St Benedict’s Catholic School, in Bury St Edmunds, to progress plans for new sixth form building following approval

Plans for a new sixth form facility at a Bury St Edmunds secondary school have been approved.

St Benedict’s Catholic School, in Beetons Way, applied to West Suffolk Council for a single-storey detached building to house the sixth form. It would feature a study space, common room, office, toilet, lobby and kitchenette.

On Monday, West Suffolk Council granted planning approval, subject to several conditions.

Previously, headteacher Imogen Senior said they always described their sixth form as ‘small but perfectly formed’ and they wanted to make sure the school’s excellent teaching was matched by excellent student spaces.

She said: “As a long-standing provider of excellent post-16 education we are always looking for ways to enhance our sixth form provision.

“As St Benedict’s has continued to grow we have for some time been planning on developing the resources in school for our sixth form students.”

A supporting document with the application said the school was built in the 1960s for a third of the pupil numbers that there are currently, and whilst additional classrooms had been built over the years, there had been no increase to infrastructure, including social spaces, since that time.

“The sixth form have particularly suffered in this regard,” it added.

The proposal would also benefit the rest of the school community, said the architects’ report.

There were several objections to the plans, including from the town council and neighbours to the site.

The town council’s concerns included the loss of a tennis/netball court, but Sport England raised no objection to this, noting it was in a poor state of repair and had never been available for community use.

A design and access statement with the planning application indicated a longer-term ambition for that area would involve removing all of the courts – but this is not part of the current proposal.

St Benedict’s is the only school in Bury St Edmunds to still have its own sixth form.

Eco Classrooms & Nurseries is the specialist contractor/installer for the build.

This timber-framed modular building would take only a matter of days to assemble, the agent had said, according to the planning officer report.

A construction management plan said the intended construction timeline is Easter 2025.

Construction traffic would access the site via The Klondyke, but would not go beyond a certain point, the management plan said.