Winterbourne Stickland Nursery School

Introduction

When news that a former school site in Winterborne Stickland near Blandford was up for auction, there were concerns that the site could be redeveloped or demolished by a new owner.

Concerned that the building could be demolished or redeveloped by a new owner, villagers rallied together to create a community interest company to buy the building with the idea to reopen it as a nursery and set up a GoFundMe to meet the asking price.

They were successful, and the nursery is now open to support families and children with full-time, year-round childcare from the age of nine months upwards.

Levelling Up

Winterborne Stickland is one of the many rural areas in North Dorset benefitting from the previous government’s Levelling Up funding to provide high-speed fibre internet delivered free of charge to everyone’s front door.

Dream becomes reality

We worked closely with Anna to ensure the service up to her front door, the installation and the service exceeded the requirements of the nursery, and we continue to support the Nursery with a £1 a month connection, ensuring they can keep their security, admin and communication running smoothly without another overhead to consider.

Trustee for the nursery, Anna Way, praised everyone involved who helped make their dream a reality. “This has been an amazing community project,” she said. It’s a difficult world at times and it has been so incredibly heart-warming to see how much kindness and community spirit there is within our local community.”