Plans for the former Wildernesse School site will be on display between 3:30PM and 9PM tomorrow (16 September) at the Donnington Manor Hotel in Dunton Green. I will be there at the opening of this exhibition.
This comes as we conclude a long period of uncertainty over the site. The Department for Education at one stage proposed taking the site from Kent County Council for the use of the Trinity Free School. KCC always made clear its opposition to this proposal, not least because it would undermine the proposals for a Sevenoaks grammar school satellite (post of 21 March). After lengthy negotiations between KCC and the Department, agreement has been reached that the Trinity Free School will take part of the site. The remainder of the site will be available for the proposed grammar school satellite, for which Valley Invicta Academies Trust and Weald of Kent Grammar School have both put in applications.
The plans shown tomorrow will show both the proposed allocation of different parts of the site, and various details of the proposed grammar school satellite buildings. This will be in advance of KCC submitting a planning application in October.
The decision as to whether or not to approve the proposals for the grammar school satellite rest with Education Secretary Michael Gove, and this is clearly an entirely separate decision from that regarding the site. However, it is clear that the issue of the site at least will not be a stumbling block to the grammar school satellite proposal. That is a very welcome development.
Further background is available in a KCC press release, and in an article in the Sevenoaks Chronicle.
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