West Nottinghamshire College has secured a £17million finance package from Lloyds Bank’s Wholesale Banking & Markets team, to support an ambitious redevelopment project to improve its estate and student accommodation facilities.
Situated across eight main sites within the Mansfield and Sutton-in-Ashfield area of Nottinghamshire, the college’s £24million redevelopment project is focused on the Derby Road campus and includes a significant upgrade of facilities across its arts, sport, catering and beauty faculties. The refurbishment will elevate the college’s position as a leading higher and further education provider in the region and help ensure that students enjoy a modern 21st century educational experience.
The first phase of the redevelopment project is already complete, with the creation of a dedicated centre for creative and cultural industries. The centre includes a 150 seat performing theatre, dance studios, live music rooms complete with editing suites, TV Studio and Apple Mac suites for multi-media use.
The demolition and subsequent rebuild of the college’s existing sports hall is currently underway and is scheduled for completion in September. The state of the art facility will feature six badminton courts and will be made available to the general public outside of college hours.
£11million of the funding from Lloyds Bank is being used to create a brand new building which will accommodate a fine dining restaurant for use by catering and hospitality students, as well as a professional health and beauty spa, hair and beauty salons and general purpose classrooms. Due to complete in January 2013, facilities will be open to members of the general public.
As part of the redevelopment project, the exterior of all buildings at the Derby Road site will be completely re-clad and undergo some internal refurbishment. The entire project is scheduled for completion by the end of 2013.
Established in the 1950s, West Nottinghamshire College offers a wide range of GCSE and A Level courses and vocational apprenticeships including bricklaying, plumbing, carpentry, gas fitting, painting and decorating, construction management, driving passenger vehicles, forklift truck driving and railway engineering, to more than 20,000 students. The college has been a customer of Lloyds Bank since 2004.
As part of the £17million funding package from Lloyds Bank, £8.5million has been secured from the European Investment Bank (“EIB”), enabling the college to complete the redevelopment project using discounted funding over a longer term. Lloyds Bank is one of only three banks that can access EIB capital specifically for higher or further education customers looking to undertake physical upgrading projects, including campus redevelopment, relocation, new build, science parks and student accommodation.
Asha Khemka OBE, Principal of West Nottinghamshire College said: “This ambitious redevelopment project forms part of our commitment to provide our students and the community with a 21st century educational experience. Our provision of a broad range of vocational training courses and apprenticeships reflects the considerable demand we see from businesses across the region who want to recruit people who have advanced industry-standard training. This is also something that Lloyds Bank is keen to support.
“Having worked with the local team at Lloyds Bank for a number of years they completely understand the specialist banking requirements of a further education college, and have been instrumental in providing the financial support needed to undertake the redevelopment project.”
Jeremy Prentice, Relationship Director at Lloyds Bank Wholesale Banking & Markets in Nottingham said: “Our relationship with West Nottinghamshire College has evolved over the last eight years, during which time we have provided a complete core banking product range. Further education colleges have an important role in the UK’s mid-market business arena, essentially acting as a core skills provider to a raft of businesses that are so crucial for future economic development. This considerable investment and upgrade of educational facilities will benefit both future employees and employers on a local level here in Nottinghamshire and also across the UK.”
“At Lloyds Bank, we recognise that education is an important sector to the economy as a whole. Our track record and expertise around the banking requirements of educational institutions means that we are well placed to provide valuable funding for further and higher education development projects across the UK using a range of monies including EIB.”