Passionate campaign to save school hearing unit

Anxious families have reacted with shock and anger at plans to shut a hearing impairment unit at a Torquay primary school.

Torbay Council confirmed plans to close the unit, at St Margaret’s Academy, and another at The Spires College, a secondary school, in a letter to parents on October 16.

According to the council, the decision comes after more than five years of operating the units at less than 50 per cent capacity. 

The letter described the closure as a “difficult decision” and assured families that alternative provisions would be made for the children.

Now 647 people  have signed a petition, including Torquay United players, urging the council to reverse its decision and preserve the “vital” hearing impairment provision at St Margaret’s. The petition highlights parents’ concerns over the potential disruption to their children’s routines and the adverse effects of removing them from their established learning environments.

Above: Torquay United's Omar Mussa signing the petition

Felicity Morris, the secretary of St Margaret’s Academy Parent Teacher Association, said the closure would affect the wellbeing of a significant number of children.

“Because it’s had its hearing support centre since 1964, St Margaret’s has almost become the primary school of choice for parents that have children with hearing impairments”, she said.

The school currently supports five children with total hearing loss and there are 13 others with varying degrees of hearing loss, all of whom benefit from the school's specialist internal hearing support team. 

She said that only the parents of the five children with total hearing loss received the closure letter.

The parents of children with partial hearing loss were neither consulted nor notified, it is claimed.

Felicity explained: “I had a message from one of the parents that had received the letter asking whether I could post it on the PTA Facebook page. I hadn’t heard anything about it. When I spoke to the headmaster, he told me this was also the first the school had heard of the decision.”

Felicity created an e-petition and  shared a story from one parent whose daughter had attended a different primary school in Torbay. The school struggled to support her hearing needs, and when her hearing aid batteries stopped working, staff were unable to replace them. 

Felicity said: “She spent the rest of the day without hearing aids and couldn’t participate in class. At six years old, she was coming home in tears, saying she didn’t feel like she belonged. When she moved to St Margaret’s, a whole team was there to support her, and now she’s thriving.”

The petition must reach 1,000 signatures for the council to consider reviewing its decision.

On November 14, Torbay Council issued a statement regarding the closures. It explained that its recent review of education, health and care plans (EHCPs) revealed that only 0.7 per cent of children and young people had a hearing impairment as their main area of need.  

Above: Torquay United Manager Neil Warnock signing the petition

In the original letter dated October 16, the council also said that forecast data showed that hearing impairment needs across Torbay had fallen and represented less than one per cent of all special educational needs in the Bay.

The parents of St Margaret’s Academy dispute this forecast.

In a letter from Torbay Hospital’s audiology department, the deputy head of audiology used data to confirm that there is no downward trend in children diagnosed with permanent hearing loss under the age of five  in the Torbay Hospital area.

The letter says: “Deafness in children is a bit like buses, we never know when it might turn up. The data for 2024 is to date, so potentially could be higher with two months of the year remaining. As you will see the numbers are small, but the need for support is high with deaf youngsters.”

The council has reassured families that children currently using the  hearing impairment units will not lose access to specialist support. It has outlined plans to provide funding directly to schools to ensure that specialist teaching and interventions continue.

But St Margaret’s parents have expressed concern that the proposed changes fail to ensure their children’s wellbeing, emphasising the importance of maintaining a “deaf community”.

One parent said: “My daughter has benefitted enormously from the school’s hearing unit. When she started, just over a year ago, she couldn’t read or write and had very little British Sign Language. She also had no deaf identity and wasn’t a part of the very wonderful deaf community. 

“St Margaret’s hearing unit has given my daughter a reason to go to school. At her previous school she would scream, cry, refuse to go and even hurt herself. She was isolated and left with the ‘support’ that the council are now saying the children will receive without the hearing unit. 

“My child is a prime example of what this will do to deaf children. I will not sit back and watch my daughter’s mental health decline again.”

Another added: “I work for the audiology department at Torbay Hospital and the vast number of primary school children that we see in audiology are students at this school and its centre provides much support to them. 

“How one person within your council can say they ‘predict’ the numbers for hearing support in children will fall is utter nonsense in my opinion and something that no one can predict. I would have never predicted my daughter would end up wearing hearing aids at age eight but here we are!”

The campaign has also drawn attention from former pupils who benefitted from St Margaret’s hearing impairment unit when it first opened.

Jonathan Brown, chair of the Torbay & District Deaf Society for 12 years, attended St Margaret’s as a deaf pupil in 1964 following a successful campaign by parents, including his own, to establish a hearing impairment unit in South Devon.

Jonathan revisited the primary school last week with his friends Jane and Jo and praised the “high-quality” support, which included carol signing in sign language. 

He said: “To think that parents of my generation fought for this unit, only for it to now face closure by councillors. To throw away the current set up would be scandalous over the sake of money. 

“This would lead to a deterioration of deaf children who will not achieve equal parity to their hearing peers.”

St Margaret’s head teacher, Tim Hughes, has voiced support for the campaign and is in contact with Torbay MP Steve Darling and The National Deaf Children’s Society.

The petition urging Torbay Council to reconsider the proposed changes to the unit’s delivery model runs until January 1, 2025. 

Signatures require a Torbay postcode and can be added at: https://www.torbay.gov.uk/DemocraticServices/mgEPetitionListDisplay.aspx