Family may move to Oz after school upset

9:14am Friday 13th April 2001

AN Australian family who settled in Marlow so their children could go to Sir William Borlase's Grammar School have said they may move back to Brisbane after being caught in the appeals for places drama.

Peter Nicholls, of Dedmere Road, was devastated when he was told last week that his daughter was being sent to an Aylesbury grammar school despite having passed her 11-plus.

He spent months researching schools in Buckinghamshire, Berkshire and Hertfordshire before relocating to the UK in 1998 and settled on the West Street grammar school as the best choice for his three children.

He said: "To my complete dismay at having watched my eldest daughter agonise her way through the rigours of the 11-plus, I find that she is facing a 50-mile round trip to get to school.

"I realise with such a high number of local parents facing the same issue that our chances of a successful appeal are slim. I cannot afford private school and all nearby schools have placed us on waiting lists with no guarantees."

The appeals for places controversy was revealed last week in the Marlow Free Press when at least 20 Marlow parents discovered their children are to be sent 25 miles to Sir Henry Floyd Grammar School in Aylesbury instead of attending Sir William Borlase.

A Bucks County Council spokesman said last week the school was heavily oversubscribed and if a child did not get their first choice place, they were sent to the nearest grammar school with an available place.

"Now I and my family have to consider that our only viable solution is to have to cut our long-term plans and return to Australia to re-establish our lives."

The appeals for places issue at Sir William Borlase's Grammar has dogged the town for the past five years after the school opted out of local authority control and extended its catchment area to include Berkshire and Oxfordshire. The appeals process will begin on June 11.

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