LETTER: Concern at school growth

This has been a single form entry school for 40 years; loved for its family feel where pupils all know each other and all staff and can take part in events as a whole school. This is set to change when the school doubles in size.

I would like to live in a society where the public have an opportunity to express their opinions on matters such as planning to be considered by relevant authorities so plans are either improved or discarded. This process is especially important when the applicant and the decision maker for the planning application are one and the same.

All evidence in relation to the plans for Parklands School, however, leads me to believe the consultation is merely a box ticking exercise and the plans will go ahead unaltered.

The first temporary classrooms were built in 2012, several weeks before planning permission was even granted. A consultation for the current planning application was held in March where we were told by staff from WSCC it has already been decided that the expansion will go ahead and comments must have been disregarded as no changes appear to have been made to plans put forward in May.

This is a plan to educate our pupils on the cheap, by expanding a small school rather than providing new schools such as Graylingwell which would promote the sustainable travel the estate was designed for and secondly, designing Parklands to meet minimum requirements rather than ones suitable for the pupils in a school of that size. If changes aren’t made, this will forever be a second rate build.

Mrs S Lambert

Sherborne Road

Chichester