The head of a Bradford upper school has put his own future on the line to secure a better education for children in the neighbouring estates.

Neil Donkin, the head at Eccleshill Upper, will have to apply for his own job against a field of national candidates when his school closes as part of the shake-up to a two-tier education system in Bradford.

Although the school site will remain, the education authority proposes to close down Eccleshill Upper and reopen it as an 11-18 voluntary-controlled secondary.

Voluntary-controlled means that the Church of England will take over the site but the authority will meet all the school's costs.

Eccleshill Upper's governing body has now backed the proposal unanimously, including Mr Donkin who, as the headteacher, takes a leading role as a governor.

"The governors voted unanimously to support the proposal for closure," said Mr Donkin. "It was a very brave decision because the governing body was, in effect, voting themselves out of existence.

"We felt that the proposals for Bradford as a whole coincided exactly with the governors' earlier submissions to the review team that there should be primary and secondary education in Bradford and that there was a future for the school site in secondary education.

"It was felt that this was the very best way of safeguarding the future of existing students as well as securing a secondary school for the Newlands youngsters for generations to come."

The decision means that all staff will have to be made redundant. But the authority is virtually guaranteeing all staff a job. Many teachers and assistants will be expected to regain their jobs in their present schools but headships and deputy headships have to be advertised nationally.

Mr Donkin said: "I'm 53 now and in a year or two years' time I will be redundant but I am pleased because that we have secured a secondary education for children in this area. We now hope the new school will have the seeds needed to create a really successful school."

lGovernors of Woodend Middle School in Shipley have voted against their proposed closure but in favour of taking on their new status as a secondary school.

It is also proposed that it becomes a Church of England school, but the chairman of governors Madeleine Lawlor said they were uncertain what the implications of this will be.

The governors want the authority to designate the proposals for the school as a "significant change of character" which will mean that the existing staff and the governors will be able to continue to run the site.

Mrs Lawlor said the school had made dramatic progress in recent years under a new headteacher, Chris Glendinning. Teacher morale was much higher and standards had risen and the governors did not want to see that disrupted.

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