BROADSTONE MIDDLE SCHOOL ON THE MOVE

How mobile is mobile? Not very, in the case of the six so-called temporary classrooms at Broadstone Middle School. Installed there 'for a short time' 30 years ago, they still stand, an eyesore but also an indispensable part of the spatial provision for the 670 pupils of this popular school - but not for much longer. The immobile mobiles are soon to go ...

Broadstone Middle School was originally set up for half the school population it now caters for, but almost from the start demographic pressures and popular demand meant that every square metre of space had to be used. Year after year, the mobiles resisted attempts to get rid of them, even when the word came to mean portable telephones. Finally, the money and the vision have been found to create a new school within the school, freeing the 'temporary' classrooms from a task for which they were never designed.

Recently Broadstone Middle School has been successful in attracting funds from central and local government totalling some £750,000, for significant additions to its building stock and upgrading of internal provision. Building work started on 20 March and is scheduled for completion by the end of this term. The modular system of construction allowed prefabricated units to be lifted into place by giant cranes over two days during the Easter break. On the third day we were already able to walk around and inspect the new structure.

Brickwork for the outer casing is now being laid. Once complete the new building will be connected to the existing two-storey block from the north, and will house three fully equipped science labs, a music suite, an art room and two general purpose classrooms.

Rooms in the existing main building formerly dedicated to these subjects will now be upgraded and converted to other uses, including newly equipped food and fabric areas. By this means the new building will have a positive knock-on effect throughout the rest of the school. In addition to the above we are also about to convert our school kitchens into a new library/research centre fitted out with the latest I.T. equipment. Funds for this have come from central government, and the conversion work will take place this summer. All these improvements will launch Broadstone Middle School into a new and even higher quality phase of its future. And the mobiles are finally moving.

Headteacher, Marilyn Warden

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