Campaigners fighting to save Menzieshill High School will ask the council to resist what they see as short-termism and give the area a community campus.
Dundee City Council’s education committee votes on the school’s future on Monday. If councillors approve the controversial closure of the school, pupils will transfer to the new Harris Academy development for the start of the 2016/17 academic year.
Those opposing the move will be heard at the meeting, with Councillor Laurie Bidwell presenting their views and counter proposals, which they state are more representative of the community.
The committee will also hear deputations from pupils, parents and chairman of the Save Menzieshill Campaign, Reverend Bob Mallinson.
Their report states: “The alternative favoured by the community is a community campus that incorporates primary and secondary schools along with new community facilities.
“Dundee City Council are already committed to new primary and community facilities and NHS Tayside wish to move some services out of the Ninewells precinct and into Menzieshill.
“A community campus encompassing a secondary school not only acts as a focus for regeneration of the area, it sustains the neighbourhood economy and fosters a strong sense of community cohesion.”
A survey of Menzieshill, Charleston, Lochee and wider-Dundee garnered an impressive 549 responses from pupils, parents, shop owners and others living and working in the area.
More than 95% of them said Menzieshill High School should stay open.
Almost 64% said they were personally affected by the planned closure, with more than 88% saying the closure would impact negatively on the local community.
Just over 85% said educational standards would not be improved by the school’s closure.
In addition to the survey, a local petition to save the high school has attracted about 2,500 signatures.
Mr Mallinson said if the closure happened, the council would be “stripping facilities and resources from a community that is already struggling, rather than making an investment.”
Education convener Stewart Hunter refuted claims the transfer of pupils to Harris Academy was purely down to fiscal challenges.
He said: “The proposal has nothing whatsoever to do with budgets and we have made that clear from the very start.
“The reason we are making this decision is the falling school roll. It is not to do with budgets of finance.
“(The roll) continues to fall and will fall again next year and, if it continues to fall, we will have great problems with what edication we can deliver (at Menzieshill High School) particularly at the senior level.”
On a mooted community campus, Mr Hunter said he was not convinced there was adequate space in the area for such a development.