WATCH: Meet Wick school's Mr Cool

Techie teacher to print 3D model of Caithness school

Published 10th Dec 2016

Wick High School is opening its doors to the public for the very last time today, as staff and pupils prepare to move to brand new facilities elsewhere.

Next year's move will mark the end of more than 100-years of teaching at the site, where graffiti by three-generations of the same family has been found on the same wall.

IT teacher Chris Aitken has been helping to record the school's history, which is on show from 10am until 3pm.

The 33-year-old is well known for Tweeting videos of his hi-tech and interactive school lessons.

He told MFR News: "Graffiti has been found - well, at one point it would have been called graffiti, but now we call it history. We've found graffiti from 1917, all the way up to last year.

"We've had graffiti of ex-teachers, current teachers, ex-pupils, children, grandchildren, parents. We've had three-generations of a family signing the same piece of wall."

LISTEN: What memories do you have of going to Wick High School? The Caithness computer whizz is passionate about the place's century old history...

It's actually become an online hit worldwide.

Mr Aitken explained: "We put that out on Facebook, and the response we've had has been amazing. We've had people from Seattle who came to the school - they signed their names and addresses on the walls in the school, in the old prefects building in the towers."

The John o' Groats man has used historic photographs to make a 3D design of the original school building, and using the computer science department's 3D printer, Mr Aitken plans to make a model.

There's growing frustration in the Caithness community, which has been forced to wait for an indefinite period of time to find out when construction of Wick Campus will be completed.

The brand new £50million facilities will replace Wick High School and Pulteneytown and South primaries.

Iain Baikie, who's Chair of Wick High School's Parent Council, told MFR News in September - just one month away from the severely delayed opening of Wick Campus: "The Wick High School parent council and other community groups were aware of ongoing problems with the building program: broken windows, failure of supporting beam, poor finish, issues with foundations and a swimming pool viewing gallery that does not offer spectators a proper view of the pool!."

ABOVE: Unfinished & overrunning work | Source: wickhighschool.org

Highland Council's Head of Resources, Brian Porter commented: "The Council is deeply disappointed by this further delay, and has escalated concerns with hub North Scotland Limited and Morrison Construction Limited to understand reasons for the delay, and seek assurances on the revised handover date."

Dr Fiona Grant, Wick High School Rector said: "We are currently planning for a phased move to our new building towards the end of this term with an expected opening date in the new building of Thursday, 12th January, 2017."

EXPLORE: If you can't make it to the open day which lasts for five-hours, then you can take a virtual tour of Wick High School from right in front of your screen...