ByJonathan Kalmus, Jonathan Kalmus
A teaching union leader has condemned the £3 million Leeds Jewish Free School as a "waste of public money".
The NUT's Leeds branch secretary, Patrick Murphy, based his criticism on what he said were the school's "dramatically low numbers". There are currently 21 pupils, including the 11 recruits for its second academic year. Around 60 per cent of pupils are Jewish, with Sikhs, Muslims and Christians making up the remainder.
Mr Murphy argued that "in areas of the city where the need is demonstrably less, the government is pouring what seem to be unlimited resources into an educational experiment whose objective is not so much the best interests of young people as the destruction of local authorities".
The school is the city's first Jewish secondary. It was given the governmental green light after the Brodetsky Jewish Primary argued that Jews wanting a faith-based, high-school education had a two-hour daily round trip to attend the Manchester King David.
A £3.1m expansion of the Brodetsky campus under the free schools programme added state-of-the-art science labs, a food technology kitchen and a design studio to cater for an anticipated yearly intake of 25.
Head says it should not be judged over a two year period
Dismissing the NUT criticism, LJFS head Jeremy Dunford said it was wrong to judge the school "on whether it has achieved value for money over two years". That assessment should be made "over the next 10 years".
Conservative councillor and school founder Dan Cohen said the attack was "a nonsense". He said that attracting non-Jewish pupils demonstrated the school's educational appeal.
"We always said numbers would build up slowly. We get the same amount of money per head as any other school. For their own political reasons, the NUT like to single out the Leeds Jewish Free School when attacking the free school policy. In our first two years we are delivering a first-rate education."