Sheffield secondary schools must find room for hundreds more pupils

Oasis Academy Don Valley which has been built on the site of the old Don Valley Stadium

A council report has said while new secondary schools are being built in the city, demand for places will continue to grow.

Currently, slightly over 5,500 children have to be found Year 7 places each school year, but this is projected to rise to over 6,100 by 2021.

A report to the Children, Young People & Family Support Scrutiny & Policy Development Committee said: “The growth started to come through into Year 7 from 2014 and the most significant rises are expected in 2018 and 2019. In response, the city has commissioned new secondary schools for 2018 in the northeast at Pye Bank/Woodside, the south-west at Bannerdale, and Oasis Don Valley, a through primary-secondary school, will also open its Year 7 for the first time in September 2018.

“Beyond this point we are anticipating continued pressure on places in the first half of the next decade, albeit not on sufficient scale to require further new schools. The council will need to work with the secondary sector to ensure that sufficient places are available during this period.”

The report said births in Sheffield had risen 25 per cent between 2002 and 2012, with an extra 1,000 children per year coming into reception classes.

An extra 5,000 primary school places have been created since 2006, with new schools built and existing ones expanded.

The report said: “We have been able to retain a very high proportion of families being offered a place at a preferred school – 97 per cent in 2015/16.

“We are not expecting demand for primary school places to continue growing in the next period and the scale of the programme to add places should significantly reduce.”

The report added there has been no clear impact on school places from the EU referendum result.