23 Jun 2009

PM's former school faces closure

9:25 am on 23 June 2009

The Prime Minister's former primary school is facing closure and has five weeks to convince the Minister of Education it should stay open.

Aorangi Primary School in Christchurch was allocated $2.6 million by the previous Government for rebuilding.

Students are in rotting temporary classrooms that were moved to the site in 2007, when an unsafe classroom block was demolished.

But Education Minister Anne Tolley told the school on Monday its funding is frozen until she decides if the rebuilding will go ahead at all.

She says closure is a possibility because of a falling roll, the cost of the rebuilding project and the capacity of neighbouring schools to take the pupils from Aorangi.

Aorangi Primary School turns 50 in October.

The board of trustees held an emergency meeting on Monday night and decided to use every resource to fight for the survival of the school over the coming five weeks.