Kendal Nursery wins £1000 for vital improvements to outdoor play facilities

Kendal Nursery wins £1000 for vital improvements to outdoor play facilities
A nursery school in Kendal has been selected as the winner of a National competition to receive £1,000 towards upgrading their outdoor play areas.

Kendal Nursery School and Brantfield Day Nursery were the lucky winners of the giveaway competition launched by the Register of Play Inspectors International (RPII).

The competition was open to all of the nursery and primary schools in the UK. All were emailed in addition to newspaper articles advertising the competition inviting schools to enter. The entrants were asked to answer three simple questions about the RPII in order to raise awareness of how important it is to get play equipment properly checked by fully registered professionals. The winner was drawn at random from these entries.

The school, based at Brantfield House, which was built in 1869 by the Somerville family who owned K Shoes. It has been operating as a school and nursery since 1958 has up to 150 children up to the age of 4 years old at any one time, providing a "home from home" learning environment.

It has extensive gardens and play areas which are used on a daily basis. The garden provides many exciting opportunities for children to continue their learning – including a sand house, tree house, boat and jetty, quarry as well as a yurt which is used as an outside classroom.

The RPII is an organisation dedicated to ensuring that playground inspectors are fully qualified to carry out the inspections required of them and recognises the different knowledge bases required for indoor, outdoor and inflatable play equipment and the level of inspection (routine, operational or annual). It manages qualification and ongoing CPD to ensure that safety standards can be maintained within the industry.

RPII Director of Marketing and RPII registered Outdoor Annual Inspector, Jon Dalton, presented the cheque to Headteacher, Veronica Broyd and then performed their first official and thorough inspection of their outdoor play facilities.

Whilst examining their extensive outdoor play area and equipment Jon explained: "Ensuring play safety is essential - both for the protection of the children using the equipment and to mitigate risk for the councils, schools and organisations in charge of these play areas. Unfortunately many local councils are advising their local schools to use play inspectors who are not registered with the RPII and are therefore not proven to be compliant, examined and accredited against the official safety standards".

Headteacher, Veronica commented that: "Our outdoor spaces are an extension of our classroom. We are very lucky to have these amazing gardens. We find that children are frequently more relaxed and confident outside and more receptive to learning – what better place to work with your friends building a car or castle? It is of utmost importance to us to maintain the safety of these areas.

"We are grateful to Jon and the RPII for undertaking this safety inspection for us and highlighting the importance of using an inspector who is qualified in inspecting outdoor spaces.

"We shall use their generous prize money to make any suggested improvements on our existing facilities and perhaps even treat our children to some brand new equipment."

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