Ormiston Senior College, a thriving educational institution in Flat Bush, Auckland, faced a common challenge for growing schools: providing adequate and adaptable learning spaces for its expanding student body in the short and long term. With the main school building experiencing significant crowding, there was an urgent need for additional classrooms that could not only accommodate more students but also foster diverse learning styles, catering to visual, auditory, reading/writing, and kinesthetic learners. The project, commissioned by the Ministry of Education, as a short to medium-term relief and was further complicated by being released in two stages due to funding constraints, each with separate design and consenting processes.

Working closely with the Ministry of Education, the Portacom team were tasked with delivering 23 new modular teaching spaces across the school’s large footprint. The build included 20 general classrooms, featuring an art room, a dry science lab and even a cooking/home economics room. The site also incorporated an assisted learning unit with three learning spaces, which now acts as a satellite facility for nearby Mt Richmond Special School, helping to support students with higher needs to get the best education possible.

Portacom, leveraging its expertise in modular construction, was engaged to deliver a comprehensive 48 module integrated project site. The primary objective was to provide the equivalent of 23 modular classroom teaching spaces and two toilet blocks, including specialist rooms configured as a science dry lab, an art room, and a cooking room. Crucially, three teaching spaces were also configured as a Special Needs Unit (SNU) satellite for Mt Richmond School, requiring a bespoke design due to its unique specifications.

Portacom’s project team demonstrated remarkable agility and had to address a number of major challenges including complex power supply requirements, challenging ground conditions, complexities with local government approval, supply chain pressures and extensive coordination between many stakeholders. The most significant issues were getting services to the project site, where delays to the electricity connection meant that the team had to quickly supply and commission a temporary power solution to ensure the project stayed on track, not just for the build process but also post-handover as well. This allowed both project works and also site handover to occur, and meant that students were in the new buildings as quickly as possible. The cooperation and coordination between different contractors also significantly contributed, with teams of project managers, engineers, MoE staff, school staff and tradespeople on site all working together to ensure the buildings were ready to go for the students.

Despite facing many complexities, the project was completed on time and within budget, with part of stage 2 actually handed over ahead of schedule. The modular classrooms provide Ormiston Senior College with a much needed, modern expansion transforming the learning experience for students.

This project acts as an example of Portacom’s capability as an experienced, flexible modular builder, capable of handling even the most complex projects and challenges to get the job done.