Bryan Klug says the club should know soon when the audit which will decide whether the academy is ready to step up to category one status will take place. Town are aiming to upgrade from category two ahead of the 2014/15 campaign.
"That’s progressing,” the academy director said. "We’re hoping that there’ll be a meeting with the higher levels to decide exactly when we will be audited, we’re not sure yet.
"That should be before Christmas and my indications are that sometime before the end of the season we’ll get the audit. I’m not sure exactly when but we’ll see.”
Part of the funding for the upgrade comes from the Academy Association with Simon Milton charged with raising £500,000 a season to add to £1.2 million invested annually by owner Marcus Evans and a £750,000 Premier League grant.
"Simon’s brilliant at his job, he’s got a tough task there,” Klug says. "He’s obviously drummed up a lot of support.
"We know that in the area everybody likes to see homegrown players, so the academy is a priority for a lot of people and we’re just very grateful to anybody who can help us really.”
Despite the planned upgrade, Klug says there’ll be no increase in full-time academy players: "That won’t alter the number of scholars, you’ve still got the responsibility to have teams in each age group and you’re limited to how many scholars you can actually take because of funding.
"We’ve obviously got a shortfall in U21 players, it’s going to be a really difficult situation next year playing against Manchester United and Chelsea where they’ve got experienced players and we’ll have U18/U19 players. That’s something that we know about and we’re trying to put that right.
"You’re always recruiting, it’s never-ending. It’s the most important part of the equation really, getting the right players in at all levels. [Head of recruitment] Steve McGavin’s got a big job on.”
One recent development at the academy is the introduction of the Advance Coaching Programme, which is replacing the Player Development Centres run by the Charitable Trust until earlier in the season.
"That’s almost up and running,” Klug said. "David Llewellyn’s been appointed to do a job there. He’s doing a couple of taster sessions and is then picking up the courses after Christmas.
"That’s not a responsibility of the academy, we are helping with it because I think it’s important to have a decent coaching programme in place and part of our responsibility is to help as much as we can at the grassroots level of football because if that’s steady then it helps us at the top end. Those should be up and running and the club will be administering them from January.
"There have been people involved with the Trust over a number of years and there’s a list of people who will be contacted to get on the courses.”