Lea Hough secures investment for academy schools

The Education and Skills Funding Agency has announced its allocation of Condition Improvement Fund for 2018-2019, with a number of Lancashire academy schools securing finance.

The CIF is an annual bidding round for academy trusts and sixth form colleges under which schools can apply for funding to improve buildings and other facilities.

Every year, Euxton-based Lea Hough works with academies across the North West to submit bids for repair and improvement works.

Projects for which bids prepared by Lea Hough’s specialist team this year included whole block refurbishments, safeguarding schemes, fire alarm replacements, boiler and heating upgrades, improvements to roofing and window and door replacement projects – a large number of which were approved.

Michael Harrison, who heads the schools and academies team at Lea Hough, commented: “This is excellent news for our academy clients, many of whom will be able to begin work on their projects in the next few months.

“The CIF represents a significant opportunity for academies and schools to receive government funding for projects they may otherwise struggle to afford to undertake. The fact that we have been able to help win more bids and more funding than ever before is excellent news for the academies involved – many of which are in and around Lancashire”.

In order to gain approval this round, the CIF has revealed that a mark of over 76 per cent was required.

The DfE received requests for more than £1.3bn for over 3,800 projects to this year’s round. Of these, 1,556 projects across 1,299 academies and sixth-form colleges were approved, with a total of £514m of funds allocated nationwide.