Building Schools for the Future (BSF)

What is 'Building Schools for the Future?'
Building Schools for the Future (BSF) is a national government initiative to improve schools and bring them up to standard for the modern world. The Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) describes the vision of BSF as 'working together to create world class, 21st century schools - environments which will inspire learning for decades to come and provide exceptional assets for the whole community'.  The aim is to rebuild or renew secondary schools in England over a 10 to 15-year period, beginning in 2005-06. Funds are being made available to local educational authorities in 'waves' for secondary schools in their areas (Westminster is wave 3 out of 15 waves nationally).

How will BSF affect The Grey Coat Hospital?
Grey Coat favours an option which allows for additional accomodation to be built at the St Andrew's (lower school) site. This new building would essentially be an Arts block - incorporating music, drama, art and textiles suites as well as allowing for theatre and film studies to be taught in a more appropriate environment. This then has a knock-on effect on the existing clasrooms used for some of these subjects in the main St Andrew's building and also at our upper school building, St Michael's, by freeing up space to improve in other areas. St Michael's building is also affected with plans for remodelling and refurbishment in the Sixth Form common and dining areas.

We have recently created a BSF Options booklet which gives a full outline of our prefered option. Please click here to download this. We would be interested to hear your comments and feedback so please contact us at info@gch.org.uk.