New school with ROOFTOP playground to open in Manchester next year

A new primary school with a playground on the ROOF will open in Manchester city centre next September.

Crown Street Primary School will open with tall walls surrounding the rooftop playground, images show. The school will also have a library, headteacher Heleyna Thompson said.

Crown Street will provide places for 24 preschoolers and 30 children in reception when it opens in September 2024, with a new intake being added each year until the early 2030s. Once it is fully occupied from preschool to year six, there will be places for 210 pupils.

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“I’ve stood in the rooms that will be our classrooms, hall and the most exciting room for me – the library!,” an excited Heleyna said. “I cannot wait to see the progress over the next few months, and to fill our preschool and reception with children who will make up our founding cohorts.”

Located at the end of Deansgate in the Great Jackson Street development, the school has been built to support a ‘sustainable long-term neighbourhood’. It will be managed by The Laurus Trust.

The organisation already runs six secondary schools, four primary schools, and four sixth form colleges, including Cheadle Hulme High School and Gorsey Bank Primary School in Wilmslow, where Ms Thompson started her career, and worked her way up to being Assistant Head.

Admissions applications are now open for both preschool and reception. The deadline for a preschool place is December 31, 2023, with the reception deadline being January 15, 2024.

The Great Jackson Street area is already home to Greater Manchester’s tallest building, Deansgate