Fancy a look around Aylesbury's new £24 million school?

Construction students, prospective pupils and interested local residents have a chance to go behind the scenes of a new secondary school building in Aylesbury this week.
An artists impression of how the new school will lookAn artists impression of how the new school will look
An artists impression of how the new school will look

BAM Construction is taking the public on guided tours of its £24 million project to create the 1,000-pupil St Michael’s Catholic School on the site of the former Quarrendon School on Weedon Road in Meadowcroft.

They started work on St Michael’s in January 2018.

The company is using a mixture of traditional and modern construction techniques to deliver the school ready for the start of the next academic year in September.

The facility – to feature two three-storey teaching wings as well as a building spine arranges around a central courtyard – will become the Aylesbury campus of the Ofsted ‘good’ rated High Wycombe St Michael’s Catholic School.

It is forecast to provide half the additional secondary school capacity required to meet projected housing growth in Aylesbury Vale over the next five years.

To book a place to visit on 20 March visit: https://opendoors.construction/site/213Local firms have been employed on the project including safety alarm subcontractor Aylesbury Fire Systems, fellow Aylesbury firm Niall Scaffolders as well as Fascel Mechanical from Luton and Rickmansworth’s Landworth Electrics. Aylesbury Tuck provide the site café.

A third of the people working on the scheme live within a 10-mile radius of it, including local apprentices getting their first taste of work.

Senior site manager Guy Milton will greet the pre-booked groups, offer them refreshments and give them a short presentation on the school project and BAM’s other work in the area.

They will be shown some of the techniques the contractor is using on site, including traditional trades as well as modern handheld devices with 3D models that quicken communication between the many parties involved in big construction projects.

Then there will be a tour of parts of the live site followed by an opportunity for questions.

Public tours of the site are taking place throughout Wednesday 20 March - but places are filling up fast.

Construction students from three local colleges have already reserved places to benefit from the opportunity to see a national contractor’s work up close.

Guy Milton said he was looking forward to showing people around the St Michael’s site.

"This is a fantastic project where local people and companies are coming together and working hard in the spirit of collaboration to create a school Aylesbury can be really proud of,’ he said.

"I look forward to welcoming students, parents and any interested people to see what will be a buzzing construction site.

"We’ll do our best to show them what we do and answer any questions they have so they can go away more informed about this brilliant project and exciting industry.

‘It will be particularly interesting seeing how some of the students react to the game- changing technology – the younger generation will probably be quicker to pick it up than some of us in the industry!"