News

Many schools operating `compressed days' due to budget cuts

Breda Academy in south Belfast will send pupils home at 1pm every Wednesday
Breda Academy in south Belfast will send pupils home at 1pm every Wednesday Breda Academy in south Belfast will send pupils home at 1pm every Wednesday

THE head of a school planning to shut early once a week says many others are taking similar steps.

Breda Academy in south Belfast will send pupils home at 1pm every Wednesday from next week.

Principal Matthew Munro said this was due to budget cuts and union action.

The overall education budget, announced in July, was £24m less than the closing 2016/17 budget.

Extra money of £10m and £26m has been found in the last two months but schools are still being forced to make cuts.

Mr Munro said many other schools have already "compressed" the day.

He said that with 23-and-a-half hours teaching time a week, his staff were "worked out to the max".

"I am little bit surprised, to be honest, at the attention some of this has attracted because what we have done with our reduced, or our compressed, day is simply what a lot of other schools have already been doing," he told the BBC.

"They have instituted a variety of measures of compressed days. We are not acting completely out on a limb here."

At Breda Academy, lessons will begin at the earlier time of 8:35am on Wednesdays and buses would be ordered to take pupils home at 1pm. The afternoon will then be used for staff meetings and to allow teachers to prepare lessons.