Nursery looking for new home
Proposal will be heard by planners at borough council
A nursery is desperately seeking the new venue needed to prevent it from having to shut.
Little Foxes in Earl Shilton is facing closure after it was given notice from St Simon’s and St Jude’s Primary School, which is planning to open its own preschool.
In a bid to keep the group going, owner Beverley Hutt has filed plans to convert a vacant house in High Street, Earl Shilton, into a new venue for the centre.
A document filed with the application said: “We are desperately looking for a new location from which to provide early years care and education for the children and families of Earl Shilton.
“Earl Shilton is an area of high deprivation, hence many of our children are claiming two-year funding (15 hours a week free childcare) for the 20 per cent most deprived families in the country.
“Furthermore, many of our families claim 30 hours’ free childcare a week as working parents, a Government initiative which encourages and enables parents to work, making their child care costs affordable and meaning more of our parents in the borough are able to access work.”
Beverley said she has offered places to all her staff who run Little Foxes at her other nursery, Little Cedars, at the George Ward Centre in Barwell.
She said: “Half of my staff,
Ihave trained them up myself. A lot of them used to be parents of mine and their children have come through with us.
“We have also taken on apprentices from Heath Lane Academy and John Cleveland College.”
The Diocese of Leicester Academies Trust said in a statement: “We have been in discussions
with Little Foxes for some time about their use of our building and we gave notice to them in January that their letting would be coming to an end in the summer term.
“We have been on an incredible journey at St Simon and St Jude’s for the last two years to improve the quality of education we offer and are very excited about opening our own preschool in September in response to demand.”
The new nursery would feature a classroom and a classroom/play area while an existing bathroom would be fitted out with three small toilets, one of which would be a disabled toilet.
A conservatory would be added to the back of the house to extend floor space for the three and four-year-old room.
The garage at the side of the house would be removed to provide car parking spaces.
There is also a public car park across the road from the house with two zebra crossings within walking distance either side of the property.
Beverley is also planning to make links with Kingsfield Care Home next door “who are also keen to build relationships between the children and their aged residents”.
Carly Chadwick, has a fouryear-old son soon to finish with Little Foxes.
“It’s really sad because it’s such a lovely place,” the 30-yearold said.
“All the staff are lovely; they do daily activities that are fun and educational and they learn through play.”
FACING CLOSURE AFTER NOTICE IS GIVEN