Two-school plans ‘short on cost and design details’

Former Education, Sport & Culture vice-president Carl Meerveld said the new plans were disappointing and unconvincing.

His comments are in contrast with those of ESC president Matt Fallaize, who has said that the overhaul will raise academic standards and nurture young people – and he staked his political reputation on making it work.

The latest policy letter was released on Friday, outlining how the current education committee expects to make revenue savings of around £2m. a year with its two-school model at St Sampson’s and Les Beaucamps.

ESC will ask the States at its September meeting for £69m. for the extensions to St Sampson’s and Les Beaucamps and £47m. for the Guernsey Institute at Les Ozouets campus.

Deputy Meerveld was part of the former committee which was behind the three-school model and after an initial reading of the policy letter, he thought it was short on detail and he was sceptical about the figures.

‘I have reservations about their costings and I am working on creating a like-for-like comparison with the previous committee’s proposals,’ he said.

Concerns have also been expressed about the size of the two schools – Deputy Meerveld believed they would be too big and impersonal.

‘The ideal size for a college is between 650 and 1,000 pupils. As soon as you start going over 1,000 it means young people can get lost in that system and it’s easy to forget the names of students.

‘There are so many practical aspects to consider because we have a limited land area in Guernsey. Also, the logistics of having only two schools are so difficult, what about for example the transport infrastructure and the number of vehicles that are going to be going through those small lanes at Baubigny?’

Under the original three-school plan there would also have been a rebranded sixth form college, but now under the new plans the sixth form will be split over the two sites.

For Deputy Meerveld, this was very problematic.

‘Guernsey doesn’t have enough sixth form students for two sites, so it means that teachers will have to commute, some students will have to commute – how much lesson time gets lost in the commute?’

Deputy Meerveld resigned from the committee at the end of 2017 because of his role in employing a PR firm to run an unbranded social media campaign for the committee’s favoured three-school vision.

That resignation was followed with more when the entire committee stepped down after their three-school model was thrown out by the States.

Deputies voted comprehensively in January 2018 in favour of the alternative two-school model by 26 votes to 13.