Khalsa School to stay in Stoke Poges
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Re: Khalsa School to stay in Stoke Poges
Mmmm tricky. It's only 3 miles away. I guess if you look at it with Bucks / Slough boundaries in mind then it looks like that, but if you look at it with a central government overview there is a shortage of places "in that area".
Free schools can be plonked anywhere for a year or two with the bypassing of local planning stuff that they are allowed .... I suppose they can land anywhere for longer than that too. But to be fair, it's nothing new and not the fault of free school legislation, if a local council had wanted to build a new school on your doorstep a few years ago when they had more power over school building programmes there probably ain't much you could have done about it.
The secondary population is going up here in Kent over the next few years and then going down again. I guess we are at risk anywhere in the country of a new school having to spring up, or new road, or more runways.
Hope it doesn't end up as bad in the village as people are dreading. There's a massive comprehensive in Oxted about 20 mins from here. It takes over 2000 children from all over the place. It's in a long residential road with little pavement in many places. Can't say I've ever noticed a problem there and I know people who live in the road. There is a railway station not far off though.
Stoke Poges does also have a Plymouth Brethren school - but that's small and I guess they are very quiet. Not that I am suggesting that a Sikh school would be overly noisy. It will probably be fantastic. Maybe the residents will warm to it. Their own primary has fantastic results too so if they fill it up with their local children and the ones from the Khalsa primary school it could be wonderful. Some tasty lunches too. Or do they all go to independent secondaries from that incredibly prosperous village?
Free schools can be plonked anywhere for a year or two with the bypassing of local planning stuff that they are allowed .... I suppose they can land anywhere for longer than that too. But to be fair, it's nothing new and not the fault of free school legislation, if a local council had wanted to build a new school on your doorstep a few years ago when they had more power over school building programmes there probably ain't much you could have done about it.
The secondary population is going up here in Kent over the next few years and then going down again. I guess we are at risk anywhere in the country of a new school having to spring up, or new road, or more runways.
Hope it doesn't end up as bad in the village as people are dreading. There's a massive comprehensive in Oxted about 20 mins from here. It takes over 2000 children from all over the place. It's in a long residential road with little pavement in many places. Can't say I've ever noticed a problem there and I know people who live in the road. There is a railway station not far off though.
Stoke Poges does also have a Plymouth Brethren school - but that's small and I guess they are very quiet. Not that I am suggesting that a Sikh school would be overly noisy. It will probably be fantastic. Maybe the residents will warm to it. Their own primary has fantastic results too so if they fill it up with their local children and the ones from the Khalsa primary school it could be wonderful. Some tasty lunches too. Or do they all go to independent secondaries from that incredibly prosperous village?
Re: Khalsa School to stay in Stoke Poges
mystery - may I suggest you note they serve vegetarian meals ... not everyones 'cup of tea'.Some tasty lunches too
I don't live near this school but you would struggle to pick a worse site for a school. It will also remove the option of free travel to a fantastic Upper school (Chalfonts Community College) for local residents.
Re: Khalsa School to stay in Stoke Poges
Do they need free travel? 
Yes, meat free looks acceptable to me. Trouble is, my kids would want veg free too so there's not a lot left. Sure you could sneak in a piece of chicken disguised as a lump of tofu in your lunchbox. Reminds me of the time I accidentally took some babyfood into a very strict Kosher restaurant in Golders Green. Most embarrassing. Anyhow, if they don't eat too much they'll take up less space. 80 to a class in an academy and they won't need an extension thus preserving the green belt.
On the free travel though it's just the same if any new school crops up closer than the one you were really hoping for. You lose the free travel if that's the way your authority's policy runs. It's an argument that anyone who lived in the "wrong place" could give for not building a new school.
Not as bad a site as the new free school in Sevenoaks is it? Two years in an office block on a major road opposite a huge Tescos and jammed in between a Rover garage and the Majestic Wine Warehouse. In one year's time it should be in a new build if the council can make its mind up about whether to build an empty grammar annex next door to it or not - an Annex to a grammar school many miles away .... not 3 miles like Stoke Poges to Slough and the Khalsa Primary. Might have to be in prefabs for a while too. That's green belt as well. Crematoria are generally acceptable on green belt ---- maybe schools are in the same category.
"Nutty" decisions everywhere really.
Might move to Stoke Poges. Bet they're all just worried their house prices go down .... it doesn't look a very cosmopolitan kind of place at the moment. Good place to start up a sweet shop.
Yes, meat free looks acceptable to me. Trouble is, my kids would want veg free too so there's not a lot left. Sure you could sneak in a piece of chicken disguised as a lump of tofu in your lunchbox. Reminds me of the time I accidentally took some babyfood into a very strict Kosher restaurant in Golders Green. Most embarrassing. Anyhow, if they don't eat too much they'll take up less space. 80 to a class in an academy and they won't need an extension thus preserving the green belt.
