference

My experience in independent education has taught me a lot about the nature of competition in learning establishments. Unless parents are sufficiently affluent or their children win scholarships to independent schools, most parents will settle for their local school, come what may. Exceptionally, parents make a political statement either way. For most of us, local is best, and we need a good reason to pay for schooling twice – tax, plus fee. I could catalogue many village schools in South Wiltshire, whose fortunes have gone up and down depending on the human frailties of Heads. But, at the margins, what makes a parent opt for independent schools versus private - or Farley versus Pitton versus Winterslow?

If any school has weak leadership, poor teaching, sub-standard buildings and a bad reputation, it will not thrive. If the reverse is true – it will blossom. In the independent sector, schools are in competition with each other as well as state schools. Too often in the state sector, especially at primary level, our schools don’t even try to compete with private schools.

Take Farley. If all the primary age children from this and neighbouring villages went to All Saints instead of well-known private schools in Salisbury, we wouldn’t have only 17 children from the village in the school. So what does it take to reverse the trend? Answer – quality education at least as good as in neighbouring villages plus the x-factor. The x-factor comes from thinking outside the box (the matrix) and capitalising on the special heritage of Farley. But won’t this just pull children out of neighbouring schools? No – only at the margins. For most parents the attraction of walking to the local school will remain as strong as ever. But for others, faced with crowded urban schools or expensive private schools, the attraction of a very special rural school will be enormous.

Village schools have so much stacked against them at present. Demography is unhelpful. Numbers on roll are going to fall for the next five years and more. There just are not enough children – especially in the villages. Finance is tighter than ever, expenses growing. There has to be some sharing and streamlining of management costs if teaching is to survive. It is increasingly hard to attract Headteachers to small schools if they must teach full-time as well as lead and administer.

It is against this background that I have made two proposals to Wiltshire County Council and the Salisbury Diocesan Board of Education.

Farley All Saints – a specialist music primary school

Farley school was founded by Steven Fox, second son of a village woodcutter, who went to Salisbury Cathedral School and on to Court where he befriended Prince Charles and made piles of cash at the Restoration of the Monarchy in 1660. When he returned to visit his birthplace he found poverty, ignorance and indignity. So he asked his friend Christopher Wren to build a church, together with an almshouse for the elderly, incorporating a school for the children. In 1867 the new National School was built – and recently nearly half a million pounds has been invested in new buildings. It would be appalling to abandon this great tradition of education in Farley – and that need not happen.

All Saints should remain a full-spectrum primary school, with the added benefit of music teaching. The way we currently organise our peripatetic music teachers is wasteful in terms of time, efficiency and stress. Surely it would be better to have a primary music centre at Farley – based on greater use of the church and village hall – and bring in the pupils for specialist teaching? This is not a new idea. Cluster schools in South Wiltshire have been doing this for years – my own children were bussed for music from Redlynch to Downton. The man who did it went on to develop teaching programmes at the Wren Hall in Salisbury Close.

Teaching staff would be cost neutral – they are employed already. Links with the Wren Hall in Salisbury Close would be strengthened. Links with the Cathedral, the Cathedral School and the Choral Foundation would be forged, based on the Founder’s education. The concept would surely appeal to our musical Bishop, David Stancliffe. And experience abounds in the Bishop of Ramsbury – for Peter Hullah was Headmaster of Cheetham’s Music School in Manchester. New money would be raised in time, for new facilities, from national sources – attracted by the pioneering concept of a primary specialist music school. It would be a first for Wiltshire and a first for the UK.

There might be a new relationship with independent primary schools in Salisbury – who would certainly feel the draught of competition.

Apart from the vision thing, a school with an exciting future would be much more likely to attract an ambitious Head. The whole project would transform the reputation of and prospects for the school.

The short-term financial crisis remains. And there is a very short time in which to make decisions. I believe all the nearby village schools would benefit from this initiative – and they may see the advantages of new, closer working relations – even federation. Given this new hope, new challenge and new start, could the LEA close the school? It would be a severe test of their commitment to village schools.

Farley All Saints – a specialist primary school for the environment

The setting of Farley All Saints on the edge of the village, with its huge garden and enormous playing fields, spilling into the farmland and surrounded by ancient woodland is nothing short of spectacular. Within walking distance of such biodiverse habitat and within striking distance of Europe’s finest chalk grasslands on Salisbury Plain and the EU Special Area of Conservation of the Avon River Basin, Farley All Saints could become another first for Wiltshire and for Britain. I do not mean another Field Studies or Outdoor Centre. I mean a centre for the development of specialist, on-line teaching programmes offering local, national and international resources for early year’s environment education.

For this, new specialist staff would be need – but what a challenge! Special funding would be needed – or staff on secondment to get the project airborne. But who would be interested in helping? In the village is one of the most successful specialist seed merchants in the UK, with family links to the school – and many years of commitment to the school gardens. Wiltshire Wildlife Trust is the most dynamic of its kind and places a high premium on education. And Salisbury is the headquarters of the world’s only international plant charity – Plantlife International (see my website gallery with link). David Bellamy is the President and the Director lives locally with children in a village school! Not a bad start.

We have another precious resource that I believe should be tapped. Projects such as these require manpower over and above the normal course of duty. I am very impressed by the local branches of the University of the Third Age (U3A). In Salisbury, over 1000 retired professionals – teachers, scientists, musicians, accountants, managers – stay young and in touch with the world by pursuing a huge range of intellectual and practical activities. Specialist primary school projects at Farley might very well gain from their attention and commitment, freely given.

Farley has a future – believe it!

Salisbury Constituency has a growing population. Forty percent of the people live in Salisbury. Sixty percent live in over 100 villages, large and tiny, in about 400 square miles of the most prosperous and most attractive countryside in England. For 21 years I have watched our community evolve. Some things have disappeared with hardly a whimper of regret. Others, like pubs, post offices and schools have been fought over. A handful of village schools have closed that people came to realise were unsustainable. Sad – but inevitable. In all my 21 years as MP I have never felt more certain about the future of a school. All Saints Farley has a bright future. It should not close.

It will take persistence by parents and governors. It will take ingenuity by the LEA. It will need the confidence of our elected County Councillors. It will need vision and commitment by all of us. The prize is great – and it is attainable.

Robert Key MP
17th May 2004