June is upon us and so came the rain... and the problems!

Faith Centre Steel Work

Whatever happened to "Flaming June"eh? It seems like for years our best weather has always been May/June leading up to a usually damp summer but the rain came early and bought with it some problems!

Now, having, in a former life, worked in the building industry I can safely say no matter how hard you try to prevent problems happening they still happen! We are working/living/learning in a building site and with it comes all the problems associated with refurbishing a building. It's not easy for the contractors, who it has to be said have been golden, but it's not easy for us in school either. Jack hammers, cement mixers, cranes, power drills hammers and the like all make a lot of noise. The dust is horrendous, so, if its hot you have to think twice about opening windows for example!
However, a deluge of rain over the weekend highlighted a problem in the fabric of the building where new joins old and we had a leak!
It culminated with a few stains, a damp carpet in the corridor and sadly, for me in ICT, a soggy computer that no longer works! In fairness to the builders they acted swiftly and plugged the leak and have offered to pay for the repair to the pc, so, all will be good in the end. BUT!! This is not mentioned when we are told we are having a new school being built and you cannot begin to imagine the impending disruption that ensues once the contractors come on site!

Onwards and upwards as they say!

The school is a little behind schedule but, it is really starting to take shape "good and proper" now! We have had sight of our new server room on the first floor of the new build by the main hall and over the holidays BT laid the new fibre optic to this new room for the school broadband feed and another to the temporary server room to keep connectivity all in order. Stephen, my techy, ably supported by James, from E-services, made all the connections and...it did not work!

Theatre roof as seen from above

As it was Friday, they left and had a ponder and a "cunning plan" was hatched! Monday saw a new week, and a commbined effort between us all quickly sorted the problem and all was working within the hour!

So what else is happening?

The newly drained and laid football field

The roof on the new Theatre is ready for its final layer of stainless steel, the new Faith centre steelwork is up and giving a clear hint to its definitive shape and although I have not seen it yet, the new MUGA is painted and looks the part! Generally around site you can see that the size of the new build is enormous taking up most of the "footie field" that used to be infront of the tennis courts and from pictures I have seen, the Football fields behind the old fencing which have had the new drainage installed are now flat and look nice and green. Perhaps now we can have a good game down there in the winter months with out taking a mud bath and chopping the filed up? We will see soon enough! But it looks good...
You can see in the pictures that the inside is starting to take shape as services are being installed and some interior walls define the structure hinting at things to come. Let's not forget... there is still a long way to go before completion and we are nearly one year into the build. It hasn't been easy for anyone concerned and we have just over a year left before it should all be finished.

Will it be worth it? "You betchya!!"