A south-eastern suburbs private school has plans to expand into Wyndham.
Heatherton Christian College has lodged plans with Wyndham council proposing a sister campus – provisionally called Wyndham Christian College – on a 12-hectare site on Ballan Road in Wyndham Vale. Wyndham Vale Christian Centre and Wyndham SES are located there.
The college is based at Clarinda, near Clayton in Melbourne’s south-east, and principal Peter Cliffe said the school is keen to have a presence in the west. He said, if approved, the proposed prep to year 12 school would open its doors for term one in 2019.
He said a billboard on the Ballan Road site is calling for expressions of interest in enrolments, and has already attracted hundreds of inquiries.
“We really sense that there’s a need for schools in that area,” Mr Cliffe said. “It’s a fast-growing area of Melbourne.”
Mr Cliffe said the multi-million dollar development would be built in stages, probably starting with prep to grade four pupils, and growing by a year level at a time. The school is likely to have a student population of about 1500.
A Grattan Institute analysis found more than 1000 new classrooms are needed across Wyndham for the projected 66 per cent growth in student numbers over the next decade.
The analysis found there will be 13,896 more primary school students and 12,845 more secondary students in Wyndham in that time.
Meanwhile, Good Education Group data shows a shortfall of school places available to cater for the projected number of Wyndham pupils graduating to secondary schools, particularly in Tarneit and Hoppers Crossing.
Tarneit P-9 College and Tarneit Secondary College both received more than $10 million in recent state budgets to underwrite significant expansions already in the pipeline.
Wyndham council’s education spokesman Cr Josh Gilligan said, over the next 10 years, many new public schools will be needed in and around Tarneit.
He said three primary schools and a secondary school are needed just to help cater for students coming from Tarneit, Truganina, Mt Cottrell, Eynesbury and Quandong.
Fellow councillor Aaron An is keen to see Williams Landing get its own school.
He said families are moving out of the area because of the lack of schools.
– With Adem Saban
