Cooking up something special for Christ Church Bentinck School

Aligned with ISG’s vision to leave a lasting legacy in the communities we work in, our social value and site teams partnered with sub-contractors; Thorpes, MJL, LLS Logistics, Celtic, LAM, Loughtons, KML, TCG, Workplace Branding and Radii, to introduce new kitchen and rooftop spaces at Christ Church Bentinck C of E Primary School.

The school, situated locally to two of ISG’s projects in Victoria was in serious need of some TLC, but without the means to make that dream a reality.

Working together with ISG’s sub-contractors, the site teams have built, donated and delivered brand new facilities, in a bid to help increase the school’s community engagement opportunities and better support the teachers to deliver the curriculum’s cooking lessons.

Upcycling unused materials from the two ISG sites in Victoria, the project teams re-purposed palettes and cable drums; transforming them into tables, chairs and planters for the school’s previously unused rooftop terrace.

To ensure that the students felt involved in this initiative, the project team offered the children the chance to paint the furniture, with all painting equipment donated by the project teams.

Zahra Fernandez, School Home Support Worker at Christ Church Bentinck School, shared her gratitude: “The children were so excited to be involved in the project and we can already see the benefit the new furniture brings. Thank you so much, it is much appreciated by the children and the school.”

Further strengthening the project’s social chains, one of the school’s outdated classrooms, the ‘Jubilee Room’, was totally refurbished to deliver a brand new kitchen space, to help inspire the next generation of cooking talent.

The project teams supplied and installed a fully equipped ‘L’ shaped kitchen, with brand new units, worktops and kitchen equipment; including microwaves, dishwashers and electric induction hobs. The kitchen was completed with redecorated walls and new vinyl flooring, with sub-contractor Celtic, even building a new acoustic plasterboard partition to reduce the noise being generated from the nearby computer room.

Both staff and students were delighted with the results, with the children expressing their joy that they could use the new space to learn more about food and cooking. The school’s staff are also looking to share the kitchen more broadly with the wider community, with a plan to invite local residents and families from different ethnicities to come and teach the students and teachers about different traditional cuisines from around the world.

ISG thanks its fantastic sub-contractors for their support on helping to make a real difference to the future of learning within Christ Church Bentinck School’s community. And with the school’s core value being to ‘enjoy, inspire and achieve’, we can’t wait to see the rooftop and kitchen support the children to do just that.