Small win for Rolleston College after ministry downsized new build
Saturday, 4 May 2024
Weeks after parents of one of the fastest growing schools in the country blasted the Ministry of Education for cutting campus growth plans, the school and ministry have decided on a new build plan.
Canterbury’s Rolleston College has secured some small wins, but the fate of stages two and three of the build remain unknown.
An extra sports field, a larger weights room and the reuse of current temporary classrooms were welcomed changes for the new stage one build. The new gymnasium however, had been halved in size, and will still lose its offices and counselling space.
Principal Rachel Skelton said she was committed to “fight really hard” to secure stages two and three.
The school was bursting with 1800 students and expected another 1200 over the next six years.
In March it was announced its planned second campus, due to be built in stages and its first phase to open in 2025, had been delayed, stripped back and redesigned.
The first stage of the new build would now open at the start of 2026.
Skelton, who previously said she had lost faith in the ministry over the changes, said there were “positive” outcomes following a meeting on Friday.
She met with national new schools programme manager David Hobern and representatives from the school and the ministry’s Te Mahau team.
“We haven't got everything that we wanted, but it's a positive step forward in the right direction to make sure that we're getting the infrastructure that is really needed in Rolleston,” Skelton said.
Stage one will still include a 24-classroom STEM block, temporary classrooms and a gymnasium. It will accommodate at least 800 students with some flexibility for role growth.
The gym had been reduced from a double to a single court, but the outdoor sports field space would expand from one field to two.
The ministry’s redesign featured a small PE staff office inside the gym, which teaching staff said would be better utilised as space for a larger weights room.
“There will still be a staff room, but it won't be in the gym because the more space that we can have for teaching and learning, the better,” Skelton said.
Another welcomed change was reusing the “well-built” temporary classrooms currently in use at the new build site, which would free up more car parks and playing space for students.
The temporary classrooms were in use while a 700-student capacity extension was being built at the current site, but once that opened in August, they would not be necessary.
By the completion of stage one of the new build, both sites combined would almost accommodate the projected student population of 3000 by 2030, but Skelton said the plans didn’t meet the needs of specialist subjects.
That’s where stage two and three come in.
“There’s special things that a music student needs [or] that an arts student needs. It's not just about square metreage, it's about making sure that specialist facilities are there,” she said.
“That’s the reason we're keen to make sure all stages are built, as all eight areas of the New Zealand curriculum need to have permanent and purpose-built buildings in time, but we're happy with temporary for the next couple of years.”
Year 12, 13 and some year 11 students will learn in the newly built senior campus.
The fate of what stages two and three would look like “will be based on [student] numbers and budget” come 2026.
Skelton said she would be knocking on the ministry’s door immediately pushing for stage two to begin when that dawns.
“We certainly haven't taken our eye off, we want a full school.”
The population of Rolleston - dubbed the “town of the future”- grew from 3230 two decades ago to 28,000 last year.