One of the objectives of this review is to achieve a five per cent cut in the costs of education provision. We think this is impossible given that the council's spending on schools is already below the national average.

No-one would argue with the underlying principles of TCS; all of us are united in wanting better teaching and learning in our schools. We do, however, question whether some of the proposed measures will deliver this.

The implications of TCS are wide ranging, even though they may be trying to address some of the current problems. For example, up to a third of our P7 children are below average in reading, writing and arithmetic when leaving primary school and even greater numbers are falling even further behind the national minimum standard by the end of S2.

However, we think that the proposal to reduce the number of principal teachers will cause even greater problems. These are the teachers with the greatest amount of experience and in secondary schools will be the subject leaders who are the backbone of every course your child takes.

TCS is proposing to reduce their number by creating faculty heads instead. For example, a head of science instead of separate principal teachers of physics, chemistry and biology; a head of arts instead of separate principal teachers in charge of music and art. We are liable to lose some of our best principal teachers if they don't get the faculty head posts.

Earlston High School Parent Council is of the opinion that we need more inspirational teachers, not less.

Another cost-saving proposal is to reduce the number of depute heads in our secondary schools, at a time when they are already working flat out to keep the schools running well.

We urge every parent to look closely at the Transforming Children's Services project which is out to consultation until October 27. Unless we ask the right questions, informed by more than a perfunctory knowledge of the education service, the service our children will be given will be much poorer in future.

We are sure that if we want a better standard of education for our children, this can't be achieved through losing some of our best and most skilled staff. Once again the pupils will pay the price and their education will suffer as a result of yet another cost-cutting exercise.

Earlston High School Parent CounciL