Outwood Family Building For The Future

The last twelve months have seen a lot of uncertainty with the ongoing coronavirus pandemic spreading across the globe, but despite this the Outwood Family has continued to invest in its students with a range of estate projects taking place across the Trust.

In the last year, the Outwood Family has invested millions of pounds into the infrastructure of its academies to ensure that the children that attend them are given the best facilities in a safe environment for learning.

A major highlight of the academic year saw Outwood Primary Academy Kirkhamgate open its new multi-million pound school building, funded solely by the Outwood Family. The building is complete with state-of-the-art classrooms and sporting, computing and design facilities.

There has been a multi-million pounds investment in sporting facilities across the Outwood Family, with numerous academies benefiting from new sports halls and sports pitches.

A brand new 3G sports pitch has been built at Outwood Academy Easingwold, providing the local community as well as the academy with an all-weather sports pitch, alongside a brand new sports hall as part of a multi-million pound investment in sports at the academy. 

Funding came from the Outwood Family, the Premier League, The Football Association (FA), the Government’s Football Foundation, Hambleton District Council, Easingwold Town AFC, and Friends of Easingwold School.

The sports hall at Outwood Academy Ripon has also been completely upgraded after it was stripped back completely to its steel frame before being over clad with new brickwork and metal cladding.

Students at the academy will now be able to play football, netball, basketball, volleyball, badminton, or tennis in the new and improved sports hall, while the changing rooms have also been upgraded to include separate male and female changing facilities with new private shower areas. 

Major refurbishment works across the Outwood Family have also been completed over the previous academic year.

At Outwood Primary Academy Bell Lane the main building underwent a refurbishment with facilities being improved, as did the main building at Outwood Primary Academy Park Hill with the primary academy also getting a new roof too.

At the secondary academies, two major refurbishments works that completed in 2019/2020 were a major remodelling and refurbishment at Outwood Academy Foxhills and a significant refurbishment of the main building at Outwood Academy Freeston.

Katy Bradford, Chief Operating Officer at Outwood Grange Academies Trust, said:

“We are delighted that despite the uncertainty of the last academic year, we have managed to continue with our ambitious estates programme. 

“At Outwood, we believe in putting students first, raising standards and transforming lives, and as part of this we want to ensure they have the very best facilities possible available to them to help them fulfil their potential.”

Another major project currently ongoing within the Outwood Family is the multi-million pound redevelopment of the Outwood Academy Hemsworth site. The highlight of the project is the construction of a new 17 classroom teaching block that will house music and drama rooms, art rooms, a main hall and a dining room.

Due to the vast scale of the project, it is hoped that it would be concluded by the end of 2021 but due to issues arising from the coronavirus pandemic, it may not be completed until 2022.

Outwood Primary Academy Ledger Lane is also undergoing a redevelopment of its own, with a new build nursery extension and remodelling which has been well received by those that have been fortunate enough to see it so far. 

The project is soon to be completed having experienced just some slight delays at the end of the project due to the coronavirus pandemic.

In the Northern region, Outwood Academy Ormesby is undergoing a dining hall extension and classroom remodelling to help better cater for its students and provide them with a better dining experience. The project is due to be completed before the end of the year.

The Post-16 Centre at Outwood Academy Valley, in the Outwood Family Southern region, is also undergoing an expansion as part of a project. 

The expansion will be a welcome boost for post-16 students and provide them with better equipped facilities for their learning. Unfortunately this project has also been hit by the pandemic and will be finished after it was originally planned, but it should still be completed within the next academic year.

Outwood Academy City Fields, in the Outwood Family Central region, is undergoing a refurbishment currently with work taking place in the hall/dining area to help better equip the facility for the students. 

In addition to this more handrails have been put in place on site, as well as additional emergency lighting units and fire stopping and fire door replacements have taken place.

As well as investing in improving current facilities and building new ones, the Outwood Family has also overseen a number of safeguarding projects across the Trust.

These include improving, or installing, fencing at three Outwood Primaries (OPA Bell Lane, OPA Newstead Green, & OPA Park Hill) and two Outwood Secondaries (OA City Fields, & OA Hemsworth) to help keep children, and staff, safe.