Four city schools get £2m for new places

More than £2m will be spent creating more than 200 new pupil places at four Wolverhampton schools.

The extra places will be created at Morteon School in Bushbury, Aldersley High School, St Matthias School in Deansfield and Bilston CE Primary School from the start of the new school year in September to accommodate rising demand.

The majority of the funding will go to Amethyst Academies Trust, which receives £1.725m to create new secondary places at Moreton and Aldersley, with a smaller expansion at St Matthias.

Bilston primary will get £150,000 for reconfigurations to accommodate extra spaces as it is currently oversubscribed.

One of two schools in the plan belonging to Amethyst Academies Trust, which is getting £1.725 across both sites to add places.

Ninety additional spaces will be created at Moreton, in Old Fallings Lane, Bushbury, including an extra "bulge" class in Year 7. These are added where there are particular pressures in a year group.

Years 8 and 9 will also get 30 extra spaces each, totalling 90 across the school.

Also run by the Amethyst Trust, Aldersley will gain 70 places.

The school in Barnhurst Lane, Codsall, will also get a Year 7 bulge class of 30, and 20 extra spaces in Years 8 and 9.

City of Wolverhampton Council said the school was already carrying out extension work to its sports hall to create new changing areas and additional learning space.

The school's gym and dance studio will also be relocated to provide extra classrooms and changes around the IT department to create more space.

The smallest secondary expansion in this programme comes at St Matthias School, on Dean's Road, Moseley Village.

Fifteen extra spaces will be created there, but without extra funding under this plan.

The local authority said further talks would be held over future demand and capacity at the school, on the city's eastern boundary near Willenhall.

A total of £150,000 will be spent to create an extra 30 places at Bilston CE Primary School.

The council said the school traditionally catered for up to 60 pupils per year group but currently had 30-pupil bulge classes in Years 4 and 6.

The work at Bilston includes reconfiguring a classroom for a different age group, refurbishing toilets and new fences.

The council said the school was a "very popular parental preference", creating high demand for places.

This will not be the end of the requirement for extra school places in Wolverhampton.

A council cabinet meeting on Wednesday will consider an expansion at Colton Hills Community School from September 2027 to account for a lack of capacity in the south-east of the city.

A report to councillors said the increase in formal capacity followed several years in which the school had informally managed an increase in admissions.

Forecasts suggest a bulge in Wolverhampton's birth rate in the early part of this century has levelled off, but in its policy for school places up until 2027, the council recognises that continued house building will bring in more families requiring extra provision.

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