Renfrewshire council aims to change four of the nursery schools - Shawnursery in Erskine, East Nursery and Springbank nursery in Paisley, andJohnstone nursery in Johnstone - into nursery classes attached toprimary schools. It wants to turn two other nursery schools, Glendeenursery in Renfrew, and Spateston nursery in Johnstone, into pre-fiveextended daycare centres.
The nursery classes will be managed by their attached primary schools,while the pre-five daycare centres will have a head of centre. Thenurseries' current headteachers are to be redeployed or offered earlyretirement.
Renfrewshire council also plans to increase its team of mobile nurseryteachers from eight to between 15 and 20, so that more children willbenefit from access to a qualified nursery teacher.
A council spokesperson said, 'We work with about 40 private partnernurseries to offer pre-five nursery provision. Children at the privatepartner nurseries do not have access to a qualified nursery teacher, sowe are reorganising to provide a pool of qualified nursery teachers tocouncil and private partner nurseries. There aren't going to be anyclosures.'
However, Barbara Riddell, early years policy adviser, said, 'Althoughthe council's plans may not appear to be unreasonable they risk losingthe very resources we need to improve the quality of early yearseducation. I don't mean that all nursery classes are bad, but they don'thave the reservoir of expertise of nursery schools.
'I urge government, both in England and Scotland, to take an imaginativeview of how we can take this specialist resource and use it to supportthe early years sector as a whole.'
