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Condition Improvement Fund Announcement Spring 2024

   

We are thrilled to announce that over the Easter holidays the School has been awarded over £1.1m of funding from the ESFA (Education and Skills Funding Agency) via the Condition Improvement Fund (CIF). Sutton Girls is in the top 1% of recipients from CIF in the last five years. In 2019, we identified that the main building of the school required major investment, namely replacing the roof, boilers including associated pipe network and electrics. Including this recent announcement, the School has secured over £3m via the CIF since 2020 to facilitate these works. The latest project to replace the heating distribution network will complete the work required on the main building and is expected to commence in the May half-term. We have adopted a fabric first approach through recent years to ensure we have a safe and comfortable learning environment for our students.

These projects have vastly improved daily life in the school, in some cases replacing components that dated back to 1929. The main building roof is no longer leaking, our gas consumption has been reduced by 40%, electricity 15% in the last 5 years allowing us to invest more funds into students’ education whilst also reducing our carbon emissions.

The next phase of our vision is to enhance the school estate with an additional building. This has been made possible through the success of accessing external funding for the refurbishment projects in the main building. Over the summer term we are hoping to finalise designs for this new venture of which we have been planning for over 2 years. This building will create new spaces for Sixth Form, Drama, Music, and additional classrooms, helping to enhance our offering as a leading school in the UK. Current costs are estimated to be around £3.5m, of which we have £3m in place. We hope to break ground on this in July 2025 with a view to opening in late 2026.

In order to close the gap, we would welcome the help of the school community. A great way of doing this is a regular or one-off donation to the school charity, which can be done via the Charity Aid Foundation.
We are hoping later in the Summer Term to arrange an information evening for the School Community where we can share our vision with you. Further details will be provided at a later date. In the meantime, if you have any questions or fundraising ideas, please feel free to contact me via finance@suttcold.bham.sch.uk. Look out for regular updates via the weekly parent bulletin and half-termly newsletters.