A state primary school which invited parents to pay �50 a term - or face making a teacher redundant - has failed to raise the amount it was looking for.

Wingrave CE Combined School near Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, has two small year groups and the problem was made worse when eight pupils moved away at the start of the year.

This meant its income was not enough to continue to pay the salaries of all its teachers.

Rather than sack a teacher and combine the third and fourth years into a mixed-age class, the school governors decided to refer the problem to parents.

The head, Baird McClellan - who previously described the process as "humiliating" - said on Friday: "It is unlikely that we will realise the sum required."

He did not wish to give details of how many parents had offered to pay because those directly affected had not yet been told.

Delay

He said there would now have to be further meetings of the governors to decide how to proceed.

Parents are being told in his newsletter to them that they will know the outcome by the end of the next halt-term break, in about six weeks' time.

He is unhappy that Wingrave is about to shut for the Easter break with the situation unresolved.

"We go into the end of term not quite knowing where we are," he said - which was unsettling for all concerned.

Wingrave's policy is to try to keep children in groups appropriate to their age. But Year 4 has only 15 pupils and Year 3 has 20.

The most obvious option is to combine them and drop a teaching post.

The education authority - Buckinghamshire County Council - has said that it funds Wingrave on the same basis as any other school, and it is up to the school itself how it spends the money.

Wingrave's dilemma highlights a common problem for schools, which are funded on the basis of their pupil numbers not their teaching staff.

Those which have most or all of their teachers on the top of the salary scale have more trouble balancing the books than those with younger teachers.