Long Live The Elms School
- The Petition
- 905 Comments
UPDATE:
Dear alumni, friends and broad Elms supporter community,
I am delighted to report that, The Elms Governors voted unanimously in support of the proposal put in front of them by the Parent Working Group. The proposed transaction with Malvern College and The Downs has been terminated. The Elms School will continue.
I am writing to thank you for your extraordinary support of our efforts. Whether it has been signing petitions, writing passionate letters to Governors that demonstrated not just a deep love for the school but the lifelong benefits that your time at the school has delivered to you, or whether it has been calling us to lend support as we put our proposal together, your efforts have been magnificent and highly appreciated. Beyond that, many of you have committed to Contingent Pledges to give our efforts the financial credibility that the Governors needed to feel persuaded that we had muscle as well as ideas.
Thank you. On behalf of the current staff and pupils, I wanted to write to express my enormous gratitude. I did not go to The Elms. My three children do. I am, frankly, jealous of the community that they have joined, of its passion, its enduring sense of togetherness and its capabilities.
It has become clear that The Elms of recent times has let its alumni and alumnae rotate out of orbit. We will do our level best to bring you back close to the school. The Elms show, held each autumn, seems to be an obvious event at which the school should welcome back its former pupils, their parents and their friends. I hope to be able to communicate more on that specific event – and to communicate more frequently with you. We have uncovered something that is extremely special and we do not wish ever to misplace that.
We will now get to work to implement the business plan that we have shared with you. Please keep in touch with us; please keep throwing in ideas; please keep listening out for ways that you might be able to help. They won’t all be financial – some will be fun.
With best wishes and enormous gratitude,
James Rose
for
Parent Working Group
HISTORIC CALL TO ACTION:
The Elms is the last remaining Independent Preparatory School in the county of Herefordshire and within a 28-mile radius spanning the counties of Worcestershire and Gloucestershire. The school has been providing education to children for over 408 years and has become an outstanding, very special and much loved institution. However, the school is now threatened with imminent closure unless the Parent Working Group Business Plan is adopted by the current Governors.
A Parent Working Group (PWG) has built and stress-tested a credible business plan (please click the links above) to support a prosperous and enduring school. The current Governors are balancing that against a proposal to move pupils to The Downs Malvern, close The Elms School and allow the charity's assets to be subsumed into the Malvern College charity. If you feel that the current group of Governors should vote to maintain The Elms School on its existing site, please sign this petition.
We raised £650,000 by Sunday 12th June please contact [email protected] for continued ways to pledge.
Please use the school post code if you live abroad WR13 6EF when signing.
Link to current list of Governors Here