Spanish trip puts school on ball for major award
STAFF from Whitworth Community High School will be in London tomorrow (Thursday) as finalists in a national competition.
Whitworth has been shortlisted in the Educational Visits Award at the Education Business Awards.
It follows a football trip the school made to Spain in February which was organised and documented by Head of PE Will Cawley.
He live blogged the trip on Twitter every night for parents back home and combined photographs and videos to create a documentary that was uploaded to YouTube.
He said: “We received a letter from Lancashire County Council’s Evolve Website for educational and off site visits recommending we put the trip forward for an award.
“I wrote a 500 word piece and explained how on the plane on the way over one of the 54 students had picked up a bug.
“It was only a 24-hour bug but he passed it on. It affected four students the next day and by the end of the fourth day it had made 16 of the students poorly.
“We had seven members of staff on the trip and they dealt with it really well.”
Mr Cawley organised the trip through travel company Inspire Sport as a follow-up to a trip in 2016 to PSV Eindhoven in Holland.
He said: “My wife is expecting our first baby on July 24, so I won’t be going to the ceremony at Grange Hotel in London.
“The trip’s deputy leader, Head of Technology Sam Sheldon, will be attending, along with Pas- toral Manager Victoria Mairs as she looked after the students when they were poorly.
“The students still played eight matches, attended five training sessions and went to Real Madrid and Athletico Madrid and toured the stadia. None of the girls on the trip were affected by the bug.”
A further footballing trip is planned for 2020, when staff and students will go to Porto in Portugal. To view the video log on to YouTube WCHS Real Madrid Tour 2018.