Parents’ Comments and Suggestions

Parents were surveyed during the same period as pupils. 141 families are represented in the school. 141 survey forms were circulated and 91 forms were returned. This means we achieved 65% return. A selection of comments from the ‘Additional Comments’ section follows:

We always walk to school but cars need to slow down to let children cross the road safely from the Carey Close side of school. A lot of drivers have no consideration of people who walk to school and have to cross over the road.

We have car shared in the past, but it doesn’t always work out. We would very much welcome a bus from Shepton Mallet. Most of the cars in the car park are from Shepton, so I think a bus would be well used. It would cut down on cars in and out of school, which in turn, would make it a much safer place for our children.

I live at Tallowood and I have walked to school before, but the traffic speeding up the hill is a nightmare, if the pavement was much wider we could overcome this problem. Tom works much better in class when he walks to school!!! It is only one mile.

I think that priority use of the car park for car sharing families or cars that are already full with one family would be an excellent idea. As someone who has car shared for the last 8+ years I cannot see any disadvantages to doing so. Perhaps parents who live close to each other and would like to car share could be put in contact with each other by the school.

As we walk to and from school every day, a crossing of some kind on the way to school would be a good idea, as it is often hard to cross Chelynch Road as a lot of parents do not give way. Also, as you enter the school, the pavement is always muddy and slippery with piles of leaves in the mud. It would be safer if this was brushed/washed occasionally.

Priority parking should be given to parents with pre-school children in – as it can be a struggle to walk toddler into school from the main road – especially when it’s raining – and you have to get to the car park 20 minutes early if your toddlers asleep in the car and you don’t want him/her disturbed when collecting your child…just to get a place in the car park! If a bus service was offered you’d lose the parent-teacher contact…and parent-parent contact – where many after school friendships are organised.

Ideally we would like to walk to school. This we could do easily if we had chosen a Shepton Mallet school. However, St. Aldhelm’s was the school we really wanted and we made the decision to make a car journey every day in order to send our children to the best school available to us. I have been car sharing since Emma was in reception and thoroughly recommend it. Not only does it reduce the car journey each day to one each. It also gives both of us (the other mum and I) someone that we can call on in times of emergency or illness for example. One does have to have a long chat with the children about who they can go home with just in case the designated ‘mummy doesn’t make it.