AMBITIOUS proposals to convert a Bournemouth office block into the town’s first “free school” have been officially submitted to the borough’s planners.

The scheme will see three adjacent Lansdowne sites – Raglan House, Homelife House and Arnetts Showroom – converted into a school for an initial 216 pupils.

This is a temporary measure to cater for this September’s intake. It will be followed by a second application to change the use of Homelife House and demolition of Raglan House to redevelop the site for a 676-place all-through school.

If granted permission, the school will help alleviate some of the pressure on Bournemouth’s primary school places, which are struggling to cope with a huge rise in the numbers of babies being born.

As a free school, it will be outside of the local council’s control, and will offer an international curriculum combining the Montessori method and international primary curriculum at primary stage and the International Baccalaureate’s middle years and diploma programmes at secondary.

During the temporary first phase, the lower two floors of Homelife House will provide school accommodation, while the upper floors will be reconfigured internally and not used by the school.

Arnetts Showroom, which is a single-storey building wrapped around Homelife House, will be used as temporary school accommodation.

The existing Homelife House surface car park will also house two portable classrooms and a portable toilet block.

Raglan House will be used as school accommodation and its car park will be converted into an outdoor play area. The rooftop terrace of Arnetts Showroom will also be used for outdoor play.

Parkfield School spokesman Ed Forbes said: “The plans have gone in as part of our continuing effort to secure the site in time for a September start.”

He said they had received a letter from the Department of Education confirming their commitment to work with them.

And he added that principal Terry Conaghan has also been busy, offering jobs to around 11 teachers.