Experience: Education

Enfield Road, Enfield

Crossways acted acted for Fairview Homes in providing strategic advice in terms of providing education use as part of a mixed-use development incliding housing on green belt land. Through our Skolar Education consultancy, we identified the need for an 8 form secondary school and conducted an open competition to find a suitable education provider.

Having selected Wren Acedemy, we assisted them in applying to the Department for Education and being accepted to open a new Free School on the site. The planning application for the housing development will follow on after the site has been deallocated green belt status through an expedited local plan review.

With the dedicated support of our partner organisation, Skolar Education, we have the expertise and experience to assess education needs in detail, conduct demographic profiling to identify best areas for location of new schools and assist with the whole process of identifying sites, presentation of strategies to ensure successful planning outcomes through to project management of new building projects. This consultancy advice is for the benefit of both existing/future school proviiders, as well as developers/landowners looking for provision of education facilities as part of major residential led projects.

Our capabilities include, but are not limited to;

  • Curriculum analysis, working with  Heads and proposer groups to best match teaching needs to space requirements together with testing the adaptability of solutions to future change.
  • Accommodation strategy development, including future capital expenditure, annual running costs and properly organised planned and day-to-day maintenance regimes. This is particularly important by acting in your best interests when engaging with the EFA and their advisors on your behalf to ensure that proposed projects are viable in the long term.
  • Master planning, providing a framework for future development and future proofing of any new school buildings, including maximising revenue generation from halls and sports facilities.
  • Project management of any building project, acting in your best interests when engaging with the EFA, their advisors and contractor to ensure that EFA procured buildings are delivered on time and meet the schools ethos, vision and educational requirements.
  • Lead on project delivery, to ensure solutions are cost effective and deliverable and can be implemented while existing school remains in operation potentially whilst in existing temporary accommodation.
  • Assistance with strategies for local community liaison, engagement with key third party stakeholders and local public relations in order to maximise successful planning outcomes.