Building record 1554000000 - Wendover Church of England Junior School, Wharf Road

Wendover Church of England Junior School opened as Wendover Middle School in 1973. It is one of three schools (with John Hampden County Infants School and John Colet Secondary School) in a campus-style complex along an access road off Wharf Road, on the north side of Wendover.
A significant increase in the population of Wendover in the inter-war period necessitated the designation of a new schools site. Discussions over the development and requirements of a new
‘Wendover Church of England Mixed School’ spanned the 1940s-1970s and are recorded in archived papers and plans of Buckinghamshire County Council (Buckinghamshire Archives ref: E/222/X/5-6). In 1946 a co-educational school was envisaged for 200 pupils, but they already had 207 pupils in the existing local school system. By 1954, when design plans were first drafted, this had increased to 347 pupils and was expected to increase to 400 pupils within two years, therefore the original architects plans were first revised in 1965 and then abandoned. In 1971 a new school design for 360 pupils (8-12 years old) was laid out by Fred Pooley, the County Architect, and corresponds with the building that
remains in use.
In 2014 the site contains a dog-leg arrangement of two adjoining subrectangular school buildings aligned north/south, adjacent to the Grand Union Canal. A small quadrangle of buildings adjoins to the eastern side of the main buildings, and a detached caretaker's house close to the east. Areas of playground are to the north and west of the school buildings, with a multi-use games area between the western playground and canal. Access to the site is via a sweeping driveway and car park on the south side of the buildings, at the northern of a cul-de-sac off Wharf Road, with vehicular access via a gate along a drive on the eastern side of the school building. The school buildings are primarily single-storey modern brick built structures. The gateway to the east of the school building is formed of gates re-located from the old school site on the High Street [CAS 11397], and includes a memorial plaque to former pupils killed in the two World Wars [CAS 07658]. See report for detail and copy of County Architect's plan (B1).