I READ recently about how Kirklees Council will be turning off street lights in select areas from 12am until 5am in their latest cost-saving scheme.

Now it can’t just be me who thinks it’s a bad idea? Turning off the streetlights for a matter of hours will only be a drop in the money-saving ocean compared with other ways in which they can save.

Why not change our street lamps to solar street lamps?

I question why they would put some of the streets in Kirklees into darkness for hours simply creating an easier opportunity for burglaries and worse.

What about the people who arrive home in the after hours or have early shifts? Does Kirklees expect us all to buy a torch when we’re trekking out for the 5.30am start at work?

Why not look into other areas where money can be saved, or hasn’t that light bulb appeared above their heads yet?

Nicole Eves

Huddersfield

Switched on

WE ARE surprised Clr Christine Smith has objected so furiously to the switch-off of some streetlights when apparently she is actually quite keen on keeping people in the dark.

She says she refused to name any street lights for the trial switch-off when asked – an option we also refused.

But when we were presented with the lists from officers, we didn’t stick our heads in the ground.

We got in touch with the people living nearby to find out what their views were about the plans. Some of the lamps people agreed with or were not concerned about.

But for those who were concerned we started talking to the officers to get them to change the plans or to come forward with more acceptable alternatives.

If there is something happening we don’t like, we speak to people and try to do something about it – we don’t switch off the lights and say no-one is home.

Clr Phil Scott

Liberal Democrat Councillor Almondbury Ward

Change needed

THE OFSTED report for Colne Valley Specialist Arts College comes as no surprise to many of us who have children at the school.

Sadly, we already know from experience that the inspectors were right. Children are bored in many lessons, the quality of some teaching is terrible, students are under-achieving, bright students particularly are not fulfilling their potential and school leaders do not seek or take advice.

We have heard a lot about the school ‘producing grades above the national average’, but the fact is the children’s abilities are already above average and the school is not ‘adding value’.

There is nothing to be proud of when you take brighter-than-average children and they attain higher than average grades.

In fact, with the intake they have, the school should have seen better grades than they did in 2011 and 2012.

Our children are under-achieving at Colne Valley.

There are good teachers at the school, of course, and they have seemed demoralised for some time.

Many parents feel for them now and wish them well. It is not individual teachers who are at fault, mostly; it is the leadership.

There is such a heavy focus from headteacher Carol Gormley on ‘behaviour management’, it seems, that children’s learning and well-being take second place.

The culture has become petty and hectoring, rather than enabling. Students are encouraged to care more about the blackness of their shoes and whether they have a pencil sharpener than about what they are learning.

Foolishly, the school keeps parents at arms’ length and fails to communicate.

There is a wealth of skill, commitment and expertise within the parent population, but school leaders do not seem to have the wisdom to use it.

Colne Valley needs new leaders – both management and governors – who will ‘lift the rocks’ and face its real problems.

They must seek help, build partnerships, and, most of all, focus on creating a positive learning environment for our children.

And Ofsted agree. The school is in special measures specifically because “the inspectors consider it to be failing and unable to turn things round without external help.”

If they had faith in the headteacher and her management team then the school would instead have been judged as having ‘capacity to improve’.

When the headteacher arrived she gave herself five years to make the school ‘Excellent’. Well, she has had her five years, and she has failed.

If you visit the school website you’ll find a powerful message from the headteacher: “Our values are very simple”, it says. “Everyone will be encouraged and challenged to do their very best, no excuses.”

The school’s leaders have not done their best for our children and there are, indeed, no excuses.

We should have ‘zero tolerance’ for a school that is failing our children so badly. It is time, at least, for the headteacher and the chair of governors to go.

Fiona Weir

Colne Valley

Time to go?

AS A parent of two boys who go to Colne Valley Specialist Arts College, the Ofsted report does not surprise me!

My boys hardly ever have homework, the headteacher sent my son home because he forget his tie – losing half a day’s education – I have tried in vain on five separate occasions to contact the school by telephone but nobody answers.

The trouble is Carol Gormley hasn’t earned pupils’ respect with her heavy handedness.

She hasn’t got the balance right and should resign. I am seriously thinking of changing schools.

Concerned parent

Praise for cyclist

MY son and I were involved in a car accident on Leeds Road and a cyclist stopped to help us and waited with us until the paramedics arrived.

He was so kind and comforting that I don’t feel I thanked him appropriately.

Maybe he reads the Examiner and will see this.

It’s good to know that the general public still cares about one another. It restores faith in human kindness.

Nicola and Euan Kinsey

Meltham

Not to be ridiculed

WHY do people believe that young offenders should clean toilets as part of their sentence?

I agree that they should be used for the good of the community and to learn by their mistakes. They should not be used in a way that people can ridicule them.

A McNae

Almondbury