Buile Hill High School

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Buile Hill High School is an educational secondary school, in Salford, in the North West of England. The school is over 100 years old in some parts, with the school itself owning a playing field with a nearby college, Pendleton College[1], which is across the field. The school has a strong Arts and Drama department and received an Artsmark Gold Award [2] in May 2006. It is one of the few schools in the area with a fully working theatre and performance space. The current number of students attending Buile Hill High School is 944 (2006), with all students in the 11-16 age range.

The School is to be rebuilt on the adjacent field and is planned to be completed by 2008. The new buildings are to be funded through the Private Finance Initiative. The planning applications are available online as a pdf document [3]

1 Decline In grade standard
2 Awards and prizes for students
3 Notable Past Pupils
4 Notes
5 External links

[edit] Decline In grade standard

For an unknown period of time, the school's GCSE grade standards were dropping, with attendance also in the same direction. The school implemented new schemes, such as awards and prizes for students in order to combat this. However, the current head teacher (Dr. G. Merit) was replaced with a new headteacher (Mr. P. Fitzpatrick) and associate head teacher (Mr. G. Swift) in 2005/6 in order to restore and higher grades and attendance. Mr. Fitzpatrick left the school suddenly at the February 2007 half term by 'mutual agreement' and sparked concerns over the future of the school which was listed bottom in the January 2007 secondary school league tables. ^[1]

[edit] Awards and prizes for students

In order to raise morale and attendance among students, the school hosts various award schemes, which make it stand out from other schools due to this unique system, such as;

[edit] "Merit/Stamp collection"

When a student behaves well or their work is of a pre-set standard, that student is awarded with a "stamp or sticker" in his/her "planner diary". Once a student has collected enough, they may be exchanged for prizes at the school office. Prizes range from pens, colour felt-tips, rubbers, pencil cases, and Parker Pens. This has since stopped, but has now been replaced by "merits" instead of "stamps", which are achieve under the same conditions, but are received on yellow strips of paper.

[edit] "Be in to win"

When a student achieves over 90%+ attendance for a half-term, they are entered into a draw which takes place on the last week of the relevant half-term, with many posters around the school advertising and reminding students. Such prizes for this draw include stereos, TVs and shop vouchers.

[edit] "100% Attendance"

To be entered into this draw, a student must attend every school day for a half-term, and is automatically entered. There is little-to-no advertising for this in the school, however, there is only one winner and one prize; £100 (£50 for the student and £50 for the student's parents).

[edit] "Triple Level 5"

This award scheme has no real name, but has since been introduced to the school in 2005/6. Any student who gains three Level 5 (or over) grades in their Year 9 SATs Exam are given shop vouchers worth £10, usually, they are shop vouchers for the Trafford Centre.

None of these 'schemes' have made any significant changes to the school, and paying students to perform is regarded by some people as wrong.^[2] ^[3] The £100,000 a year 'Superhead' brought in to turn the school around has since left ^[4]

[edit] Notable Past Pupils

Paul Lockitt award-winning radio newsreader, who was named commercial radio's Newsreader of the Year at the Independent Radio Awards in 2005 for the second year running.

Peter Hook and Bernard Sumner of Joy Division and New Order

Mike Leigh film director who joined the Royal Shakespeare Company as an assistant director in 1967. He later achieved lasting fame for plays such as Nuts in May and for his films including the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival and five Academy Award nominations. His latest film (2005) is Vera Drake.

Eddie Maguire scriptwriter who wrote "Ray's A Laugh" (with Ted Ray) for the BBC among other successes

Tony Mercer became interested in stage lighting at school and gradually got into artistic direction. He now lives in Moscow but returned to Salford recently to direct the latest dance spectacular The Sleeping Beauty at The Lowry