Secondary education
Since September 2018, additional capacity has been added in Secondary schools to provide for the larger birth cohorts identified through the pupil forecasts through phases. As agreed at Coventry Education Partnership meetings, the plan has been to deliver and adopt a model of both permanent and temporary expansions to ensure sufficiency of places, viability for schools, and cost efficiency.
Due to the increase of in-year migration the number of pupils attending Coventry primary schools has grown, which is impacting on secondary sufficiency when the relevant cohort moves to year 7. As a result of this primary cohorts are larger than previously forecast, meaning more year 6 pupils have been applying for year 7 school places.
To respond to this, CCC has adopted the following strategy:
- working in partnership with schools to either re-utilise former bulge (temporary) classes as part of the One Strategic Plan 2018 to 2024 or introduce new bulge (temporary) classes
- the challenges of creating in-year bulge classes within secondary schools, and the difficulties this has created for timetabling and recruitment, has highlighted the need to ensure that available spaces are created as part of the co-ordinated scheme. This is a more manageable approach to support schools logistically and would deliver sufficient places to manage both co-ordination and several years’ worth of in-year applications
Phase 1
This period spanning 2018 to 2021 created 544 additional Year 7 places through a combination of temporary and permanent expansions across existing secondary schools in Coventry.
Phase 2
This phase (2022 to 2024) focused on addressing the projected shortfall of school places through the creation of additional temporary places and bulge classes. This was done to ensure sufficient surplus places across the city. For 2024, plans were adjusted (from 6FE to 10FE) in response to a rise in in-year applications. During this period, 810 additional places were created across 11 secondary schools in Coventry.
Phase 3
Due to the unforeseen increase of in-year applications phase 3 was developed to cover the years 2024 to 2027 ensuring sufficient secondary school places. Due to the more transient nature of phase 3 this will continue to be reviewed annually in line with the updated pupil forecasts, and the expansion plan will be altered accordingly:
- in total 5 permanent additional classes and 2 temporary additional classes were added for 2025 with a total of 193 Year 7 places added
- in September 2026, 2 additional Year 7 classes will be needed in addition to the above
- in September 2027, 5 additional Year 7 classes will be needed in addition to the above
It is anticipated that the 2 additional classes for 2026 can be met within the existing estate, but as most secondary schools in the city have expanded to their capacity, work has been undertaken to identify a site for a new secondary school for opening by September 2027, subject to planning and funding considerations.
Since 18 out of 22 secondary schools in the city have already expanded and there are limited possibilities to expand further, work has been undertaken to identify a site for a new secondary school. It is planned to bring this school into operation from September 2027 subject to planning and funding considerations.
