Small is beautiful, big is best. The county council seems to believe both of these in its arguments for changing the school system in Borehamwood. Do they really expect parents to fall for that contradiction?

The suggestion is for a huge "super school" at 11, the largest school in Hertfordshire. Yet the majority of the children will come from one form entry primary schools, of a size below the norm.

Any parent knows that the most traumatic time for their child happens when moving school. And now our elected representatives and paid education officials suggest that it will improve standards when children are suddenly moved from the warm, caring and secure family environment of very small primary schools to the anonymous, untried and socially remote establishment with 2,000 pupils.

Has real consideration been given to all the implications for the young people of Borehamwood? Has a very important consideration been forgotten in County Hall? You only get one childhood. Tim Westrip,

Headteacher, Hillside School,

Hillside Avenue, Borehamwood.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000.Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.