HUNDREDS of parents, teachers, governors and residents have signed petitions calling for a Southampton school to be saved from closure.

They hope to persuade the city's top education councillor to scrap a proposal to close Grove Park Business and Enterprise College in The Grove, Sholing, at a crunch meeting on Monday.

About 100 mums, dads, teachers and pupils turned out to an impromptu meeting at the school yesterday where head teacher Eric Freeman outlined the council's latest shock proposal to close the school on August 31, 2010.

Despite the option not having been included in the original consultation earlier this year, it is now the only one being tabled as a possibility.

"We are extremely worried," Mr Freeman told the meeting.

"Staff are worried and governors are worried. It is crucial that everyone who supports the school contacts the councillors before Monday's meeting."

"I have been overwhelmed by the supportive response against the proposal. It has been very humbling.

"The parents wanted to know what was going on and I wanted to tell them as much I knew," he said.

It is ultimately up to the city's Cabinet member for children's services and learning, Councillor Ann Milton, to decide whether to launch a six-week public consultation on whether to close the 630-pupil school.

She told the Daily Echo: "I am taking on board what is being said in the letters and e-mails I have received. I have briefed the ward councillors on the proposal and I'm taking advice from council officers before reaching my decision on Monday."

Surplus places

Education bosses have also proposed the closure of Millbrook Community School in a bid to remove about 1,000 surplus places across the city, due to declining birth rates.

Now hundreds of parents, including those whose children will join Grove Park in September, are backing a campaign to save the school.

A website has been set up at www.savegrovepark.co.uk, posters placed on the school gates and 150 'Save Grove Park' T-shirts produced.

The school's supporters are organising a walk from Grove Park to Woodlands Community School tomorrow at 6.30pm to highlight the extra distance youngsters will have to walk if the school closes.

It had originally been proposed to create a mixed school on the Grove Park site to replace the existing Woolston School and Grove Park boys' schools.

However, following objections from the Woolston community about longer journeys for pupils, education bosses have now recommended Grove Park's closure.

Its staff, governors and parents have been baffled that the Woolston site, with no on-site sports facilities or dining areas, looks set to stay but Grove Park's playing fields and new £1.3m sports complex could be turned into houses.