St Andrew's High School in Glasgow forced to turn away pupils due to increasing numbers

A Glasgow high school that is full to the brim is set to get six new classrooms to cope with rising pupil numbers.

All S1 placing requests to St Andrew’s secondary school in the east end of the city had to be refused as a result of demand from families living in the area.

The school’s intake for the catchment area, which includes Easterhouse Cranhill, Wellhouse and other neighbourhoods, increased to 380 youngsters this year.

To help tackle the issue, a planning application has been lodged to build four temporary school buildings and a footpath.

The buildings are to provide six classrooms and one staff room. They will be used by the school’s English department for all year groups.

A Glasgow City Council spokeswoman said: “The intake for the catchment area has increased to 380 this year and this will have an impact for the next few years which is why we need the additional teaching spaces. Due to the increase in capacity the school has had to decline all placing requests to S1 this year.”

The school’s current capacity is 1800 pupils.

Glasgow City Council is considering the planning application for the new temporary buildings, which were submitted by firm Amey.

The spokeswoman added: “School roll projections for the school have indicated a rise in the pupil numbers over the next couple of years so the temporary accommodation will meet this increase.”

Scottish Government figures show the Catholic school had a roll of 1746 in September 2020 with the capacity then stated as 1700.