MALVERN College is launching a £1.6 million appeal for new facilities to enhance its national and international reputation.

They include a £1.2 million International Communication and Language Centre and a £400,000 all-weather playing surface.

The college, which has invested £5 million in improvements and developments over the past 10 years, has taken the unusual step of appealing to parents and former pupils for help with the latest projects.

This would enable existing funds to be directed towards pastoral care and further improvements in the school houses, said headmaster Hugh Carson.

Mr Carson began approaching friends of the school in May and has already secured pledges of £600,000.

He is hoping to exceed the £1.6 million target, putting any surplus towards the school's own assisted places scheme, set up as the government scheme was being phased out, to help gifted children whose parents cannot afford the fees.

Besides writing to parents, Mr Carson plans to take the appeal to Germany next month and to the USA in November.

"The Ambassador for Thailand is a former pupil and I'm going to Washington in November for an old boys' reunion at the Thai Embassy," he said.

"It's so exciting that we have done so well already, before the appeal becomes public. If we get this right it will enable us to carry out other developments within the school.

"We have to keep on improving our facilities. We can't stand still."

The need for an International Communication and Language Centre reflects the global outlook of the school, which draws one fifth of its 750 pupils from overseas.

The new centre will be built next to the Science Schools, east of No 8, and it will be designed to harmonise with other college buildings.

It will contain information technology and language rooms, including one for English as a foreign language and allow English and mathematics to be brought together in the main building.

Planning permission has already been obtained for an all-weather pitch in the south-west corner of the playing fields, which will be available for community use when not in use by the school.