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Bramcote College Building Update

24 May 2019 ~ Published in Buildings and Improvements.

First published on 24th May 2019 in issue 211 of the Trust Newsletter. Newsletters are sent to subscribers and all parents/carers of students at The White Hills Park Trust, for whom we hold a valid email address. They also published on the Alderman White School, Bramcote College and Bramcote College Sixth Form websites for a minimum period of 6 months from the date of issue. Archive copies of the Newsletter are available on request.

After a long and sometimes frustrating period of waiting, excitement is building as we are now planning in earnest for our new Bramcote College building. As you know, Nottinghamshire County Council have committed to providing the up-front funding for the new school, and we have been busy securing the necessary permissions and agreements so that the building work can begin. Over the next couple of weeks, there are a number of surveys that are taking place that will inform the design and construction, including ecology surveys, particularly important in a location like ours. We have also had on-site visits by contractors to discuss access, location of builders’ compound, deliveries and so on.

ARC Partnership have been contracted by Nottinghamshire County Council to manage the project and draw up the detailed designs. They are a company that specialises in delivering public-sector building projects in this part of the country, and have delivered over a thousand successful projects. If you are interested, you can see their website here. We are delighted to be working with such an experienced and talented company.
Our vision is for a new school and sixth-form college that provides the highest educational outcomes in an environment of real quality. We want it to be a place where students will have the opportunity to follow a wide range of academic courses that will take them to success in higher education and the world of work, but we also want our new school to be a beacon for those students who specialise in the arts, sports technology and vocational courses. Our school will have new Science labs, technology rooms, IT suites, music and drama rooms, photography suite, pastoral and special needs bases, as well as other essential spaces such as classrooms, Hall and Dining areas.
Central to our vision is a school at the heart of the community that provides a benefit to local people in many ways. For example, we want to be able to offer the opportunity for local drama, dance and arts groups to have a theatre space to put on performances, we want our sports facilities to be accessible for local teams and to complement other local services such as Bramcote Leisure Centre, we want to have rooms available for meetings and evening classes. We think that through an intelligent approach to design, we can make sure that our school will be accessed safely and securely outside the school day, and we can truly be a resource for the community.
We realise that since we are spending public money we have a fundamental responsibility to use it wisely and ensure that we get the best value and the best quality we can for our budget. Our new building will be built in line with regulations set out by the Department for Education, and so will conform at least to the standards for floor space, facilities, sports fields and so on that all new schools are obliged to meet. We are currently building for a 120-form entry school, which will be expanded to 150 as increased housing is built in the local area, so this will comfortably accommodate our current numbers and give us room for growth.
One key aspiration that has already been emphasised to me by students, staff and parents is that our new building should be as environmentally friendly as possible, and this is an aspiration we will be communicating to the design team. Our current building is hugely inefficient to run, and its location on the very top of the hill has a visual impact for miles around, so we expect that the new building will be much more sympathetic to its context, and will enhance the local area.
Your views are vital in this whole process. We want to make sure that our parents and members of our local community have a genuine input. We have set up a dedicated email address at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. for any comments, questions and suggestions, and have a page on our Trust website devoted to news and updates about the new build.
We would also like to invite you to a special open meeting of the Bramcote College Parents’ Forum on Tuesday June 25th from 5-7pm. This will be an opportunity to see the plans as they are developing, meet the design team, ask questions and make comments. We would love to see you there.

Paul Heery
Executive Principal