PRIMARY aged children living in Blandford will have a brand new school with masses more space to learn and play in from September 2008, after North District planners gave their thumbs up to the scheme costing £5m.

Archbishop Wake Primary in Fairfield Road is to be rebuilt on the much larger site of the former St Leonard's School in Black Lane at a cost of £4.5m.

A quarter of the former school in Black Lane will be demolished for the new primary, while another half a million will be used to refurbish the remaining buildings for use as a Children's Centre.

Some of the buildings will also be turned over to adult education.

The soon-to-be-empty Archbishop Wake primary in Fairfield Road will then be demolished and the land sold, says headteacher Richard Chapman.

"We are so excited especially now that we have planning permission," he said.

"At the moment we have 270 children and staff on the one-acre Fairfield site including seven temporary classrooms. The Black Lane site is 17 acres so you can appreciate the difference it will make.

"We've had a say in the design of the new school and it also includes environmentally-friendly features."

The Black Lane school site will see its former administration offices, staff room, hall and ICT suite bulldozed to make room for the new primary.

"Its classrooms were just not big enough under new DfES regulations and it's cheaper to pull the whole thing down and start again, than try and convert it," said Mr Chapman.

"The Children's Centre is also operating, but without children, because it needs to be adapted for day care use. But some services are already up and running such as music groups and crafts for parents.

"The Children's Centre will be open properly from September next year.

"Unfortunately there's no cash allocated for the adult education part of the buildings so they will have to make do with what's already there."

Dorset County Council is financing the works as a result of the reorganisation from three-tier to two-tier education in Blandford and an increase of numbers of pupils at the school from 200 as a first to more than 300 as a primary.