On the free travel though it's just the same if any new school crops up closer than the one you were really hoping for. You lose the free travel if that's the way your authority's policy runs. It's an argument that anyone who lived in the "wrong place" could give for not building a new school.
Not as bad a site as the new free school in Sevenoaks is it? Two years in an office block on a major road opposite a huge Tescos and jammed in between a Rover garage and the Majestic Wine Warehouse. In one year's time it should be in a new build if the council can make its mind up about whether to build an empty grammar annex next door to it or not - an Annex to a grammar school many miles away .... not 3 miles like Stoke Poges to Slough and the Khalsa Primary. Might have to be in prefabs for a while too. That's green belt as well. Crematoria are generally acceptable on green belt ---- maybe schools are in the same category.
"Nutty" decisions everywhere really.
Might move to Stoke Poges. Bet they're all just worried their house prices go down .... it doesn't look a very cosmopolitan kind of place at the moment. Good place to start up a sweet shop.
Re: Khalsa School to stay in Stoke Poges
Edited by moderator
......... Bucks has some very deprived families; I didn't believe it until I lived here.
Stoke Poges is a village - Sevenoaks isn't. Try a 'walk' along the road using google maps ...
It's nothing to do with house prices ...
......... Bucks has some very deprived families; I didn't believe it until I lived here.
Stoke Poges is a village - Sevenoaks isn't. Try a 'walk' along the road using google maps ...
It's nothing to do with house prices ...
Re: Khalsa School to stay in Stoke Poges
To further emphasise the points about the location
Stoke Poges lacks pavements for much of the narrow country road on which the school is located as well as street lights throughout the village. There are virtually no shops left and minimal public transport to the village. The approval of this school will also ensure that there is no free transport to the catchment grammar schools as well as Chalfont Community College
Stoke Poges lacks pavements for much of the narrow country road on which the school is located as well as street lights throughout the village. There are virtually no shops left and minimal public transport to the village. The approval of this school will also ensure that there is no free transport to the catchment grammar schools as well as Chalfont Community College
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southbucks3
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Re: Khalsa School to stay in Stoke Poges
Within a very short period of time the school will close its doors to those not of Sikh religion by virtue that it will be allowed to begin an admissions criteria based on religion and giving priority to sikh children. Recruiting a certain percentage of children entirely from that religion I believe kick starts that process.
Once this has happened the locals will be able to get free transport to the community college again, by virtue of the fact they cannot get a place at the school. In the mean time those in the village that are not wedged up real estate brokers will suffer a big hit to their finances as they suddenly have to pay £700 to get their kids to school each year. This is frankly unfair as doubtless these are the families that have lived in the village for generations and are clinging on despite the village bring hailed as a rich man's bolt hole from the city.
No one has ever answered the question properly as to why a school wants to develop in a village office building away from its customer base, not a purpose built, currently empty school building, slap bang in the middle of an area where a need for more school places has been identified. The only thing I can think of is they want to get the richer kids at the school out playing on jallopies as part of their sports curriculum. (Private school mentality on state school funding?)
Once this has happened the locals will be able to get free transport to the community college again, by virtue of the fact they cannot get a place at the school. In the mean time those in the village that are not wedged up real estate brokers will suffer a big hit to their finances as they suddenly have to pay £700 to get their kids to school each year. This is frankly unfair as doubtless these are the families that have lived in the village for generations and are clinging on despite the village bring hailed as a rich man's bolt hole from the city.
No one has ever answered the question properly as to why a school wants to develop in a village office building away from its customer base, not a purpose built, currently empty school building, slap bang in the middle of an area where a need for more school places has been identified. The only thing I can think of is they want to get the richer kids at the school out playing on jallopies as part of their sports curriculum. (Private school mentality on state school funding?)
Re: Khalsa School to stay in Stoke Poges
I know Bucks has some very deprived families but isn't there a council policy for means- tested school transport even if you are not going to your closest school for those who really cannot afford it? We can't block every school we don't like the look of because it might affect our free transport to somewhere else. And children who are already going to school elsewhere will not be affected. So there would have to be more compelling reasons for not having that school there.
I don't know what Bucks home-school transport policy is but a lot of local authorities still help more people than is required by statute:
Children living too far away
Children living outside the statutory walking distance to the nearest
qualifying school (2 miles for under 8s, 3 miles for 8 and over), where no
suitable arrangement can be made for school closer to home. The distance
measured should be the shortest route along which a child may walk with reasonable safety.
