EC Harris is providing project management services for the schools, including advice on setting up the trust and governance frameworks, helping to manage the relationship between the school and key stakeholders, setting up service level agreements, managing the TUPE process, and where relevant, performance manage delivery partners and quality assure outcomes.
The schools that EC Harris is working with are:
- Europa Free School, a specialist language centre serving the Oxford and Abingdon areas. It aims to ensure that all students leave the school fluent and literate in two languages.
- Alban City Free School, proposed by a group of teachers and parents in combination with Hertfordshire County Council to address the lack of primary school places in the centre of St Albans.
- Stephenson School Academy in Milton Keynes, replacing the Gatehouse School, an 11-16 year old boys behavioural, emotional and social difficulties (BESD) school, with a co-educational academy for a 13-19 year olds. This is the first special school project to procured through the DfE’s new framework.
- Bridgewater College Academy in Somerset, being formed by amalgamating local nursery/infant, primary and secondary schools to address issues of low attendance and high levels of unemployment in the area.
- Stone Soup Learns Free School, an existing social enterprise in Nottingham providing vocational courses for young people with behavioural difficulties not able to access full time mainstream education. The 11-19 year old alternative provision secondary school will have places for 100 pupils when open.
- City Gateway Free School in Tower Hamlets, converting an existing independent school into a free school with 462 places.
Account leader for education Phil Wright said: “These schools are being set up to address specific needs in local areas with their communities in mind. We are experienced at delivering complex educational projects and these schools offer us the opportunity to create tailored, successful schools that suit a range of ages and needs.”
EC Harris is also already working on four other school projects; Portland All Through Academy, Samuel Ryder Academy in St Alban’s, St Barnabas Primary Academy in Manchester and Heyworth Primary Academy, in Sussex.
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