Last year, I went to a couple of meetings at my old school, Manning Intermediate, to do with the ‘proposed’ closing. Thanks to someone storifying my tweets from the meeting, it seems that one of the officials said that Manning would not close until 2014. The decisions on Monday brought forward that closure date to the end of 2013, a year before the staff and students had been told.
This is the tweet:
"Manning will close at the end of 2014 ... Unless you choose to have it closed sooner" - woman from MoE. With a straight face #SaveManning
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James Macbeth Dann (@edmuzik) October 30, 2012Now, having read some of the statements from Manning’s Principal Richard Chambers, it is pretty clear that they did not “choose” to have it closed sooner. It would seem to me that the Ministry has broken their word to the children, parents and community of Manning Intermediate.
ps I’m not sure who the woman was, but in another tweet from the meeting I said:
Catherine Palmer, David Hogben, Sue Clark here from the ministry of education. The "renewal manager" couldn't make it #SaveManning
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James Macbeth Dann (@edmuzik) October 30, 2012
I just don’t understand the closure of Manning at all (it’s my old school too). It’s a relatively new school (70s?), fills a hole in the area (whats the nearest Intermediate?!?) and shares a land-block with Hillmorton High – which I would assume is all good Earthquake-wise…
Pretty sure it was Catherine Palmer, I’ll try to find my notes of the meeting. I didn’t get everything as I was also running round with a mic that night.
Thank you for writing this, I really learned something new.
I was thinking I knew pretty much everything there was to know in this niche market
(I manage a web site just like this one), however it turns out I am incorrect.
I will probably do an article such as this on my own
site and send you the url.