I visited the Michaela Academy site at Arena House in Wembley Park yesterday and was concerned at the state of the building which 120 Year 7s are expected to attend in less than a month.
I am awaiting responses from Michaela and Wilmott Dixon, the builders, to my enquiries about building progress.
Any delay will follow the failure of two other free schools, Gateway and Gladstone, to open in Brent in September, which left those Year 7 pupils to find places in other local schools.
On its website Michaela says:
Whilst the refurbishment of the entire building is scheduled to be completed by early 2015, from September 2014 we will have the use of a substantial portion of the site with all the necessary facilities and resources to enhance the education of our first Year 7 pupils.
In our first year at Michaela we will only have 120 pupils and eight teachers, and it has always been our intention to limit our use of the building to the lower floors, with the upper levels opening as the school grows.
The photographs below were taken yesterday evening and I leave readers to judge for themselves:
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| The 'playground' beneath the building |
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| A classroom? |
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| External view? |
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