The Manchester Evening News
Friday 9 December 2011

Press Release: Friday 9 December 2011

Manchester’s newest school - New Islington Free School – will be created in partnership with one of Manchester’s oldest school s – The Manchester Grammar School, working with Urban Splash.

New Islington is a Millennium Community inner city regeneration project.  It is exciting, innovative and well advanced in its development.  The vision and the broad commitment to achieving it can best be understood by spending a few moments browsing the website at http://www.urbansplash.co.uk/residential/new-islington

At the heart of the vision are outstanding community facilities; health centre, shops, restaurants, recreational facilities and, of course, child care and community education facilities including a primary school.

The principal partners in New Islington are Urban Splash, Manchester City Council and the Homes and Communities Agency.  Now joining this group and with a particular interest in the development of first-rate educational facilities is The Manchester Grammar School (MGS).

Plans are well advanced to open a new primary school in New Islington.  It will be a Free School which means it will be funded in full by central government but controlled and run by an independent exempt charity working through a board of governors.  An application will be lodged with the DfE in February 2012 with a view to the school opening in September 2013 or September 2014.  To that end the consortium is working closely with the New Schools Network (NSN) and Partnership for Schools (PfS).

MGS will be responsible for the curriculum for the School, the appointment of the Head Teacher and the academic staff, and leadership of the governing body.  Urban Splash will coordinate the capital development in partnership with the Homes and Communities Agency and Manchester City Council.
 
The school will be called New Islington Free School

The School will deliver a first rate primary education with the curriculum and staffing being under the aegis of MGS.  It will provide a focus of educational excellence in the city centre that will attract families who may otherwise move out to the suburbs as well children from families already resident in the area immediately surrounding the proposed site.  It will be a nucleus around which the community will grow with extended opening hours welcoming children and adults alike to play as well as study.

The School will be mixed (boys and girls) and comprehensive (non-selective on academic grounds) in its intake.  It will provide high quality education drawing on the best principles of MGS delivered in and adapted for a different context; it will not be a clone of MGS.  There is expected to be contact between the schools at all levels though.

Before an application to open the School can be considered, hard evidence of demand for places needs to be collected.  The Department for Education requires this to identify real children who may attend the School so parents of children who will be of Reception age (4 years) through to Year 5 (9 years) in September 2013 are now invited to get in touch to register that interest.  They can do that via links on the websites of Urban Splash or MGS.  Three priority catchments have been identified; the residential area immediately surrounding the School in New Islington, the residential areas immediately adjacent to New Islington and children of commuters who work in the city centre.

Sir Richard Leese, Leader of Manchester City Council, said: It's long been one of our goals to have a new primary school in New Islington and that vision is moving forward step by step. We're pleased to be working with Manchester Grammar School and Urban Splash in this innovative partnership which we're confident will help make New Islington an even more attractive place to live.




Tom Bloxham MBE, Chairman of Urban Splash, said:  I've long had an ambition to build a new primary school in New Islington. We've already delivered hundreds of homes, workplaces, a clinic, a park and a marina and are now delighted to be making real progress towards building an inner city free school in New Islington.

There's a generation of people who've lived in city apartments for the past decade but at the point of having children they often feel that they have to move out to the suburbs.  This is a great initiative that takes us one step closer to providing more facilities at New Islington. I hope the school will be a great asset to residents of both the city centre and East Manchester and will combine the educational ambitions of MGS with our own ambition of turning New Islington into one of the very best areas of Manchester.

Much work is still to be done but we look forward to working with MGS and the City Council to create what I hope will be one of the best free primary schools in the city.

To register your interest in the New Islington Free School please visit www.newislingtonschool.com

Contact details:

Sally-Anne Rogers
Director of Public Relations
The Manchester Grammar School

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07701 059726