Lewisham Council are close to starting substantial rebuilding of Crofton School to expand the school, provide modern facilities and a better environment in which to study
- sports centre users have been contacted to tell them about alternative facilities and the council is working with sports clubs to assist them to find alternative venues
- a new Sport Hall at Forest Hill is expected to be completed in December 2005 and open in January 2006. The Mayor has just agreed a five year programme of investment in sport and leisure
- better PE facilities, with public access, are part of Lewisham’s aspirations for redeveloped schools across the borough and community use agreements for public access will be negotiated.
Ensuring better schools for our children is a priority for the Council and the people of Lewisham. Crofton School is due for a major modernisation as part of Lewisham’s £200million Building Schools for the Future Programme. The site needs to be vacant from 10 July to allow work to start.
The redevelopment of Crofton will include the expansion of the school from 6 forms of entry to 8 forms of entry. Extra capacity is planned to come on stream in September 2007.
At the request of the school, Lewisham assisted in managing community access to the sports facilities out of school hours in the run up to the redevelopment of the school. The school have continued to have responsibility for the building.
The Council have written to all users to tell them about the closure. They have also been given details of alternative sporting facilities in the borough. Organised clubs are being assisted by the Council to transfer to Forest Hill or other sites. Forest Hill is likely to accommodate badminton, basketball and netball clubs. There will, however, be a small time delay between the closure of Crofton and them being able to use Forest Hill. Other sites are available immediately.
There are no plans to remove the astroturf facilities at Crofton although they will not be available for use during building work.
The new Crofton school will house a sports hall, gym, drama facilities and the external sports pitch plus associated changing accommodation, for curriculum purposes. These school facilities will be available for hiring out to the community during evenings and weekends. The rebuilding of the school should be completed by August 2007 subject to the award of the PFI contract.