TWO Minehead schools are set to benefit from more than £1.2m in funding from the government to spend on school improvements.

Minehead First School and Minehead Middle School, both of which are part of the West Somerset Academies Trust will share a total of £1.225,541.43.

The trust's successful bids were initially submitted to the 2020/21 Condition Improvement Fund making the case for improving school buildings and addressing major building concerns.

Minehead First School will be given £437,000 while Minehead Middle School will get £787,000.

The funding is to be used to replace and repair old flat and pitched roofing; both schools have suffered from water ingress and leaks over the years.

And the Minehead schools are among 16 in Somerset who will benefit from funding.

Barbara O’Keefe, chief operations officer of the Trust who coordinated the bids said: “The trust is delighted at the outcome of these bids.

"The £1.2million will be used to address some significant buildings issues at the schools and will better enable our trust to provide consistently warm, dry and safe teaching and learning environments for our children and staff.

"As part of the planned building work full opportunity will be taken to remove asbestos and make to significant improvements to insulation and energy efficiencies.

"These projects will run on from the 2019/20 CIF bidding round, where the trust was successful in bidding for window replacement programmes at Minehead Middle School and Danesfield Middle School.”


READ MORE: These Somerset schools will share £6.5 MILLION of Government money 


Paul Rushforth, chief executive officer of the trust added: " “The time and effort that the trust has put in to bid writing has come to fruition.

"I am delighted at this outcome; this additional investment will help us in our drive to further improve outcomes for the children in our schools."

Mr Liddell-Grainger, Conservative MP for Bridgwater and West Somerset, said the allocations would make a huge difference to educational provision at both schools.

“I know they have the benefit of really dedicated staff who have been doing their best to deliver high-quality education but in surroundings which are overdue for improvement,” he said.

“This money will enable that situation to be corrected and make the task of delivering world-class education to local children more achievable."