FORWARD TO THE FUTURE

At last the barriers are starting to come down!  Area by area, room by room, staff and pupils are beginning to enjoy the brilliance of design and quality of workmanship which lie behind our massively complex building project.  For visitors to the website, the time has come to give a full account of what is happening, and of the benefits which the project will secure for school and community alike.

The springboard for the entire project was of course the need to provide for expansion: in September 2007, with the new Year 7 entry, the student population will grow from its current 760 to over 1,000.  There was also an urgent need to improve facilities: expansion in the past concentrated on the addition of classroom blocks, the newest science laboratories date from the seventies, and the catering and physical education areas have remained virtually unchanged for forty years.  Most of the faculties have been working in outdated conditions, and our Business and Enterprise Specialist College has been operating from a tiny room next to the main foyer.

The current transformation has been achieved by moving upwards as well as outwards.  Despite problems caused by the varying heights of existing buildings, a spacious first floor has been created which almost circles the present main school.  Brand-new sporting and catering facilities dominate the outward façade, as does the 21st-century layout for car parking and coach transport so vital for a rural school.  Close to the original entrance doors is the “stand-alone” Business Centre, a separate project financed by the capital sum associated with our specialist status and other monies raised through sponsorship.  The entire development is in the hands of architects Lambert Scott Innes of Norwich, and the school has enjoyed excellent working relationships both with them and with Mansells, the main contractor responsible for the whole building operation.  On our side, all credit is due to the Herculean labours of Mr. A. Wood, formerly Head of Technology but now Project Manager, and to Mr. A. Moore, who has concentrated on the electrical and electronic installations, and whose family firm, AA Joinery of Great Yarmouth, carried out the superb work on benching and worktops in the Business Centre’s ICT suite. 

Let’s make a “virtual tour” of the new facilities.  The imposing building at the eastern end of the site is of course the new Sports Hall.  Three times the size of our present gym, it is a “four-court” hall, and behind it is a multi-use outdoor games area with two courts and planning permission for floodlighting.  The purchase of part of the adjoining field will give us two football pitches to replace the space lost through the building programme.  Adjacent to the hall, and part of the same building, are the new kitchens and dining hall, with plenty of space outside for gathering and socialising.  The old kitchens will be mothballed for the present;  when funding allows, they may be adapted and used for catering courses.  The old Hall will remain untouched and, as ever, serve as home to assemblies, examinations, concerts and dramatic productions.

The Science Department will have three new laboratories with state-of-the-art equipment: two on the ground floor of the original school building and one in the Technology Block, which will be the headquarters for Mr. Taylor’s Agricultural Unit.  Mathematics will be centred on the first floor at the front of the school.  The main ICT room will remain in use, but Technology will have new open computer areas as well as an ICT/Graphics laboratory, a remodelled workshop and machine room, and on the new first floor two rooms for food technology and one for textiles.  Faculty offices will also be on the first floor, with resource rooms and toilets for staff and pupils.

The Arts Faculty will take over the old gymnasium, converting it into two teaching areas for dance, drama and music, and the Arts Block itself is to be remodelled as the Faculty’s nerve centre.  The Learning Support Unit will operate from a conversion of the old changing rooms, and the Pastoral Care Faculty will work from the adjoining area, on the other side of the Long Corridor.  The new Library will be situated on the first floor, above the reception area, while the staff room will move to the upper rooms previously occupied by Learning Support.  The main school entrance and reception area are also to be rebuilt. 

The new Business Centre, set on its own in front and to the right of the main entrance, is equipped with a 100-seat lecture theatre, an ICT suite, a meeting room, office space and its own lavatories.  It has been built to the highest specifications, and designed so that it can be leased out for functions and conferences as well as being used by the school.

A vital improvement at the front of the school is the new exit route for vehicles, which allows traffic to circulate on a one-way basis. There is generous car parking space, and for buses and coaches there are two dedicated lanes which permit unimpeded parking and movement.  There is also a new pedestrian entrance from the road to the main doors.  The development has given us the opportunity to introduce significant Health and Safety improvements, with new fire and burglar alarm systems, access and parking provision for the disabled, outdoor ramps, lifts to the first floor and platform lifts in the Long Corridor.  The building work will be completed with careful and attractive landscaping of the entire site.

Our “virtual tour” is complete – but how is the work actually progressing?  At present, we are crammed to capacity: there are 11 mobile classrooms in use and recreational space is more restricted than ever.  Conditions for teachers are difficult, too: their workroom is temporarily lost, and the old library, cramped and crowded with bookshelves, has to do duty as a staff room.  Still – one new laboratory has just been handed over; after half-term we should have use of a new workshop and machine room, together with the new mathematics classrooms; and after Christmas the whole of the first floor, the Sports Hall and the new dining hall and kitchens should be in our hands.   The Business Centre, of course, is already up and running, and the entire project is still scheduled for completion in August 2007.  Those of us who merely stand and watch should be immensely grateful to Mr. Wood, Mr. Moore and Mansells, and to all who have had a hand in the planning of this complex enterprise, for their part in securing a splendid material inheritance for future generations at Flegg High.