In an ideal world, all school refurbishment projects would be delivered outside of term time.  In the real world, that’s not always possible.

The project may be too complex to fit within the six-week summer recess or too urgent to wait that long. However, carrying out works during term time shouldn’t involve disruption to staff, students or the normal running of the school, as LST’s recent scheme at Cowplain Community School in Waterlooville demonstrates.

A busy high school with a wide range of facilities available for community use and private hire, Cowplain Community School required full refurbishment of all six of its science labs, including complete strip out of the labs, prep rooms and stairwells, removal of asbestos, upgrades to mechanical and electrical services and new finishes, lighting and furniture.

To enable the school to operate effectively during the project, we phased the programme to ensure asbestos removal and refurbishment of three of the labs was carried out during the school holidays.  This enabled the three remaining labs to be refurbished individually during term time.

Completing both the asbestos removal and the refurbishment of three of the labs during the summer break involved a demanding programme with extended working hours.  However, as a contractor with wide-ranging experience of school refurbishment and improvement projects, we understand the business-critical need to ensure health and safety hazards are avoided and schools are able to operate during term time. 

As a result, we worked flexibly to develop a programme that focused on getting the school ready for occupation in September, while completing the remaining works with as little disruption as possible over the following two months.

The scheme demonstrates that it is possible to combine term-time construction works with a programme that begins during school holidays, but the success of such a project depends on effective planning and detailed scheduling from an experienced contractor like LST.