Pity the poor parents at Hutton School. They have now been told that a decision on whether or not to close Hutton and Burnmouth Primary Schools has been postponed from August until next October. Apparently this is because the Scottish Executive is publishing guidelines on school closures in September. The Leader of the SBC has said that Councillors will then have ‘more confidence’ in making decisions on the remaining proposed closures-Hutton and Burnmouth being the two Berwickshire schools whose fate is not yet known. Yet they made decisions confidently enough to save Eccles/Leitholm Primary School in the absence of any guidelines. But now common sense is not enough.
All this means that children will start a new academic year without knowing if it is to be the last in Hutton. This will hardly encourage prospective new parents to send children to a probably doomed establishment and existing parents may well decided to desert a probably sinking ship. Hutton roll is already very low and sinking –one child has already been transferred to Chirnside but for reasons unconnected with the possible school closure. So even if the Executive’s ‘guidelines’ turn out to be helpful for schools like Hutton there may not be much of a school to save. Depressing
