Consultation is to start on a major re-organisation affecting schools in Dover and Deal, dealing with falling numbers - and standards.

County councillors have given the go-ahead to consultation on:

A proposal to close Archers Court School Maths and Computing College at Whitfield and replace it with an academy, sponsored jointly by KCC, Canterbury Christ Church University and the two Dover grammar schools;

A proposal to merge Deal’s two secondary schools - Castle Community College and Walmer Science College - as a new trust school to be built on the Castle college site.

The plans are partly linked to KCC’s efforts to lift standards at the schools. Archers Court is among 33 Kent schools currently failing to achieve the Government’s target for 2011 for all schools to have 30 per cent of students passing five or more GCSEs including maths and English.

Education Secretary Ed Balls has threatened to close schools that fail to meet the target and recently announced he was sending in special advisers to help Kent because of the high number of under-achieving schools.

In the case of the two Deal schools, the merger has been prompted by concerns over falling pupil numbers.

If the plans go ahead, Archers Court would close next July, with the academy opening in September. New buildings would be constructed on the same site by 2013.

County councillors approved the consultation process on Thursday, October 8.