ISG has secured a further £48 million of framework wins with the Department for Education (DfE), harnessing its Platform Design for Manufacture and Assembly (P-DfMA) approach, and adding to its £35 million haul of three school wins announced in January.
The latest group of wins includes three Special Education Needs (SEN) schools - Grand Union Village in Northolt, Portsmouth SEN and Two Bridges in Bristol, as well as the Sixth Form College Harris Academy Rainham and Faringdon School in Oxfordshire.
Both Portsmouth and Grand Union developments will be catering to pupils with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND), with Portsmouth being a 66-place facility for ambulant students with Autistic Spectrum Conditions (ASC) and Social, Emotional and Mental Health (SEMH) needs for ages 9-16.
The Two Bridges project, the largest to be awarded in this group of wins at circa. £12.5 million, will bring to life a new 112 place SEND school for children 2-19 years old and is a pioneering Net Zero Carbon (NZC) pathfinder scheme. The core requirements rest around a requirement for the school to be Net Zero Carbon in operation led by improvements in the building design and fabric, which will be supported with site generated renewable energy. The DfE is using this as a pathfinder scheme to support the government’s wider climate agenda.
The 400 place Harris Academy Rainham Sixth Form is a response to a the strong local need for additional post-16 education places, while Faringdon will cater to 420 pupils and include the relocation of the existing 90-place nursery.
These new projects are the latest to benefit from ISG’s standard component design approach. By partnering and collaborating with the same subcontractors, ISG replicates standardised project components that achieve high-quality results for schools across all settings, bringing enhanced consistency and operational efficiencies to project outcomes.
Early engagement on the schemes, through the framework procurement approach, has enabled the identification of project similarities at both Harris Academy Rainham and Portsmouth SEN projects. On both schools, ISG has utilised the same Structural Insulated Panels (SIPS) envelope system, providing cost, quality, delivery and performance enhancements to the two schemes, underpinning the advantages of the P-DfMA approach.
Paul Watkins, framework manager for ISG’s UK Construction business, said: “The DfE’s pioneering construction framework is designed around the principles of strong contractor collaboration and supporting innovation that delivers outstanding education spaces designed to meet rigorous environmental performance and efficient operational standards. By encouraging framework contractors to really challenge traditional operating processes, the DfE has provided the catalyst for transformational change in our sector and the highly positive results from this programme demonstrate the true efficacy of a P-DfMA approach.”
Secured through the DfE’s 2017 construction framework, the latest wins swiftly follow the procurement of Compass School Southwark, Two Rivers CofE Primary School - a pioneering Passivhaus Plus project in Keynsham, and Chelveston Road School in Northamptonshire. ISG additionally reached completion of the East London SEND New Special Free School Hatchside in March 2021 and follows the announced completion of Badbury Park, Ark Soane Academy and Norton Hill School at the end of last year.
