Southampton City Council has approved a proposal for extensive expansion of special school places in the city at a Cabinet meeting on 14 March 2023. The planned expansion will create an additional 278 special school places within 3 existing School sites.
The six special schools in the city have reached capacity and in response to the continued growing need for special school places, modular classrooms are being used at Great Oaks School, Green Lane and Vermont. This has helped schools to meet the increasing demand whilst mitigating the high cost of out of city placements.
The proposal approved by Cabinet includes the progression of planning applications to convert the current temporary accommodation into permanent accommodation at both the Green Lane and Vermont sites. This new permanent accommodation will ensure children and young people will have access to the facilities and support they need to develop.
Cabinet Member for Children and Learning, Councillor Darren Paffey said: "The proposed new facilities at our special schools in the city will help to meet their needs and transform children’s learning. By offering more school places and recruiting more specialist teaching staff we can improve children’s learning outcomes for the better."
A full public consultation on the proposal will be carried out in the late Spring.