The expansion of a school for children with special needs has been approved by West Sussex County Council.
The decision will see St Anthony’s Special School, in Chichester, increase its intake from 264 children to 314 from September 2027.
Until last year, St Anthony’s shared its site with Jessie Younghusband Primary School. But now the latter has moved to a new home, the special school can expand into its vacated buildings.
A council report stated that there was ‘an ongoing shortfall’ of specialist places for children across the county, and an ‘urgent requirement’ for extra places.
The report added: “In West Sussex there has been a significant growth in the number of children and young people with Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCP). The county currently maintains over 11,000 EHCPs.
“Whilst we would expect most children and young people with an EHCP to be supported within a maintained mainstream school setting, there is increased demand for specialist provision and approved place numbers of all the council’s maintained special schools have been exceeded.
“Increasing provision for children and young people with SEND through the creation of additional places will assist with the aim of enabling children to attend school locally. Consequently, this will reduce the number of children and young people with SEND moving from maintained schools and academies into costly education provision in the Independent and Non-Maintained Special School sector.”
A public consultation towards the end of 2025 received 171 responses, with the vast majority supporting the expansion.
The council has already approved the use of £4.138m of capital funding to design and deliver the project.
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