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Move to boost struggling Moray primary schools

The Scottish Secular Society has called for a ban on the teaching of creationism in schools
The Scottish Secular Society has called for a ban on the teaching of creationism in schools

Moray Council has pledged £73,000 to ease the burden on overworked teaching staff.

The money will be used to create interim deputy head teacher posts in seven Moray primary schools until August 2016.

Under current guidelines deputes are assigned to schools with a roll above 220.

However, the council’s policy and resources committee has agreed plans to extend the system in August to include schools with 200 pupils.

Those with rolls of 326 or more will be allocated a second deputy head, and a the third will be appointed in the case of schools with more than 480 children.

Chairwoman of Moray Council’s children and young people’s services committee Anne Skene said: “This is very much an interim arrangement as some of our schools need extra support.

“We want to alleviate the pressure on those schools for the next 18 months.”

As part of the shake-up, nursery children will also be included in school rolls and staff assigned based on nursery capacity rather than the roll at census date.

A report submitted to the committee by the council’s corporate director of education and social care, Laurence Findlay, explained: “Nursery pupils are currently in attendance for three hours and 20 minutes a day, and the workload implications for the school equate to that of a primary school child.”

Acting head of the council’s schools and curriculum department Vivienne Cross added: “We’re taking a wider look at management structures in schools across Moray.

“In some schools nursery pupils account for half of their roll, so these measures should help them especially.

“A recruitment process will begin soon and we are looking to put these arrangements in place in August.”

The committee approved to the recommendations from officials, but Fochabers and Lhanbryde councillor Douglas Ross criticised Moray Council’s “incoherent approach” at tackling the area’s education problems.

He said: “I do have an issue in that we will be discussing restoring principal teachers at the end of the month and we don’t seem to have a coherent set of proposals for the future of education in Moray.

“We should be addressing all these issues together, we won’t be able to see how the issues affect each other if we look at them individually.”