PLANS to close a Northumberland school are being called into question as parents launch a determined campaign to block the move.

Allendale Middle School has been put forward for shutdown by September 2013 under proposals involving a reshuffle of the Haydon Bridge Partnership.

It would mean neighbouring schools taking on extra pupils, with changes to their pupil-age intakes.

But angry parents in Allendale, who organised a public meeting on Tuesday, are vowing to fight the closure proposal all the way.

Parent Susan Robson, of Catton, who jointly called the meeting, said: “There is a huge amount of support for the school.

“Over 100 people came to the meeting and they want to keep the school as it is. There is now going to be a petition. I’m positive for the school. It does a good job and has so much potential.

“But I feel it has been very possibly neglected.”

A report to the county council executive, which meets on Monday, says the Department for Education wants the 53-year-old, 137-pupil school, which faces an adverse Ofsted report in the near future, to take academy status.

But if this happened, other schools in the area could be “sucked in” to the same fate, according to county council leader Jeff Reid.

This was denied by county councillor Colin Horncastle, who insists the school could stand alone as an academy.

He said: “The report is slanted and flawed to turn the executive away from an academy.

“They are going off internal advice from officers and they don’t want any schools to become academies.