Designs for Caldicot's new secondary school have been unveiled as part of an £80million investment in the county's education system. The plans, drawn up by architects working closely with staff and pupils at the school, feature open spaces, improved parking and 'hubs' to encourage independent learning. A planning application is likely to be submitted in August, with work starting in January 2015 and expected to be complete by the end of 2016. The rebuild will run alongside a similar development at Monmouth Comprehensive, while work on Raglan's new primary school gets underway next month. The three projects form the next phase of Monmouthshire's 21st Century Schools programme – a series of capital investments part-funded by the Welsh Government.

Continued on Page Two Caldicot's share of the pot – which amounts to £34.9million – will mostly be used to fund the new secondary school, although there will be funds made available to the primaries which feed into it. Welsh medium school Ysgol Y ffin will still get a share of the cash despite feeding into secondary schools outside of the county. Architect Simon Kneafsey said most of the school's pupils at the school had been part of the engagement process, as had every member of staff. "This is part of the redevelopment of Caldicot as a whole with the school as a catalyst." The three-storey building will be built with minimum disruption to the existing school and will allow the Design Technology and entrepreneurial areas to have their own outside spaces. Mr Kneafsey said that while Caldicot School would be a "fairly easy build", Monmouth would present more challenges in terms of 'decanting' pupils from one building to another while construction work is going on. "We will try to avoid using temporary buildings where possible as this is dead money," he said. He added that the council's construction partner Interserve was looking to use a local workforce where possible and would be holding open days for local contractors. Public engagements will take place over the next couple of months. Liz Hacket Pain, Monmouthshire's cabinet member for education, said: "If you have the right environment to learn in, children will do better. "We are looking at each child as an individual and these designs allow children to learn in different ways. "This is part of a 12-year programme and is happening because the Welsh Government changed the way funding comes to us – we have already invested heavily in our primary schools but there is no way we would be able to afford to do a secondary school otherwise." She said the headteachers of Chepstow School and King Henry VIII in Abergavenny were being involved in the process as the next round of investment in 2017 will focus on those two schools. Sarah McGuinness, the county council's chief officer for education, said she was excited about the designs. "This is a wonderful opportunity but we are mindful that this is public money and we want to spend it very wisely," she said. Mayor of Caldicot, Councillor Alan Davies said how excited he was with the new plans for the school: " It's fantastic, out of this world. " I didn't realise how good it was going to be, it's going to be a facility not just for the school but for the community as well. We now need a town centre to go with it."