SCHOOL SPENDING BOOSTED
AUTHORITY SET TO BUY TEMPORARY CLASSROOMS
MORE than £20 million is to be spent on some of Leicester’s most popular secondary schools to ensure demand for pupil places is satisfied over the next eight years.
Leicester City Council is planning to buy temporary modular buildings that have provided extra classroom space at six schools and colleges over the past year, as part of its secondary schools’ growth programme.
It said the modular buildings installed at Babington Academy, in
Beaumont Leys; City of Leicester College and Judgemeadow Community College, both in Evington; Crown Hills Community College, and at Rushey Mead Academy and Soar Valley College, both in Rushey Mead, in 2017 and 2019, had created the room for about 1,300 additional pupil places across all year groups in 2019/20.
The modern temporary classrooms are credited with helping to address the “increasing and ongoing demand for secondary school places” resulting from new families moving to the city.
A spokesman for the education authority said: “By buying the buildings outright, the city council will save more than £1.5 million compared with continuing to rent them.”
As part of the plan, the Madani Boys and Girls Schools, North Evington, will benefit from a £1 million expansion to create 60 additional pupil places in year seven, equating to 300 new places across all five year groups at the schools.
City mayor Sir Peter Soulsby said the investment would ensure the schools would have enough places to meet “ever-growing demand”.
“Thanks to major capital investment in our secondary schools in recent years, we have ensured there are sufficient places to meet evergrowing demand for pupil places,” he said.
“Investing in these modular buildings at some of our most popular secondary schools makes good financial sense and will ensure there’s sufficient capacity to meet these schools’ needs for the next eight years or so.”
The investment is the latest in a programme of work which has expanded schools to create nearly 7,500 additional primary places since May 2010 – from 27,385 places to a current total of 34,830, according to the city council.
A council spokesman said: “Over the same time period, the number of secondary school pupil places has increased by 183, from 20,756 to 20,939.
“The council has pledged to create over 2,500 more secondary spaces by 2027/8 – bringing the number of places to 23,442 – through a combination of new school building and investing in temporary modular buildings in existing schools.”