Oaklands Community College reached another milestone on their journey to a new school and campus with the launch of their plans on Wednesday 6th of October. Speaking at the launch, Principal Mr Brian Kehoe said “A substantial amount of work for our new school has been ongoing over the last number of years and the unveiling of these plans is a very exciting time for all our school. This will be a state of the art campus that will be a huge boost to everyone in our school community and for the town of Edenderry and its surrounding areas. We are delighted with the plans and look forward to one of the finest secondary schools in the country being built in Edenderry.”
The new building will include open and spacious classrooms, there will be 6 Science laboratories, 4 Technology rooms, Computer rooms, as well as specialist Music, Art, ASC and Home Economics rooms and our students will benefit greatly from these facilities. The school building has a generous open design with large circulation and assembly areas. Students will also be able to avail of state of art facilities including sports hall, gym, hard courts and a full size GAA pitch.
Our school has seen a huge growth in numbers over the last 10 years, which is down to the outstanding work taking place in the school on a daily basis. We have a fantastic teaching staff, we are very proud of our pupils who are doing so well here and no student is left behind at Oaklands. Our recent engagement with past pupils has been very rewarding. It is great to see them excelling in their chosen areas, graduating from Oaklands and progressing to successful careers in Medicine, Science, Engineering and Business to name but a few.
We are currently in the process of finalising some of the technical details with the Department of Education and our local planning application will be submitted over the coming months”
“I would also like to take this opportunity to thank our Chief Executive, Mr Joe Cunningham and the staff at Laois and Offaly Education and Training Board for all their hard work to date on this project and also our design team of Butler Moffat Architects, Downes Associates Civil and Structural Engineers, O’Malley Mechanical and Electrical Engineers, MJ Turley Quantity Surveyors and Integrated Risk Solutions Health and Safety consultants. I would also like to thank Margaret Brennan and the team at the Department of Education Buildings unit for all of their work with the project. We have an excellent design team in place who we will continue to work with to drive this project forward”.
Speaking at the launch, Chairperson of the Oaklands Community College Board of Management, Cllr. Robert McDermott said “This is a fantastic new school, the Board and I are really looking forward to seeing its construction commence. Oaklands has a long history in education excellence and this new school will further enhance its reputation. This site which is currently not in use, will be a catalyst for development and growth in this part of the town.”
