All courses are being moved out of an adult education centre long-rumoured to become a new Harris Academy secondary school.

Five petitions and a Twitter campaign were set up to oppose changes to Merton Adult Education (MAE) in Whatley Avenue, Raynes Park, which has more than 5,000 students of all ages on its books.

The service was under threat after Merton Council announced plans to ‘review’ courses at MAE in the face of £32m of budget cuts over the next four years in 2014.

October 2014: Neighbours and students of under-threat Merton Adult Education incandescent after rumours of council cuts

Now it has been revealed the building will not be used for adult education from September this year, and the council will commission South Thames College to provide the lion’s share of adult education courses.

October 2014: Opposition builds to adult education 'cuts' as part of £32m budget gap

March 2015: No turning back on Merton Adult Education outsourcing, council decides

This includes English and maths, creative arts, modern foreign languages, IT and vocational courses.

Employability skills such as CV writing and job interview techniques and family learning courses such as English and maths and healthy living, will be provided by a charity called Groundwork London.

January 2015: Merton Adult Education site could become secondary school - charity in talks with council

Wimbledon Liberal Democrat Shas Sheehan, who led one of the petitions and now sits in the House of Lords as a Baroness, said a lot of questions she raised still remain unanswered.

Mrs Sheehan said: “As far as I know they haven’t been able to find anyone that can enable people with learning difficulties to carry on in the way that Whatley Avenue does.

"They need dedicated professional staff and they need the facilities as well.”

Wimbledon Times:

There were rumours the site would be used by the Harris Federation to build a secondary school there, but the Department for Education, which makes the decision, said it was still working with the council and Harris Federation to find a suitable location.

The council would prefer to put the school in the south Wimbledon area.

Any changes to the MAE site will have an impact on Joseph Hood Primary School which neighbours the college. The school did not wish to comment at this stage.

Merton Council will now be working with the new providers to finalise the courses that will be on offer for the academic year 2016/17. The curriculum will be published in the late spring.

Councillor Martin Whelton, cabinet member for education, said: “We considered the responses to our previous consultation and commissioned the providers who we are confident will be able to provide the courses people want, in the borough and in line with our adult education principles agreed by cabinet in February 2015.

"The situation about the Whatley Avenue site remains the same as reported in the cabinet paper last September. The building will not be used for adult education from September 2016.

"We will remain in regular contact with the local school and residents, but at the moment, it is too early to say anything further about this site.”

Sue Rimmer OBE, principal and CEO of South Thames College, said: “South Thames College has a long history of providing adult courses to our local communities and we are looking forward to extending this provision in Merton.

“We will be finalising the course details with Merton Council over the next few weeks and welcoming our first cohort of Merton adult learners to the college in September.”

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