Eddisons confirms winning bids to upgrade schools and colleges across the UK as total funding secured tops £100m

Leeds-headquartered property consultant Eddisons has secured building improvement funding for schools across the UK, including more than £5m for Yorkshire, £5m for North East and £4.5m for Midlands academies, in the latest round of the Government’s Condition Improvement Fund (CIF). A specialist in the education sector, Eddisons has now raised over £100m in successful CIF bids since 2016 to enable schools and colleges across the country to improve their estate.

Funding secured by Eddisons in the latest round of schools projects includes £2m for the Odyssey Collaborative Trust, which operates seven primary schools in Derby, following a successful 2020 bid for £2.5m. Odyssey’s Beaufort school will get the second phase of a new roof and new windows, Springfield school with also receive a new roof, while Oakwood junior school is in line for a new fire safety system.

In the North East £500,000 will pay for new boilers and windows at New Silksworth Academy in Sunderland. Projects in Yorkshire include £1m for a new roof at Prince Henry’s Grammar School in Otley, which is part of the Collaborative Learning Trust.

An academy trust in south-east London, Chancery Education Trust, was awarded £1.4m to upgrade its school buildings, installing new boilers at Darrick Wood Infant and Nursery School in Orpington, a new fire safety system for Pickhurst Academy in Bromley and a new roof at Davidson Primary Academy in Croydon.

The CIF programme is an annual round of bidding under which academy schools and colleges can apply for funding for the upkeep and improvement of their buildings and to fund expansion projects for schools that have been rated good or outstanding by Ofsted.

Eddisons’ national building and project consultancy team, which is led from the firm’s Leeds office, and also designs and project manages the delivery of schools’ CIF projects, has grown from a small team to a 30-strong department of project managers, building surveyors and architects, with further hires planned for the coming months as demand for its education services continues to grow.

Building and project consultancy head, Ian Harrington, said:

“We are tremendously proud that this latest funding announcement means we have raised well over £100m of funding in total for our education sector clients since we began working in this area in 2016. The CIF projects really are essential to creating a better learning and work environment for both students and staff at schools and colleges across the UK.”

He added: “The CIF bidding procedure can seem impenetrable and Eddisons expert education team have built up huge knowledge and experience over the years to help deliver successful bids and projects that make a real difference to people’s lives.

“Every year the process of submitting a successful CIF bid becomes ever more competitive for schools and we are really pleased to say that we have maintained our position as a key adviser to the education sector, with an excellent success rate for our bids.”