PUPILS who are being taught the three Rs in a church are praying for a new school.

They are hoping that some divine inspiration will help them find a new home to carry on in the new Millennium.

Trustees of the school are trying to raise a £30,000 deposit so they can move from their temporary base in Besses United Reformed Church.

As reported earlier, Whitefield Preparatory School was threatened with closure after principal Julian Roscoe said he did not have enough pupils and cash to continue the family-run school.

It had been founded in 1936 in nearby Dales Lane by his mother, Olive, who decided to set up her own school because, at the time, married women could not become teachers.

She will be 103 this year and lived in the school building until it was sold.

Her son, a former pupil at the school, took over as principal in 1961 but called it a day last year because of spiralling maintenance costs and a falling school role. Parents set up a charitable trust to find a permanent home and £15,000 has already been raised to move to a house in Bury New Road. The latest effort by pupils was a coffee morning which raised £150.

Mr Geoff Hough, chairman of the trust, said: "We have 15 pupils at the moment and it is going very well.

"Everybody has knuckled down and are making the best of the situation.

"It is not an ideal situation but we are just carrying on. The church has been really good and we have two rooms as well as being able to use the hall."

The rooms have been given the feel of a traditional classroom with pupils' artwork .

However, the school cannot use its computers because of fears they will get stolen.

Mr Hough's seven-year-old granddaughter attends the school. He added: "Everybody was close before as it was a family run school, but people are even closer now.

"We want to keep it as a family run school. This is why we like the building on Bury New Road: it is similar to where we were before."