South Gloucestershire Council

The Commissioning of Places Strategy 2019-2023 contains the information required to form a strategic view of the need for school places across South Gloucestershire.

It provides a revised and updated policy framework for:

• considering statutory proposals (opening, closing and defining the size of schools)
• implementing new school competition arrangements
• facilitating the development of collaborative and federated arrangements
• where possible encouraging all through school models and free schools

The strategy is linked to the Small and Rural Schools Strategy.

To be effective, the commissioning process requires the strategic planning of services based on an analysis of need. This a set of policies and principles by which decisions will be made, and well defined processes for implementing proposals.

The strategy sets out demographic trends for South Gloucestershire, including:

• a summary of new major house building
• details of current school and post-16 provision
• an analysis of the pupil projections
• details of capital funding
• the priorities for capital investment linked to emerging proposals for commissioning new and additional school places

Policies and principles which will inform any decisions are contained in appendices in the full strategy, along with more detailed pupil projections by school and by planning area. Associated area maps are also set out in the strategy to help identify the locations of both schools and proposed new house buildings.

This strategy is for all key stakeholders and partners including:

• the local authority
• schools
• governors
• parents
• the churches
• local communities
• businesses
• providers of education

to help understand what school places are needed in South Gloucestershire, now and in the future and how they will be provided.

The Executive Summary provides a summary of current primary and secondary school provision. It also identifies gaps or shortages and sets out how we intend to address these.