Selby's new showpiece town hall is to be used as classrooms to help beat a school's overcrowding problems.

Town councillors last night approved Selby High's request to use the hall for lessons after headteacher, Dr David Squires, said the Leeds Road school would be "bursting at the seams" when the new term starts in September.

The new town hall, a former Methodist chapel, was officially opened earlier this year after almost £400,000 worth of refurbishment work.

The elegant surroundings, including pillars painted in green and gold and green velvet curtains, will house two classrooms, one in the hall-cum-arts-centre and one in the adjacent youth drop-in centre.

The school believes the unique idea is the only way it can solve a growing pupil roll crisis, which will see numbers top 1,000 for the first time when the autumn term starts.

Town councillors agreed to hand over the hall for classrooms between September and Christmas, and will offer Selby High a discount rate on its £15 an hour hire charges to reflect the block booking and the school's non-profit making status.

Selby Mayor and town councillor, Jennifer Shaw-Wright, who is also head of English at Selby High, said the 136-year-old town hall would be ideal for classrooms.

She said: "It's very quiet, there will be no interruptions and it will be an extremely pleasant place in which to teach and learn."The school is so popular that we're literally bursting at the seams."

Dr Squires said the school's accommodation problems had been made worse by a sudden influx of first year children starting in September. About 245 youngsters had enrolled instead of the normal 210.

He said: "We're trying to solve these problems on a temporary basis by renting two prefabricated buildings, but these won't be installed until the early autumn.

"Furthermore, North Yorkshire County Council plans to refurbish two laboratories during the autumn terms, and this work will displace classes and add to the problems.

"Without the town hall, we would have some quite serious overcrowding problems."

Dr Squires said they hoped to accommodate up to 60 pupils in the town hall classrooms. They would be closely supervised, and chaperoned to and from school.

The county council has allocated over £300,000 next year for a new multi-storey block comprising six general classrooms, three laboratories and a music/dance studio.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.