‘This will affect generations’: Whitby’s Eskdale School and Caedmon College to be amalgamated despite pleas from locals for reconsideration

A process that began last year has concluded that from August 2024, Caedmon College Whitby and Eskdale School will be amalgamated resulting in the closure of the latter.

On Tuesday, June 20, North Yorkshire Council’s executive committee voted unanimously to approve the recommendation and move forward with the amalgamation process which has seen considerable opposition from both parents and politicians over concerns about the provision of choice as well as financial implications.

The authority has said that the amalgamation of the schools is necessary due to low pupil numbers, significant financial challenges at both schools, and an imperative to give the “best education and curriculum to the young people of Whitby”.

North Yorkshire Council said it would be the “dawn of a new era” and would allow “investment in a broader curriculum which can offer pupils more opportunities and the chance to develop skills which meet their needs.”

Speaking at the meeting, Terri-Anne Jones, a parent and member of the Keep Choice in Whitby and Save Eskdale group, said: “The reports you have in front of you are not the full picture.

“Where are the guarantees that closing Eskdale will boost the sixth form numbers?”

She added: “This will affect generations and unlike you, we can’t walk away and forget, we have to deal with the aftermath, we have to pick up the pieces.”

Many of those who have been campaigning against the proposals have said they are not in favour of the “status quo” and have suggested that there should be two 11 to 16 schools based on the Eskdale and the Caedmon sites.

Campaigners have also criticised the authority for what they say is a failure to consider alternative options, a claim North Yorkshire Council has rejected, stating that “no other option had been identified” which addressed the “core” issues.

North Yorkshire Council’s executive member for education, learning and skills, Cllr Annabel Wilkinson said: “Thank you to everyone who has been involved with and engaged in this consultation – it has been emotive, as to achieve this amalgamation sadly involves closing a school site and that is one of the most difficult decisions we can make, and not one we would ever make lightly.”

Cllr Wilkinson added: “We believe this is the right thing to do in order to secure a sustainable future for education in Whitby.

“We, as a council, are keen to provide greater stability, ensuring we maintain the best possible environment in which our children can learn and fulfil their true potential.”

Also speaking at the meeting was Tallulah Jones, a year-five student at Whitby’s West Cliff Primary School, who said: “Your decision will not have an impact on your lives but it will on mine”.

She said that having visited different schools, she “felt safe at Eskdale” which would have been “the school for me”.

She added that rather than go to Caedmon she would “travel 30 minutes away to another school”.

Later in the meeting, the ten-year-old posed a question to the council’s corporate director of children and young people services, asking: “Why are the children now [at Eskdale] being failed?”

The corporate director, Stuart Carlton responded by stating: “We don’t believe children are being failed.

“We think we are taking a decision to look at the future of the school and to provide a one-site school that is big enough to provide a depth of curriculum that Whitby children decide, we just don’t agree with your mum.”

Speaking to the Local Democracy Reporting Service after the meeting, Alison Hume, Labour’s parliamentary candidate for Scarborough and Whitby, said: “I’m really disappointed for the families.

“As a parent who has faced the challenges of finding the right schools for my son with complex disabilities, my heart really goes out to those who have found their right school in Eskdale and now have to contemplate a future without it.”

The co-chairs of governors of the Whitby Secondary Partnership, Su Crossland and Christina Zanelli said: “This is an exciting opportunity for staff and students to work together to create a vibrant, new school that they can be proud of.”