Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council (SMBC) is attempting to permanently close Summerfield Education Centre. As a result, children within Solihull will lose valuable education and the wider support that is provided for them by the school. The students that attend Summerfield have already been excluded from mainstream education, this is mostly due to unmet social, emotional and mental health needs (SEMH), and special educational needs (SEN). This will not only be detrimental to its current students but also to any other students that will be permanently excluded from school in the future as Summerfield is the only school of its kind within the borough.

The staff at Summerfield are currently fighting on behalf of the children to keep the school open and provide them with an education and hope that you will support them in doing so. In order to support them you could sign this petition which will apply additional pressure to the SMBC to keep the school open.

Bev Petch, the council's Head of Alternative Provision, has told the staff at Summerfield that there are other viable options that do not require the school to be closed however she would prefer to close the school as it will save SMBC £1.3 million.

Bev Petch and SMBC have already closed Auckland Education Centre a similar school for primary school children and as a result the children that attended there are now without a school and forced to be home educated  Something that Bev, as recently as September 2019 was quoted as saying to the Birmingham Mail regarding home-schooling "Also some parents do not understand what they have signed-up to," and "....that for me is really sad... getting back into the school system is not easy."

If the school is closed and parents do not or are unable to home-school their children they will be forced to have children sent miles out of the borough to other unknown establishments, which as yet have not been identified and may not actually exists or be appropriate.

This is your opportunity to make your voice heard and that of your children. Help to keep the doors open at Summerfield Education Centre, the only place that opened their doors for your child when others closed them.