Executive to consider plans for £1.5m school refit

Learning facilities at Clifton Green Primary School could be significantly improved for current and future pupils if City of York Council’s Executive approve plans for a £1.5m refit later this month (16 March).

York’s Rapid Improvement Group - which supports schools to improve their learning offer - has highlighted the existing layout of classrooms and spaces at Clifton Green Primary School is not supporting targeted intervention work with small groups of pupils.

The school serves one of the most deprived wards in the city and has a higher proportion of children with Social, Emotional and Mental Health Needs (SEMH) and children who speak English as an additional language. It is facing an increasing number of significant challenges that exacerbate its ability to help pupils due to teaching and intervention areas that are inaccessible, cannot be used or are incorrectly located around the school building

The proposals recommend re-organising internal rooms and spaces and erecting new fencing to make the school’s outdoor areas more useable and secure, improving the safety of pupils.

 It is hoped that reorganising the internal spaces will ensure that the use of the rooms and spaces are suitable and sufficient to meet the needs of children and will reduce the number of pupils that need to access other specialist provision around the city, providing more suitable provision in mainstream settings for neurodiverse children and for those with SEMH.

Cllr Andrew Waller, City of York Council’s Executive Member for Children, Young People and Education, said: “‘The council is working to ensure that all pupils across the city receive the best start so that they can reach their full potential. These proposals form part of targeted support in areas where there is the greatest challenge, together with opportunities to make an early intervention. “

If approved, work would be carried out over two summers to reduce the disruption to pupils and staff.