A SAWBRIDGEWORTH infants school is on cloud nine after receiving a £90,000 government grant to build a bigger and more modern nursery classroom.

The plush new classroom at the Fawbert and Barnard Infant School, Knight Street, will enable the school to boost its nursery intake from 22 pupils to 30, for both morning and afternoon sessions.

Fawbert and Barnard was one of three Stort Valley schools which benefited from a slice of a £3.2m repair grant earmarked to Hertfordshire County Council as part of the governments New Deal for Schools initiative.

A delighted Fawbert and Barnard headteacher Yvonne Beeson said: This is wonderful news as we did not have enough room to cope with demand from nursery pupils.

Over the last few years there has been a mini population boom, but now the problem seems to be dropping. This new classroom will enable us to take up to 30 nursery pupils for each session.

This will enable the nursery to match the standard 60 admissions we cater for in all the other year groups in the school.

Mrs Beeson added that the current mobile classroom had reached the end of its 25-year-old lifespan and added that work was hoped to start on the new building during the summer or autumn.

But she stressed there would be no disruption for pupils if the work began in the autumn term as the school had the use of an empty classroom from September to December.

l Also benefiting from the government windfall is the Little Hadham JMI School, with a grant of between £35,000 to £40,000 for replacement windows.

Headteacher Pam Newman said: I was ecstatic when I heard we had received a grant as the windows are really in desperate need of repair. We have been top of the county list of priorities for three years so its nice to know were finally getting the windows done.

And Sawbridgeworths Mandeville JMI school, West Road is one of 33 schools which will be having their cold water storage tanks upgraded at a cost of £2,600.

The money is part of the governments £1.3billion capital programme for schools which has been funded by the windfall tax on privatised industries.

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