The council has backed down after furious opposition from parents and governors at the school
Nonetheless, senior councillors were expected to press ahead with the next stage of the proposed closure at a meeting tomorrow , before news of the U-turn emerged.
In a letter to the school head Mark Duce on Tuesday morning, the authority’s executive member for education, Councillor Jonathan Pryor, said: “While issues around the falling birth rate in the Aireborough area are unchanged, the consultation to address this through a closure of Queensway garnered the highest level of responses we have ever received and were overwhelmingly in favour of keeping Queensway open.
Queensway was rated ‘inadequate’ by Ofsted in June, but parents at two public meetings last week insisted Mr Duce and other senior leaders had overseen massive improvements since taking charge just over a year ago.As a result of that rating, the government had placed an academy order on the school, in a bid to take it out of the hands of the local authority.
In his letter Councillor Pryor said he would ask the Department of Education to rescind this order, to allow the school to continue its “improvement journey”.He added: “I acknowledge how difficult the past few months have been for everyone involved, not least yourself, but over this period you have only further demonstrated your leadership capabilities and I look forward to seeing Queensway going from strength to strength under your leadership.
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