Oropi School's cramped resource and meeting spaces are receiving a $450,000 solution, with the Ministry of Education announcing the school will receive a Special Property Grant.

Announced this week, Oropi is one of 31 schools out of about 150 to see their SPG applications granted.

Oropi School Principal Andrew King says a $450,000 Special Property Grant is to add an extra 176 square metres of building space to the school.

Principal Andrew King says the grant will see the school's overall building space increase by 176 square metres, bringing it up to the code-required square metre space.

Currently, a range of buildings in the school are cramped for students and teachers alike. 'In our assembly room, for assemblies we have move back furniture into the adjoining library so the whole school can fit in there – and use the library space as well.”

Andrew says the school often has no room available for relief time for administration tasks. 'And we have children doing special programmes out of the staffroom, so the staffroom is used as a teaching and learning space as well as a staffroom.”

The resource room is creatively turned into a research space. 'It's traditionally housed all our teacher resources and we've had to re-organise the shelving in that space.”

Andrew says the school has lots of ideas on what to do with the extra metre-age.

'It will be added onto existing buildings, to allow for more a modern learning environment facilities such as break out spaces and small office areas and resource areas, but also to possibly increase our room area where will hold assembly,” says Andrew.

'It's been a hope and aspiration we've had for about two years. This fund only becomes available from time to time, not annually, and during the last few years the priority has been with Christchurch schools.

'The exciting thing is we're in such desperate need of building space and it's going to create all sort of possibilities; it's going to be hard to putting the list of what we want into a priority as to what is most important, starting with what is best for the kids.”

Andrew says the school's been under the required square metre space – by 176m2 – for a number of years and this will ease the demands on space created by a growing roll.

The school roll is 185 students, which Andrew says has been steadily growing since 2010, when it numbered 120.

The grant the also comes as two classrooms, currently in council consent phase, worth $320,000 – financed by the school's five-year agreement fund with the ministry – will be built ready for use at the start of the 2015 school year, to cater to about 50 children.

The two classrooms replace one classroom being demolished, due to leaky building syndrome, seeing the total classroom tally at Oropi reach eight.

'We'll have enough classrooms now, but we have that 176m2 shortfall of additional space for when we have assemblies, meetings, withdrawal rooms – so there's lot of things we can do with the SPG money.”