THE catchment area for a "successful and popular" secondary school will not change following a lengthy investigation.

Council bosses pledged to assess access to Hyndland Secondary following a city-wide consideration of catchment areas in 2019.

After looking at school rolls, placing requests and the area around the West End school, Glasgow City Council now says there is "no strong argument" to make changes.

This comes despite requests from "small numbers" of parents in an area of Scotstoun to be added to the catchment.

Councillor Chris Cunningham, City Convener for Education, said: “An agreement was made to look at Hyndland Secondary’s catchment after the city wide secondary school catchment consultation in 2019.

“Officers have now carried out this extensive piece of work which included review and detailed analysis of school rolls, catchment areas and placing requests that directly or indirectly affect the secondary, and the consideration of actual and historical trends from nearby primary schools which has changed over the last few years.

“Officers have concluded that there is no strong argument to alter the current delineated catchment area based on the number of children going to the school but will continue to monitor the situation of trends in the north west of the city and make recommendations based on educational benefit to young people."

A report, describing the school as "successful and popular" will go before councillors on Thursday for approval detailing the steps taken to assess entry to Hyndland Secondary.

It has four associated primary schools: Broomhill Primary, Hyndland Primary, Thornwood Primary, and Whiteinch Primary.

Hyndland has a maximum capacity of 950 but a roll of 1027 with 40% of those placing requests.

When Victoria Drive Secondary school closed in 1998, Scotstoun Primary school became associated with Knightswood Secondary School.

For seven years, pupils from Scotstoun primary had the right to a priority placing request to any secondary school in the city but in recent years increasing numbers of children have been transferring to Knightswood Secondary School.

Education officers made a recommendation in January 2019 to the City Administration Committee that a scoping exercise should be carried out looking at the catchment for Hyndland.

Officers found that over the last five years the number of pupils going from Scotstoun Primary to Hyndland Secondary was falling - from 25 in 2015/16 to seven in 2019/2020.

A small number of parents in the area of Scotstoun known as "The Avenues" had asked that their streets move to the catchment area.

The report reads: "It would not make sense, nor be equitable, to transfer this area or a larger area, such as including both sides of Dumbarton Road, in isolation to the Hyndland Secondary School catchment area or to make it a shared area, i.e. families would have the right to send their children to Hyndland or Knightswood.

"This would result in Scotstoun Primary School being associated with two secondary schools.

"There would not be a strong educational argument for this."

Three options for the school were looked at: leave Hyndland entry criteria as is; that is, no change; add part of the existing Scotstoun Primary School catchment area onto the Hyndland Secondary catchment area; add all of the Scotstoun Primary School catchment area onto the Hyndland Secondary catchment area.

The first two were rejected and the report adds: "Given the necessity to provide a strong educational benefit associated with any proposed changes, officers would recommend Option I with the caveat that officers should continue to monitor the numbers of pupils transitioning to secondary schools in the North West of the city.

"Educational benefits must always take precedence over personal choice, ease of access, and child care."