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A consultation about proposed changes to the Berwick Partnership of schools is in its closing stages.

All of the public sessions – including the events at Berwick Academy and Berwick Middle School – have now taken place.

Northumberland County Council has said it will invest £40million in schools in the Berwick Partnership – but the local authority has stressed the system needs to be “sustainable” and following what it says was an informal pre-consultation, it put forward two detailed proposals based on the current three-tier system and a two-tier system.

Under the proposed three-tier model Norham CE First and Scremerston First schools, and Glendale Middle School, would close. Under a two-tier model, Scremerston First and Glendale Middle schools would again close, along with Berwick and Tweedmouth Middle Schools.

The session at Berwick Middle School. Picture by Margaret Shaw.

Campaigns have been set-up to save the schools that will or may close depending on the outcome of the current consultation.

The consultation will close at midnight on Friday, March 3.

At the Berwick Middle School event last Thursday, parents with children at Berwick and Tweedmouth Middle Schools were observed asking why a two-tier system was being considered given the education offering of both schools – with both rated ‘Good’ by Ofsted.

At the earlier event in Berwick Academy, those who attended were invited to sign-up for planned guided tours of the school during the school day so that they could see first-hand the programme of improvements that has been and continues to be implemented at the school.

The session at Berwick Academy. Picture by Margaret Shaw.

It moved up a level from ‘Inadequate’ to ‘Requires Improvement’ in its Ofsted report in October 2021 and staff have been working since then to address the issues raised by inspectors in their report.

For more information about the proposals and to have your say, go to https://padlet.com/Northumberland/Berwick

This website includes a section on Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) and the response to the question ‘When will a decision be made?’ is as follows: ‘If this consultation follows through to a statutory consultation, the cabinet decision, on whether or not to approve any proposed changes, could be made in late summer or early autumn term 2023.

‘However, this will depend on the outcomes of the current Phase 2 consultation, as further consultation may be required.’

Not long left for people to have their say on the future model of schools in Berwick