Once the Hope Centre was completed, the initial plan was to vacate and ultimately demolish, the rather dilapidated Foord House, which had previously housed GWC’s cafeteria and single male student accommodation. But, with GWC’s Explore department bursting at the seams, and when 2020 brought a large number of students – with many more single female students – it became necessary to renovate Foord House to accommodate student overflow, house the Explore department, add a sizeable extra classroom and provide postgraduate students with a much- needed postgraduate wing. “It is really nice to have a dedicated space to call our own where we can spend time immersed in our work,” Bongolomzi Mkiva (BTh Hons student at GWC).
Nathan Lovell, Director of Postgraduate Studies, says, “Postgraduate projects are large with lots of reading required and, practically speaking, GWC’s postgraduate students were in need of a safe, dedicated area in which to work and store their textbooks and laptops, mid-project. The secondary benefit of having a postgraduate wing is that it lends itself to building community in what is, largely, a period of isolated and self-directed study, in creating a space where students can benefit greatly from being able to confer with each other.”