A row which threatened a £775,000 grant to a strictly Orthodox school may now be speedily resolved.
Beis Chinuch Lebonos, a school for Charedi girls, in Stamford Hill, North London, was awarded the grant by the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF), in order to build a 72-place workplace nursery. It was intended to cater for employees' children, as well as for people living in the area.
A condition of the grant was that the funding had to be administered locally through the Learning Trust, which oversees education in Hackney.
But last week the Trust said it might not accept the grant on the school's behalf, as it would be financially liable for the project.
Headteacher Avraham Schechter said the school had already spent up to £30,000 on architects' plans. He said that the shortage of local childcare made it imperative that the project should go ahead.
"The condition of the funding was that the project should be finished by March 2009. That is now no longer realistic, because of the delays."
Now, however, the JC has learned that the Learning Trust is ready to expedite the disbursement of the funds so that the project can go ahead.
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