CAMPAIGNERS from a Kidderminster school have been forced to concede defeat in their efforts to save it from closure.

Angry parents formed the "Hands off Stone School Action Group" when it was decided it would shut its doors as part of the Wyre Forest education shake-up, which sees a shift from a three to a two-tier system.

They had hoped to save the Bromsgrove Road school, which has 41 pupils, from the axe by mounting a legal challenge against the changes through a judicial review.

Jayne Peters, whose seven-year-old son, Frazer, still attends the school, said the group had been forced to admit defeat because it no longer had the funds to continue its fight.

She explained: "We were getting help from legal aid but we have been told we cannot have any more. It is really sad because our barrister said we had a good case. The timing is very disappointing."

It means Stone C of E First School, which has been open for more than 120 years and teaches children between four and nine, will take its last lesson in 2007.

Mrs Peters said she was now trying to find a similar small school for her four-year-old daughter, Lydia, who starts full-time education in the next academic year.

She added: "It is very sad for the school and the community. It has been a long hard fight over the last two years but if we were put in the same predicament again, we would do it again.

"I think in the future people will reflect on how effective small schools were and come to understand the good work they did."

The change in Wyre Forest's education system, which was approved by the School Organisation Committee this year, will see the current 45 schools replaced by 30 new ones in September, 2007.