BSF Government to decide next week

[Face-Man]

looks like they will final decide what to do

 

BBC News - School building announcement expected next week

 

my bet is the word "cut" might figure heavily....

[Blackadder]

Hopefully the word is "cut" and not "delay".

[broc]

BSF is one of the few Govt programs propping up the private sector building industry at the moment. House building is in the doldrums, the property market in general seems to be stalled so my guess is the program will continue but be streamlined.

 

They could save money if less time was wasted in the planning & design stages, perhaps having a set of off-the-shelf school designs rather than allowing schools to be quite so free with their vision of how the building should look/function?

[Guest Guest]

BSF is one of the few Govt programs propping up the private sector building industry at the moment. House building is in the doldrums, the property market in general seems to be stalled so my guess is the program will continue but be streamlined.

 

They could save money if less time was wasted in the planning & design stages, perhaps having a set of off-the-shelf school designs rather than allowing schools to be quite so free with their vision of how the building should look/function?

 

Nice spin

 

I do agree though, why should every school be different? Surerly we know what works and what doesnt by now. It could even be modular too; "we like the wheel and spoke design but we would think creative arts would benefit from the design such and such a school has got". That way every school is abit different and feels as though they got a say, but without all the crazy "pioneering" ideas like multi-purpose halls and 10ft football terrace sofas.

[Gar]

Perhaps if 12.5% of the funding for EVERY school build didn't go to consultants there would have been a bit more to spread around sooner... Now it looks like it's all over they'll be retiring until Labour get back in.

 

Seriously though, I spent some time with a recently finished school a couple of months ago and they'd been charged £45,000 for an IT Consultant (Becta framework) to write about 200 words in their Output Specification. He also wanted to charge them £7,000 to "assess the suitability" of their current desktop population for future use. The youngest machine they had was 6 years old.

 

We're all in the wrong line of work...

[Blackadder]

Interesting thought about the builds keeping the construction industry alive... my school (thankfully) is listed and can't be modified externally at all, plus the local council won't give planning permission for extra buildings in the grounds. So I wonder what BSF can do for us? Maybe tart up the inside a bit, that's probably about it!

[jsnetman]

I think the LA's have already been informed about what projects will go ahead and which ones won't, just been informed by the head that BSF will not happen here, we were due to go BSF after the bidder had been chosen sometime this year. The head was not keen on a managed IT service but was desperate for a new school, so he would of went for it should we have got it.

 

We being in North Tyneside.

Edited June 30, 2010 by jsnetman

[sicknote]

There are some schools around where I am which are crying out for this. It will be a shame if elements of this are cut back as in the long run it's the students that will suffer.

[GoldenWonder]

I think the LA's have already been informed about what projects will go ahead and which ones won't, just been informed by the head that BSF will not happen here, we were due to go BSF after the bidder had been chosen sometime this year. The head was not keen on a managed IT service but was desperate for a new school, so he would of went for it should we have got it.

 

We being in North Tyneside.

 

Hmm I'm in NT as well and we haven't been told anything like that yet. As far as we know its business as usual but it was a long way off anyway