Report: “One-in-five Primary School classrooms are over-crowded”

Wednesday 29 July 2015

A fifth of primary school classes has exceeded maximum size limits in the current academic year after the number of young pupils swelled.

Last September’s school intake has seen an increase in primary school numbers, and a decrease in the number of secondary school pupils.

The shifts in numbers balance each other out - the overall number of children in education hasn’t changed in the last four years.

One of the key factors has been the number of children from families who don’t just speak English. The percentage of primary school children whose first language isn’t English is 22.4%, much higher than the comparable UK figure of 19.4%.

Average class sizes in Jersey primary schools overall remains at 24.1 pupils, which is well below the UK average of 27.

But in a fifth of all primary school classes, the Education Minister had to approve an exemption to the standing policy so that the maximum class size of 26 could be breached.

At the same time, the average number of pupils in secondary school classes was 21.6 – a figure above the UK average, but well below the department’s class-size limit.

The figures were revealed in a new report by the Education department about demographics of the 12,140 young people in Jersey’s 31 primary and nine secondary schools.

It also shows that in all but one of the academic years from under-fives to 15-years-old, there were more boys than girls enrolled in school.