THE next stage of building work to replace the fire-damaged Woodmill High School will start this month.

With the first phase of pupils set to return on Tuesday, an update to parents has confirmed that work to replace parts of the school which have already been demolished will get under way in January and continue until the summer.

The demolition stage for the East wing of the building is nearly completed while the refurbishment of the school is in its finals stages.

A total of six additional modular classes are now ready for use and will house the social subjects faculty.

The school was destroyed by fire on August 25.

A 14-year-old boy was charged with wilful fire-raising and has appeared in court in connection with the incident.

Pupils from S3, S4 and S5 will be the first to return next week while S6 will work across both St Columba’s and Woodmill.

From the start of the new term, S1, S2 and DAS pupils will have opportunities to travel back to Woodmill from their temporary bases at the Vine Centre, Queen Anne High and Blairhall Primary to use specialist teaching spaces.

Areas of the school where building work is taking place will be fenced off.

Rector Sandy McIntosh said: “This next stage marks an important phase in starting to get all of our young people back to Woodmill High School.

“I will be communicating opportunities for year group parental sessions that will be taking place in January and February at Woodmill where parents will be able to speak to senior staff, subject specialists, careers advisors (SDS) and get a tour of the refurbished school building.

“We are working towards returning our S1 and S2 back to Woodmill as soon as we have capacity in the building, likely to be around Easter time, once the next phase is completed.

“Our DAS pupils will be returning once we have our specialist DAS building provision in place, likely to be completed Summer 2020.”

From January, S2 pupils will leave from St Columba’s slightly earlier at 8.50am. The school day for S3, S4 and S5 at Woodmill will now start at 8.45am and finish at 3.20pm.