St John’s scores a new $1.7million hall
Wednesday June 17, 2009
St John’s principal Deb Fryer with Year 5 students Bonnie Wilson and Gabbi Lennon outside the school’s old hall, which will be incorporated into the design for the new $1.7million hall which the school received funding for this week.
St John’s School has been awarded $2million in funding to build a new multipurpose hall and refurbish a number of classrooms.
The school was one of almost 5,000 schools to receive funding under Round Two of the Federal Government’s Primary Schools for the 21st Century (P21) funding pool.
Federal Minister for Education and Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard formally notified the school this week that it would receive $1,763,300 for the construction of a new
multipurpose hall and $236,700 for the refurbishment of classrooms.
School principal Deb Fryer told The Cobar Weekly on Monday the school community is thrilled with the announcement.
“The new multipurpose centre will include a canteen, a sports resource room, a music resource room, and we will be able to hold classes for cooking because it will feature mobile benches,” Mrs Fryer said.
“The old hall will be incorporated into the new building.
“There will be cantilever doors which lead out onto a covered basketball court, so it will be a wet weather facility as well,” Mrs Fryer said.
The P21 funding is part of the Federal Government’s Building the Education Revolution plan, which netted the school $125,000 in April this year.
The $125,000, along with the funding announced this week, is being spent on painting and carpeting in classrooms, new windows, and new walkways.
A requirement of the P21 funding is that the project commences immediately, with a deadline of January 2011 for the project to be completed.
Mrs Fryer said an architect is now in the process of finalising the plans and coordinating the tender process for construction.
“They will go through the usual tender process and we are hoping that it will be awarded to local tradesmen,” Mrs Fryer said.
Round Two of the P21 funding program saw a total of $6.3billion awarded to schools across Australia, with Catholic schools
sharing in 20 per cent of the total funding pool.
According to the funding guidelines, the construction of 21st century libraries in schools was the first priority for the federal government, followed by the construction of multipurpose halls or covered outdoor learning areas.
“These buildings will provide students, teachers and the wider school community with access to a range of high quality resources, information and cutting edge tools to support learning and improve the quality and diversity of learning environments,” Mrs Gillard said.
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