News from schools around Tayside and Fife. To tell us what your school has been up to email schoolsandfamily@thecourier.co.uk.
Colliston cooks
Junior MasterChef was given a run for its money at Colliston Primary School, in Arbroath.
Pupils in P5 to P7 set up their own restaurant in their Step up to the Plate challenge.
After conducting market research, teams designed, prepared and cooked a two-course meal and drink with a set budget.
A voucher donated by Quality Meat Scotland was used to purchase some of the ingredients, most of which were locally-sourced.
And as judge, lucky head teacher Siobhan Brown was able to savour the results, which included homemade burgers, vegetable soup and strawberry cheesecake.
Lathallan climate change champions
Lathallan School, in Johnshaven, has raised its fifth Eco-Schools green flag from Keep Scotland Beautiful.
It was commended for its range of activities and enthusiasm for outdoor learning.
Headmaster Richard Toley said: “We are delighted to receive our fifth Eco-Schools green flag.
“Eco-schools has been an excellent programme for educating and informing our young people, connecting them to nature and empowering them to create change on our journey towards a sustainable school for the environment”.
Work by pupils over the past year includes making their own climate pledges, planting trees, organising an eco-fashion show and cutting down on single-use plastics.
S6 pupil Oliver Noordermeer said: “It makes us feel that we can all play a part in the fight against climate change and create a better future for us and future generations”.
Bell Baxter Pride
Bell Baxter High School pupils are preparing to celebrate Pride month, starting on Tuesday with a rainbow non-uniform day.
Their equalities group are encouraging people to wear bright colours to the Cupar school in return for a donation to the LGBT Youth Scotland charity.
The school is aiming for a silver award this year, with pupils working hard to promote LGBT+ awareness by drafting a manifesto, reviewing the school’s equality, diversity and inclusion policy and supporting faculties to embed greater awareness in courses.
Two new Pride flags, funded by the parent council, will be flown at the school throughout Pride month.
School rector Carol Ann Penrose said: “I am extremely proud of the work we have carried out this year and look forward to the school going from strength to strength in building the kind of supportive, inclusive and welcoming culture that we aspire to and making this a great place to work and learn.”
Fife frigate engineers
Design of Type 31 frigates at Rosyth is inspiring engineers of the future at west Fife schools.
Aerospace, defence and security company Babcock is hosting its third Festival of Engineering event at Rosyth.
It has been delivered virtually this year to pupils at Aberdour, Cardenden, Carnegie, Commercial, Pittencrieff and St Margaret’s primary schools.
Graduates at Rosyth hosted STEM – science, technology, engineering and maths – projects and delivered activity packs which showed how the five Royal Navy frigates are designed.
Sean Donaldson, managing director of Babcock’s Rosyth site, said: “The Festival of Engineering is a great project for us to engage the local community with the work that we do at Rosyth.
“STEM outreach with local schools is long-standing at Rosyth, so it was a natural fit to use the Type 31 frigate programme as one of our topics to excite and encourage the next generation of potential engineers using fun and interactive challenges – albeit off-site for now.”
Karen Hopkins, depute head teacher at Commercial Primary School, said: “There was a high level of interest from the pupils, and it was pleasing to see groups of girls, who traditionally are difficult to engage in STEM subjects, showing enthusiasm about learning engineering ideas and concepts.”
