Until March 2011 we were a pack-away pre-school and had been operating in this way for 40 years. A huge sum of money called the Early Years Capital Grant was made available to Early Years Providers. The aims of this grant were to enable Early Years Providers to develop the learning environment for the delivery of the Early Years Foundation Stage. Running pre-school from the village hall offered many benefits including a central location and reduced running costs as we had no maintenance costs. However, Ofsted have in the past commented adversely on Stanford Pre-School being a pack-away setting and there are many benefits of operating from a dedicated building.

We believe that our purpose-built premises provides:

Enhanced opportunities for the children

• By providing greater opportunities for increasing self-help skills and responsibility through the provision of small toilets and basins, child height coat hooks, work surfaces, display boards
• Improved opportunities for learning withall weather outdoor (partially covered) play space with suitable surface(s)
• Maximising resources available to the children
• Display of children’s work at child friendly heights to improve self-esteem and pride in own creations, and ensure that children have time to complete long-term projects.

Needs of the Village community to be met. Increased flexibility of opening hours and greater space to meet numbers and ages of children and government directives.

Improvement of the Welfare of Staff by avoiding the health and safety risks associated with the moving and lifting of heavy equipment.

Improvement of the Pre-schools Professional position. In the pack-away setting we had a large negative use of time due to set up / pack away. This worked out to be 129 hours per 6 week term and could be better used for the benefit of the children.

Below are the original plans for our new building.

Design and Access Statement
http://idocs.whitehorsedc.gov.uk/WAM/doc/Design%20and%20Access%20Statement-270318.pdf?extension=.pdf&id=270318&appid=1001&location=Volume2&contentType=application/pdf&pageCount=6

Plans Block
http://idocs.whitehorsedc.gov.uk/WAM/doc/Plans%20Block-270320.pdf?extension=.pdf&id=270320&appid=1001&location=Volume2&contentType=application/pdf&pageCount=1

Plans Proposed
http://idocs.whitehorsedc.gov.uk/WAM/doc/Plans%20Proposed-270322.pdf?extension=.pdf&id=270322&appid=1001&location=Volume2&contentType=application/pdf&pageCount=1

Plans Site
http://idocs.whitehorsedc.gov.uk/WAM/doc/Plans%20Site-270319.pdf?extension=.pdf&id=270319&appid=1001&location=Volume2&contentType=application/pdf&pageCount=1

Mockups of plans, showing how new building will look:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/1366541@N22/pool/