Cluster Primary School Model Arrangement

The Highland Council has agreed to adopt a cluster model for managing smaller primary schools, with one non-teaching head teacher managing two or three schools in a locality.

It is to formalise arrangements at 15 pilot cluster schools and roll out the model where this is appropriate throughout the Highlands at schools with a school roll of less than 146 pupils.

The model has been adopted to ease the role of the class committed head teacher at smaller primary schools to allow them adequate time for leadership and management roles.

The need to consider alternative arrangements for the management of smaller primary schools is reinforced by declining school rolls, projected to fall by 2,000 by 2010, and  difficulties in recruiting primary school head teachers.   There is also the growing burden of administration and financial management and on top of this 50% of all teaching staff will retire within the next 10 years.

Bruce Robertson, Director of Education Culture and Sport, said: "Traditional patterns of management of smaller primary schools are no longer necessarily appropriate for the 21st century. The current pilot cluster schools have been very well received by parents, staff and head teachers and are seen as providing an effective method of ensuring professional management in the smaller primary schools, which up to this point would have been managed by a class-committed head teacher.

"We will now formalise the current arrangements and adopt the model for the management of small primary schools as and when opportunities arise, taking into account the location of schools and subject to the necessary consultation."

The first pilot cluster school involved the management of Raasay, Staffin and Carbost primary schools in Skye. This has since been followed by other cluster schools in that area as well as in Lochaber, Ross and Cromarty, Inverness, Badenoch and Strathspey, Caithness and Sutherland.