The rebuild of Ashburton College’s elderly classrooms has been on the drawing board for several years and the project’s future is now in Government hands.

College principal Ross Preece has been working with the Ministry of Education’s property advisors on the rebuild and said what happened next was up to Cabinet.

“We know we’ve cleared the ministry’s hurdles, we’ve done all we can and it’s up to Cabinet to decide how many dollars they’ll give us,” he said.

The ministry could recommend a scale of work and put a dollar value around this, but the power lay with Cabinet to say yes, or no, Preece said.

“The good news is that we will know the decision early in the new year and if there is a significant rebuild with large dollars around it the minister will announce it.”

Most parts of the college were shabby and run down and the college’s dilemma now was whether to spend money on upgrading those blocks if they were to come down in five years, he said.

Upgrade work will be carried out on the school’s mini-gym but work on the auditorium will be deferred until the outcome of the building proposal is known.

“We’re having to do selective work until we know but drab, grey concrete blocks might be fine in East Berlin but not in a modern learning environment.”

In terms of a time frame, Preece anticipates that if funds for a rebuild are approved, the ‘new’ college is unlikely to be completed before 2021.

The college was at 100 per cent capacity in terms of classroom space but it was fortunate in having plenty of green spaces and the old netball court area where prefab classrooms could be placed during a rebuild, he said.

By Sue Newman © The Ashburton Guardian - 8 November 2018