Rainbow Hub’s dream gets closer to reality as work progresses

The weather over the past months may not have been brilliant but nothing has stopped work  on Rainbow Hub’s dream – their purpose-built school in Mawdesley for children with special educational needs due to physical and neurological disabilities.

The main construction is near completion with windows and doors in within a month and electrical work beginning at the end of May. Partition walls are being added and completion is due in August giving time for the charity to install their equipment before opening in September.

The building will have solar panels and air source heat pumps with mechanical heating to ensure a constant temperature.

When complete there will be three large classrooms, plus one already in existence: a multi purpose hall with suspended ceiling swings; two additional therapy rooms; accessible life skills kitchen; ground level Rebound Trampoline; outdoor classroom, new meeting spaces and a dedicated parent/carers room.  

Designed in neutral colours for a calming effect, all education and therapy rooms will have an H track ceiling hoist and classrooms will contain both education and therapy equipment making them multi-purpose. 

When open, the school will initially offer places to children aged 5 – 11 years who have physical challenges but can follow a personalised curriculum. Future plans will extend places to young people up to 16 years. It is being developed for children with physical/neurological disabilities whose families struggle to find an environment that can meet their physical, social and learning needs.  

With the growing number of children needing places in a specialist setting, local authority schools are not always able to meet specific needs of children with physical disabilities who deserve the same access to an education as any other child. A combined education and health approach at Rainbow Hub will help children to lead as full and independent lives as possible.    

Lyndsay Fahey, CEO, Rainbow Hub, said: "We started with a dream and to make this dream a reality we secured funding of £5m from Wain Foundation which was a remarkable act of kindness for which we will be forever grateful. This development will allow us to extend the good work we already do in conductive education and our specialist nursery. It will allow us to provide support to children who may sometimes be over-looked but deserve every opportunity to become as independent as possible."

She continued, “Groundworks have also begun for a hydrotherapy pool for which we were delighted to receive a grant of £100,00 from Chorley Council as part of the Rural Prosperity Grant Scheme. We hope this will be completed by September 2025.  However, these wonderful donations are restricted to the building projects and we will still need to raise £700,00 each year to keep our core therapy services running so the support of all the other wonderful people who help us is vitally important.”

For more information on the work of Rainbow Hub or to support them, please follow them on social media @rainbowhubnw