Contractor appointed to build £1m school extension

Stoke-based Novus Property Solutions has won a £1m contract to deliver a two-storey extension at Excel Academy in Stoke-on-Trent.

The extension, at what is considered to be the city’s most oversubscribed school, was granted planning consent in November 2018.

To meet a demand in capacity at the school has been using a number of mobile classrooms and the extension is designed to increase capacity and improve the flow of students moving around the school between lessons.

Six new multi-purpose classrooms will are being built as part of the 6,233 sq ft extension, which will also include internal fixtures and a new covered stairwell as a separate addition.

Dean Povey, Build Senior Operations Manager at Novus, said: “Excel Academy is a hugely popular school in Stoke-on-Trent and the new classrooms are designed to ensure it can meet current and future student capacity.

“Academies, by their nature, have to define their own proposition to parents and students and the quality of learning environments is a huge part of that. Our extensive experience in education means we know how to create spaces that help pupils and teachers to achieve their best, with works specially planned to avoid any disruption.”

Last month Novus completed a three-bedroom Premier Inn at Hereward College in Coventry, which is the smallest of Whitbread’s 800 odd hotels in the chain that will help train students for careers in the hospitality sector.

The Excel Academy extension is set to be completed in September 2019 with measures in place to avoid disruption during term time.

Stephen Goodwin, Head of Support Services at Excel Academy, said: “We’re incredibly proud of the success of the academy and due to its popularity, we’ve recently had to introduce temporary mobile classrooms to accommodate students.

“The new extension is designed to provide us with much needed teaching space and be a long-term solution to the high demand.

“Novus’s expertise in the education sector makes it the perfect partner to be delivering this project.”

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