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Wrangle over “school with no name” 24/10/10
A messy wrangle over a Western Isles school will be aired on Monday night on Lewis.
Western Isles Council has apparently blundered over the lengthy exercise to educate all pupils in the Point district of Lewis in a new school on a centralised campus.
However, after 12 years of waiting, it has emerged that Bayble school was never legally closed and it becomes the sole designated school for the area.
At the last minute, shocked staff at Knock and Aird schools have been told they will not get jobs at the new school as anticipated.
It means that teachers and staff at the two Point primary schools which are closing down will not be relocated to a new community school as expected.
Many residents wrongly believed that the original aspiration to shut the three primaries at Knock, Aird and Bayble and create a centralised community campus for the whole of Point was adhered to.
Originally a neutral greenfield site at Seaview Knock was mooted -
But, this was later changed to a demolition and new-
A council investigation has confirmed that it never officially consulted to shut Bayble primary so teachers and support personnel do not have to concede their posts for the displaced staff at the other two schools.
Knock and Aird staff can now expect to be redeployed outwith the district.
The blunder also impacts on choosing a new name for the school. Legally, it continues to be called Bayble School but one popular suggestion is Sgoil an Rudha. Alternatively, it could be called Garrabost Academy after its host village.
A joint parent council covering the three Point schools will debate the issue at
a meeting on Monday evening at Bayble School.