Construction of a new PPP secondary school, Noel Baker and St Martin’s School, will start in January 2011. To help fund the scheme Balfour Beatty will invest £3m into the 25-year construction and facilities management concession.

The extensive remodelling of Derby Moor School, a design and build secondary school project, will also start in January.

The contractor has pledged a lasting skills legacy for the local area that includes 1,040 apprenticeship weeks of training throughout the construction period.

This will be operated through the recently-launched Balfour Beatty Apprenticeships programme, mentoring and work placements will also be open to pupils in Derby.

The firm has pledged to offer employment for local residents, and work packages for local employers.

Balfour Beatty chief executive, Ian Tyler, said: “We look forward to working in close partnership with Derby City Council to create new, first-class, learning environments as well as facilities that will be available to the whole community including leisure, learning, sports and ICT provision.”

Balfour Beatty Education was appointed as preferred bidder for the scheme in June 2010.

The new deal brings the number of  Balfour PPP concessions in the education sector to 11, five under the BSF at Blackburn with Darwen and Bolton, Newcastle, Southwark, Islington and Knowsley and five in the UK under the previous PPP model at Stoke, Bassetlaw, Rotherham, Birmingham and North Lanarkshire and one in Singapore.