Top marks for super school given by Sir Al

Feb 27 2008 by Dave Black, The Journal

CHILDREN’S champion Sir Al Aynsley Green returned to his North East roots yesterday to praise a pioneering educational partnership project in a former pit town.

Sir Al – the independent Children’s Commissioner whose aim is to give a national voice to all young people – visited Ashington in Northumberland, where a 3,000-pupil ‘super school’ has been created in a bid to raise educational standards.

The Ashington Learning Partnership is one of the first 12 School Trusts to be set up across the country as part of the Government’s Schools Pathfinder Project.

It involves five schools – Ashington Community High, Bothal and Hirst Park Middle, and Central and Wansbeck First – coming together to establish a single organisation educating children from nursery age to when they leave for university or college.

It aims to drive up standards by creating a continuous institution which reduces problems caused by pupils having to move between schools at different ages, and by using the expertise of trust partners including Northumbria University, Northumberland College and the Wansbeck Business Forum.

The trust has become independent of local authority control, although the county council remains one of its partners.

Yesterday, Bedlington-born Sir Al, who was appointed to his national role in March 2005, met trust pupils and heard about a recent Deep Learning Day at which the partnership organised all-age teaching groups and youngsters moved between the different schools.

Afterwards he said: “I came here because I had heard of the exciting things being done in Ashington, especially this new trust.

“My job is to travel the country, meet young people and find out how they feel. There is so much negativism and demonisation of young people these days.

“I am trying to find examples of where things are not like that and Ashington should be proud of what is going on here. I have met children today aged from eight to their teens and it has been inspirational in terms of what they have got to say.

“I think it is very important for children to have role models, such as the Ashington School Trust’s partners, for how they can be a success in their lives, such as in industry or business.

“These children are our single most important asset and looking after them should be everyone’s business.

“Children I have met today have told me that adults don’t respect or listen to their opinions, and I would urge the local authorities to address that.”

Ken Tonge, strategic head of the Ashington Schools Trust, said: “It is a real accolade that the Children’s Commissioner has chosen to visit us.

“He is a leading figure who is highly influential in determining policies which affect young people.

“We are at the sharp end of the programme to create school trusts and have tried to create a single, all-age school, looking at a new way of working and expanding boundaries.”