A group of Brighton residents are exploring the possibility of starting a cross-communal Jewish free school in the city.

As an initial step, they are circulating a questionnaire to gauge the strength of local demand.

The project is being managed by David Shinegold, who retired to the city five years ago after a background in social care which included being director of  Ravenswood village.

“There is a group of three of us,” he said, “and two, Paul Margo and Gordon Kaye, have children of school age”.

They have been encouraged to test the water by the example of Mosaic, the cross-communal Jewish primary school in south London.

“We have visited Mosaic to see what their experience was like and we’ve spoken to other people. If the questionnaire proves there is a need, we will take it forward.”

In the introduction to  the questionnaire, they attribute Mosaic’s success to being “truly cross-communal, bringing together all denominations from Chabad to Liberal, with a shared vision.

Crucially, they engaged with the non-Jewish population since 75 per cent of school pupils are non-Jewish. 

“Similar-sized communities in Birmingham, Glasgow and Liverpool all have one, so why not us?” According to the last Census, in 2011, there were 2,670 Jews in Brighton. “Some people have said that if we had a school, it might encourage people from London to move to Brighton,” Mr Shinegold added.

www.bhjewishschool.org