SEEVIC College is spending £400,000 on a temporary building to accommodate an extra 250 students.

The college has applied to Castle Point Council for permission to site the two-storey block at its main site, in Kiln Road, Thundersley.

It will offer ten new classrooms and place of two existing blocks on the site.

Principal Nick Spenceley said: “The plans respond to requirements for study programmes which see students spend more time in college.

“This has created demand for extra space.”

The extra space was needed, he added, partly because the college was moving some of its courses out of the Icon building in Southernay, Basildon.

It also wants to double the number of students taking foundation courses. Mr Spenceley added: “It will have two floors and a steel frame.

“The classrooms will be quite a bit larger than in Portacabin-style buildings.

“We need the extra room because we are already using all our space.

“The idea is to give students a better environment in which to to learn.”

The college’s planning application asked for the new building to remain for five years, though Mr Spenceley said it might need the classrooms for longer than that.

Mr Spenceley said the building itself had something of an interesting history.

At one time is was used in the the Olympic Park complex in Stratford, East London.

He added: “It’s a movable structure and I think it was part of the management headquarters.

Before that, it was on the Channel Tunnel site.”

Each new classrooms will have room for 25 pupils.