PRIVATE schools are hiding the fact many of their top-class facilities are open to the public, government-funded researchers claimed last night.
State-of-the-art sports pitches, swimming pools, gyms and drama studios are among the assets being kept off-limits because schools are frightened of putting off fee-paying parents, according to Scottish Independent Schools Project.
Private schools
cannot be compelled to open their facilities to the public but doing so, even for a fee, counts towards their charitable status.
The report looked in detail at three unidentified Scottish private schools and found evidence that some facilities were, in theory, open to the public but not advertised.
Hutchesons' Grammar, Glasgow; Merchiston Castle, Edinburgh; Lomond School, Helensburgh; and St Leonard's School, St Andrews, have already been warned by the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator to improve their public access or lose their charitable status.
Charitable status, currently enjoyed by all private schools, is worth thousands of pounds in tax breaks. Schools must prove they are of public benefit by providing bursaries and scholarships for those unable to afford fees as well as opening facilities to the public.
Dr Joan Forbes is a researcher with the Scottish Independent Schools Project, which is supported by the government-funded Applied Educational Research Scheme in Scotland. She found the three schools she looked at did not advertise public access because their websites were aimed at parents rather than the community.
She said: "Community use is currently not considered a positive selling point to potential parents who may well expect their child to have unrestricted, and perhaps 'exclusive', access to the full range of school facilities."
A Scotland on Sunday reporter closely examined a number of private school websites for information about public access. At the time of first checking, we could not find any information on the websites of Merchiston Castle, St Leonard's, Kelvinside Academy in Glasgow and the High School of Dundee. Kelvinside and Dundee have since updated their sites to make information about public access obviously available and all four deny "hiding" details.
Some schools which do advertise facilities charge what some would consider high fees, itself a potential breach of the rules on charitable status. Fettes College, Edinburgh, promoted its health club, but access required a membership fee of £59 a month.
Some private schools are happy to provide community groups with access to their facilities. Gordonstoun School in Elgin, which has an ocean-going yacht, a climbing wall, a rifle range, a swimming pool, an all-weather pitch and a sports hall with four squash courts and a weight training room, listed on its website 33 community groups using its facilities on a regular basis.
Colin Rennie, of Fields In Trust Scotland, which protects sports facilities for community groups, said: "We encourage private schools to make their facilities as available as possible. We have all got a duty to encourage our children to be as fit as they can be."
A spokeswoman for the High School of Dundee said: "It's done on an individual basis depending on requirements and timings. We have hired out all sorts of different facilities on request including the school hall and playgrounds."
St Leonard's said information had been available on its website for three years. A spokesman said the information had resulted in a wide range of groups using the facilities, which were heavily booked.
A spokesman for Kelvinside Academy said: "The public are welcome to use our facilities and have done so on many occasions."
Merchiston Castle's headmaster Andrew Hunter said: "We have been inundated with requests to use our facilities but are already using most of our facilities to capacity, either through school activities or community groups. Most specifically, we update our website on a weekly if not daily basis to ensure we keep everyone informed."
No one was available for comment from Fettes.
