Fresh plans for multi-million pound 82-pupil Stoke-on-Trent school building

Fresh plans have been lodged for a new multi-million pound development for pupils with special educational needs on a demolished former school site. Stoke-on-Trent City Council wants to transform the old Middlehurst School site, in Chell, which closed 10 years ago.

The proposal would see a new SEN school building constructed to provide much-needed facilities for the nearby Watermill School, which ‘operates above its current capacity’. The vandal-plagued former school was demolished back in 2022, a year after the local authority secured £7.5 million of Government funding for the proposed development.

Similar plans, which included a sports hall, were then lodged and rubber-stamped in January 2023. However, revised proposals have now been put forward.

The planning application states that the new satellite facility will cater for 82 pupils aged between seven and 16 years old. Eight classrooms will be created along with a suite of specialist teaching spaces and staff facilities.

The new development would provide 71 car parking spots as well as seven disability spaces. It is hoped that, if the plans are approved, building work could begin by the end of the year with the development completed by around mid-2026.

The design and access statement says: “The current Watermill School is a SEN school and is located off Turnhurst Road. The school was part of the former BSF programme and was built at the same time and adjacent to the Ormiston Horizon Academy approximately 10 years ago.

“The existing Watermill School operates above its current capacity and has limited scope for extension on its exiting site. However, the Authority has suitable nearby land to develop a satellite provision which has been an element of the Authority’s long-standing strategy to retain former education land for potential future provision in this way.

“The main satellite expansion to Watermill School is a long established plan to bring back into use for SEN provision land formerly used for the Middlehurst Special School (prior to its closure on the formation of Watermill School).”

Members of the council’s planning committee are expected to approve the application next week.

Source: Stoke-on-Trent Live