Item 1 City Council 27th October 2011 Executive Committee

Report by Bailie Jean McFadden, Executive Member for Education

Contact: Maureen McKenna, Executive Director of Education Ext: 74551

Future use of the former St Aidan’s Building

Purpose of Report

To inform the Executive Committee of the future use of the former St Aidan’s building and to seek approval for budget to be allocated for improvements.

Recommendations

The Executive Committee is asked to approve Prudential Borrowing from within the Education Services revenue budget to support capital funding of £750,000 for investment in the fabric of the building and the creation of appropriate facilities to support the curriculum to meet the additional support needs of the young people.

Ward No(s): 18 Citywide:

Local member(s) Yes x No consulted: Yes No advised: 1. Introduction

1.1 Specialist day education provision for secondary aged children and young people with significant and complex social and emotional needs is currently provided in Cartvale School (Full time and Outreach) and Ladywell Learning Centre (Part-Time and Outreach). This is supplemented by full time placements purchased from independent providers and voluntary sector providers. Young people travel daily to these provisions and the cost of transport is met by Education.

1.2 Up to June 2010, Education Services had purchasing arrangements for children and young people with significant social and emotional needs with St Philip’s School (Plains, Airdrie); St John’s School (Springboig/ , Glasgow); The Good Shepherd Centre (Bishopton); Kibble School (Paisley); Spark of Genius (Paisley) and Ballikinraine School (Balfron).

1.3 The cost of purchasing placements from remaining providers (2010 costs) ranged from £45,000 to £57,000 per placement annually (inclusive of travelling costs). Therefore the cost of purchasing 32 placements from these providers would be approximately £1.44 million - £1.6 million per year, with transportation costs additional to this.

1.4 Almost all children and young people attending this specialist day provision are looked after by and are in receipt of multi agency services and supports. Glasgow City Council is the Corporate Parent of these young people.

2. Background

2.1 At the beginning of session 2010/11 Cartvale Secondary School increased its capacity to offer 40 full time places. This increase was achieved by the planned relocation of Cartvale to the former Copeland Primary School building and the subsequent refurbishment of these premises. Cartvale Secondary School also offers an outreach service to individual young people and groups to support their placement in mainstream school settings.

2.2 In June 2010, St John’s School (Springboig/ Carntyne, Glasgow) and the Good Shepherd Centre (Bishopton) closed. At the time, Glasgow purchased 22 placements at St John’s and 10 placements at Good Shepherd Centre. Consequently 32 Glasgow young people required an immediate educational placement.

2.3 In order to meet the additional support needs of these young people, Education Services took the decision to temporarily increase Glasgow provision to provide up to 32 extra placements by opening an Annex to Cartvale Secondary School in the vacated premises of Hill’s Trust Primary School, . 3. Future provision

3.1 For many of the young people, school has not been a positive experience due to their additional support needs. The new provision will provide a curriculum which will be tailored to meet young people’s individual needs. It will be focused on literacy, numeracy and health and wellbeing with a particular focus on employability skills. Facilities will be developed to allow young people to learn vocational skills in areas such as horticulture, car mechanics, technology and hairdressing. The current temporary accommodation in the former Hill’s Trust Primary is inappropriate in the long term for the following reasons:

x Inadequate internal design – Hills Trust is an ‘open plan’ primary building with few closed off areas. x There is limited capacity for providing a secondary curriculum. In particular the building is severely restricted in suitability to provide vocational and practical subjects/ activities. x The level of investment required to bring the school up to standard for long term occupation.

3.2 City Property have been working with Education Services to explore the options available to provide an appropriate education for these young people within the city. Any such provision must offer a curriculum which will be tailored to meet young people’s individual needs. It should be focused on literacy, numeracy and health and wellbeing with a particular focus on employability skills. Facilities would be required to allow young people to learn vocational skills in areas such as horticulture, car mechanics, technology and hairdressing.

3.3 Two options for future provision were identified: the purchase of the St John’s building in Carntyne and investment in the former St Aidan’s school building. The former St Aidan’s building was vacated in June 2011 when St Aidan’s School merged with St Joan of Arc School and became Cardinal Winning Secondary School. The pupils moved to new premises in the former St Vincent’s School for the Deaf building.

3.4 The former St Aidan’s building offers the following: x appropriately sized classrooms, practical rooms and outdoor and indoor physical education facilities. x There is potential accommodation for vocational and practical subjects x There are appropriate facilities for individual work with young people and focused group work for programmed interventions in, for example, health and wellbeing. x There are appropriate recreation areas x It is located within the Glasgow boundary x It is free standing within its own grounds x It is easily accessible from the M8 3.5 In addition, the accommodation is close to John Wheatley College which will allow the curriculum to be extended to better meet the range of needs of the young people.

3.6 It is considered that the option to invest in St Aidan’s offers best value to the Council for the following reasons:

x Purchase price of St John’s exceeded available budget; x Proposed annual rental agreements offered by the current owner did not represent value for money; x Former St Aidan’s building was in B/C condition and with some investment could be A/B condition x The maximum school roll for the new provision would be 45 full-time places and St Aidan’s had a school roll of around 80. There would, therefore, be sufficient capacity for the planned provision. x The building would remain available for local community use. x The building is situated near to most young people’s homes thereby reducing travel costs and is close to John Wheatley Annexe, again reducing potential travel costs.

3.7 The use of this building as a school will enable the local community to continue to make use of the facilities through school lets, managed by Glasgow Life on behalf of Education Services.

3.8 The young people are currently researching the history of the area with a view to undertaking a consultation on a new name for the school. Once the consultation is concluded a paper will be brought to Executive Committee seeking the approval of elected members.

4. Legal Implications

4.1 This proposal supports the Implementation of the Additional Support for Learning () Act 2004 and the Additional Support for Learning (Scotland) Act 2009.

5. Financial Implications

5.1 The capital investment will be funded from Prudential Borrowing, with net annual revenue savings of £367,000 expected to be generated as a result of providing the education for these young people in-house as opposed to purchasing from independent providers. 5.2 The funding is to improve the playground and external improvements, internal refurbishment and repairs, decant and decommissioning of Hill’s Trust, investment in the ICT infrastructure and installation of the necessary equipment for technical subjects. 5.3 The total cost is estimated at £750,000

6. Personnel Implications

6.1 Within existing resources.

7. Service Plan

7.1 This Policy is in line with Service Plan commitments.

7.2 This proposal will underpin and improve educational resources by building capacity to better meet the needs of children and young people in line with the staged intervention model outlined in ‘Every child is Included’. This would be done within Glasgow.

8. Environmental Issues

8.1 This proposal will ensure that we provide inclusive and accessible learning environments for children and young people with additional support needs.

9. Sustainable Procurement and Article 19

9.1 None

10. Recommendations

10.1 The Executive Committee is asked to approve Prudential Borrowing from within the Education Services revenue budget to support capital funding of £750,000 for investment in the fabric of the building and the creation of appropriate facilities to support the curriculum to meet the additional support needs of the young people.