No, the site might not the be the best - and sure I haven't see it --- but if they're all coming and going in buses from the car park of this office block does a lack of pavements really matter? And if local children do use it (but we are being told they don't want to) maybe they can cycle up the road?
From you description it sounds like a wealthy commuter village with no amenities as most people just drive out to work somewhere else. Maybe they need to set up a community shop near the village school? Hey, was just joking about the sweet shop (but it would probably do well).
No streetlights ... no, it's pretty black outside our village school too. Nearly fell over a low wall on the way out one evening. But the school has been there since Victorian times and there's more than road without pavements leading into the village "centre".
Sounds like it could do with a bit of inward investment and daytime life - you make it sound quite a miserable place! Maybe I won't move to set up that sweet shop.
I don't know what Bucks home-school transport policy is but a lot of local authorities still help more people than is required by statute:
Children living too far away
Children living outside the statutory walking distance to the nearest
qualifying school (2 miles for under 8s, 3 miles for 8 and over), where no
suitable arrangement can be made for school closer to home. The distance
measured should be the shortest route along which a child may walk with reasonable safety.
No, the site might not the be the best - and sure I haven't see it --- but if they're all coming and going in buses from the car park of this office block does a lack of pavements really matter? And if local children do use it (but we are being told they don't want to) maybe they can cycle up the road?
From you description it sounds like a wealthy commuter village with no amenities as most people just drive out to work somewhere else. Maybe they need to set up a community shop near the village school? Hey, was just joking about the sweet shop (but it would probably do well).
No streetlights ... no, it's pretty black outside our village school too. Nearly fell over a low wall on the way out one evening. But the school has been there since Victorian times and there's more than road without pavements leading into the village "centre".
Sounds like it could do with a bit of inward investment and daytime life - you make it sound quite a miserable place! Maybe I won't move to set up that sweet shop.
Re: Khalsa School to stay in Stoke Poges
I see the problems you are all listing, but if the school goes elsewhere it would surely affect someone else's "closest school" and rights under the Bucks or Slough policy as it stands.
I don't know anything about the site --- but I've seen the masses of objections that happen whenever a location for a new school is mooted - in the country, in the town, by a main road, on a quiet road, in a residential area etc etc. There's always going to be some kind of massive safety, traffic, noise or parking problem.
They're a bit less popular than crematoria until they are up and running and very good, and then everyone wants to live right next door to get a place.
Now yes, as a religious school, it does depend on the admission policy whether living next door would be any use.
This happened with the school my children attended for a short while. It became popular and it filled up with church-goers from all over the place and the non church-goers in the village couldn't get in. The school wanted to be part of the village so they rephrased the policy so there was a balance.
Now that there's so much freedom on admissions policies that's another problem with a lot of schools - particularly those which are their own admissions authority - VA and academies. Things can always change. There's a DfE document which sets out how an academy can go through a process to change its admissions policy. This school will be an academy - just like your Bucks grammars all are now.
I don't know anything about the site --- but I've seen the masses of objections that happen whenever a location for a new school is mooted - in the country, in the town, by a main road, on a quiet road, in a residential area etc etc. There's always going to be some kind of massive safety, traffic, noise or parking problem.
They're a bit less popular than crematoria until they are up and running and very good, and then everyone wants to live right next door to get a place.
Now yes, as a religious school, it does depend on the admission policy whether living next door would be any use.
This happened with the school my children attended for a short while. It became popular and it filled up with church-goers from all over the place and the non church-goers in the village couldn't get in. The school wanted to be part of the village so they rephrased the policy so there was a balance.
Now that there's so much freedom on admissions policies that's another problem with a lot of schools - particularly those which are their own admissions authority - VA and academies. Things can always change. There's a DfE document which sets out how an academy can go through a process to change its admissions policy. This school will be an academy - just like your Bucks grammars all are now.
Re: Khalsa School to stay in Stoke Poges
Mystery. This school is a Free school so classes as a state school for the purposes of Bucks transport policy. It is the nearest state school to Stoke Poges residents and therefore they will not qualify for free bus transport to other Bucks secondary schools.
Re: Khalsa School to stay in Stoke Poges
Yes. I fully understand that. I am just saying that it is not a valid reason for objecting to a school. It is annoying if a closer school is built than the current closest school that you really like, but it is just tough. It could happen to any of us anywhere as the school population increases.
If that school was made to move somewhere else it would cause the same problem for someone else.
Surely someone who was really down on their uppers would be happy with a really good school in the village that required no transport whatsoever? I presume it will be excellent - the associated primary is. Or are there concerns about the quality of education?
If that school was made to move somewhere else it would cause the same problem for someone else.
Surely someone who was really down on their uppers would be happy with a really good school in the village that required no transport whatsoever? I presume it will be excellent - the associated primary is. Or are there concerns about the quality of education?