Brigshaw High School

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Brigshaw High School and Language College is located in the village of Allerton Bywater. It is the fastest-growing high school in the city of Leeds [1] with over 1400 pupils in September 2006 compared to 870 pupils in 1996.

The school was originally opened in September 1972 and a newer block, "De-Lacey", was built in the mid-80's to cope with the schools' growth. In September 2004 it became a specialist Language College as part of the UK's Specialist schools programme.The headteacher for the school is Mr Peter Laurence. Feeder schools include: Colton Primary School, Swillington Primary School, Great & Little Preston Primary School, Kippax North Junior and Infant School, Allerton Bywater Primary & Methley Primary among others.............


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[edit] Silkstone

The main building was destroyed by a fire in April 2000, caused by arson by a pupil. It was rebuilt during 2002 at a cost of £8m and opened in September. It was re-named "Silkstone" after a coal face located underneath the school.

[edit] Sports Hall

The sports block was destroyed by an electrical fire in December 2003, and was rebuilt in July 2005 at a cost of £1.5m. The new sports facility includes a fully equipped gym, a running track, football / rugby fields as well as indoor tennis and basketball courts. Certain design faults were soon apparent after completion of the building which include a major fault with the water system. Tests carried out on the water revealed that Legionellosis (an infectious disease caused by bacteria) is likely to be present in the water dispensed at the drinking fountains. It is currently being investigated by the contractors who constructed the building.


[edit] Musical History

British rock band The Music met at the school, and have had great success in the United Kingdom and overseas. The music centre is the only building left which remains from the original 1972 construction. It has recently been updated, with new windows & doors added and a state of the art music-technology computer suite.

[edit] Curriculum

Because Brigshaw is a Language College the school offers students the ability to speak a different language. In year seven, the 'Y' side of the year studies German and the 'X' side of the year studies French. When students reach year eight, they then begin to learn Spanish. Some pupils are put forward to do a fast track German/French course and take their GCSE 2 years early. The first students to do this two years early started the course in 2005. After completing their language GCSE early, they were then able to choose between Spanish (for a GCSE) or if they wished, they could choose Japanese as a non-GCSE lesson.

In year 10, the students begin studying their chosen 'pathways', which are any three of these:

Drama, Media, Business, ICT, Cooking, Electronics, Art, Music, Woodwork, Graphics, Textiles, Geography, History, P.E., Health & Social, and Metalwork.

Any of these courses can be taken as a BTEC course, where only coursework is done and no exams are held.

In addition to the three chosen subjects, they have to take the compulsory ones as well:

English, Maths, Science, Either one or two languages [Spanish, German, French, Japanese, Russian] PHSE, RE, Basic PE and Basic ICT.