A secondary school is proposing to make changes to the timetable that would give pupils Friday afternoon off - and allow teachers to do staff training during the day.

Parents at Walderslade Girls' School in Chatham are being asked to send in their views on two consultations.

One proposal is to change the school start time and number of lessons each day.

Currently, pupils start at 8.20am and finish at 2.50pm with six 50-minute lessons during the day.

From September the proposal is to start the day at 8.25am and on Monday’s finish at 3.50am and have six lessons.

Tuesday to Thursday the school day will finish at 2.50pm with five lessons.

And on Fridays, students will finish at 1.10pm after attending four lessons.

Speaking to our sister paper the Medway Messenger, head teacher Fraser Campbell said: “It will mean the school becomes more orientated towards adults.

“Staff development is crammed into after school slots, this is far nicer to be able to do staff training during the school day.

“Parents have raised legitimate worries about the late finish with the times of buses and getting home in the winter months. We will consider all of this.”

A second consultation is about the school joining the Greenacre Multi-Academy Trust.

Walderslade Girls’ School became a single academy trust in November 2011 and continued to have a joint sixth form with the boys' school.

Dr Campbell said: “People have always thought it was inevitable because we share the same site, have a joint sixth form and have a lot of informal collaborations anyway.

“There are benefits in terms of management becoming centralised and subjects from both schools working together.

“The pupils will notice very little. The consultations responses so far have asked will the school change its name?

"No, it won’t. Will co-ed creep in? definitely not."

• Parents can email consultation@waldersladegirls.org.uk