Saintfield pre-school closure decision ‘incredibly painful’

Saintfield pre-school closure decision ‘incredibly painful’

7 May 2025

A SAINTFIELD pre-school is to close at the end of term.

Little Sunbeams said the decision to close in a few weeks’ time was an “incredibly painful” one and was made only after all other avenues were exhausted. 

The news comes after the Little Stars pre-school in Killyleagh revealed last month that it had issued redundancy notices to staff as a cash crisis threatened its future.

The Saintfield pre-school said the impact of its closure will be felt by local families, children who were due to attend in September and its “outstanding staff” who now face redundancy.

Its chairman, Dr Mark Bowman, confirmed what he described as the difficult news of the closure at the end of the academic year after decades of providing high-quality, community-based early years education to local families.

He said the school’s voluntary committee and staff worked tirelessly over the past few years to keep Little Sunbeams afloat but, unfortunately, the structural and funding challenges facing the non-statutory pre-school sector – combined with administrative failures – left it with no viable option but to close.

Dr Bowman explained that at the heart of the problem is the Pupil Allocation Number (PAN) which is the number of funded children a setting is permitted to enrol. 

He said that despite consistently high demand and repeated appeals to the Education Authority (EA), the Saintfield pre-school’s pupil allocation number was capped well below the level needed to sustain it financially. 

He said the PAN is based almost entirely on the uptake of the allocation number from the previous year. 

This meant that should the number of applications for one year as a result of birth rate or other factors, then the following year the pupil allocation remains at that level. 

Dr Bowman said Little Sunbeams allocation number was affected by this very reason. 

“Despite an increase in applications in subsequent years, the numbers we were permitted to accept had reduced,” he said.

“This policy disproportionately affects more rural settings were application numbers could fluctuate from year to year. We made it clear to the EA that a drop in our PAN from 14 previously to eight children [and with little notice] meant our setting was not viable.”

Dr Bowman said over the past two years, the Saintfield pre-school depleted its reserves, despite significant fundraising efforts and Informed the EA that a pupil allocation number of between 11 and 14 would be required to balance income and outgoings “without placing unsustainable demands on our committee to raise thousands of pounds annually just to cover basic running costs”.

He said Little Sunbeams was “devastated” to discover that the number was initially set at eight places for this September.

However, after the stage one admissions process had closed when most parents had already accepted offers elsewhere, the EA offered a retrospective increase to 10 places. 

Dr Bowman revealed that to compound the issue, the EA prematurely released stage one outcomes, which then made it impossible for the Saintfield pre-school to recall additional children from its waiting list. 

“In short, the increase came too late and was of too little benefit to make any real difference,” he said.

“We are not alone in facing these issues. Nick Mathison MLA, speaking recently in the Assembly, highlighted the precarious situation facing many non-statutory pre-school settings, particularly those in rural or voluntary/community-run contexts.

“He rightly pointed out that the current approach to pre-school funding and admissions is placing unsustainable pressure on small providers, despite their proven value, strong local ties and the high-quality care they deliver.”

More broadly, Dr Bowman said the issue raises serious questions about how the early years sector is being supported and whether enough is being done to safeguard community-based provision that sits outside the statutory system.

He added: “We are immensely proud of what Little Sunbeams has achieved over the years and grateful to every parent, staff member, committee 

volunteer and child who has been part of our journey.

“Our story reflects not a lack of demand or quality but a system that has failed to protect vital community settings like ours.”