CHILDREN and parents of Netherthird Primary are still in limbo as repair work to the building continues.

When the Chronicle visited the school, in Craigens Road, there were two skips and debris in the yard where there should have been children playing.

While the early years children are unaffected, the primary school-aged pupils have been decanted to other establishments in the town.

A drop-in session has been arranged to let parents know exactly what the arrangements are although, at this stage, East Ayrshire Council are saying no final decision has been made.

Until further notice, primaries one to five are going to Greenmill Primary with P6 and P7 pupils temporarily at Cumnock Academy.

The decision to close the school was taken after some cracks were noticed in some classroom ceilings, which indicated possible structural weakness.

It was also decided to decant the children to allow specialist engineers to carry out further investigations into the problem.

Parents will be updated at a drop-in session which will be held at Netherthird Community Centre on Thursday, August 24, between 4.30pm and 7pm.

Meanwhile the council has issued a number of guidelines regarding the current situation.

They have said: “To provide some stability the decant arrangements will remain in place until October 2017 and we will review the situation then.

“Splitting the decant into two groups, allows all pupils to continue benefitting from a consistent, high quality learning and teaching environment, with a minimum of disruption.

“All teaching resources and furniture will be transferred and this process is already under way.”

Pupils are being taken by bus from Netherthird Community Centre Car Park to Greenmill Primary and Cumnock Academy and back every day.

There is no charge to parents for this, while any pupils who travel by taxi will be taken to their temporary place of education.