£19m refit creates three-in-one school

Published: 19 March 2010
by JOSH LEOB

HOLLOWAY School has two reasons to celebrate. In January, staff and pupils waved goodbye to “The Cube” – a cramped temporary block – and trooped into new classrooms built as part of a £19million overhaul. 

The following month, the 900-pupil school received an inspectors’ report commending the commitment of staff and its “zero tolerance” of anti-social behaviour. 

The overhaul was funded by the government’s Building Schools for the Future scheme. It involved stitching together three buildings built over more than three generations – the turreted Edwardian “old school”, a 1950s block and new wings opened this year.

Construction company Balfour Beatty is now putting the finishing touches to a new dining hall and landscaping the gardens – the final stages of a project five years in the making.    

Pupils say the new buildings have brought big improvements. Head girl Sky Diaz, 16, who has been predicted 18 A-C grades in GCSE exams this year, said:  “The school has changed a lot. The classroom environment has been upgraded and things are a lot more comfortable than they were.”

Malik West, 15, who is expected to net an even higher number of A-C grades, agreed: “The environment is better for everyone. It’s a much better place to work.”

Ofsted inspectors praised the school’s “able and resilient” headteacher, Bob Hamlyn. He vowed to continue the improvements, adding: “We won’t rest until we become outstanding.

“We have high aspirations. I don’t want the urban context to be an excuse for under-achievement. The students and staff can do as well as any in the country and it is important our building matches that.”

Mr Hamlyn, in his sixth year as head, says some of the school buildings were “not fit for purpose” prior to the construction work. The school now has a new Apple Mac suite, a refurbished swimming pool managed by Aquaterra and a hi-tech study support centre, a joint venture between Arsenal in the Community and Cambridge Education. 

The school corridors are decorated with pupils’ artwork. Mr Hamlyn said: “The white walls of these corridors could easily be ruined by one pupil with a marker pen, but they haven’t been because the pupils respect them.”

Other Islington schools benefiting from Building Schools for the Future money are St Aloysius College, Islington Arts and Media School of Creativity, Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Language College, Central Foundation Boys School, Mount Carmel Technology College, Highbury Fields School and New River College Pupil Referral Unit.