These are exciting times for Colne Valley Specialist Arts College.

In June we learned that we were among the top 10% of schools nationally for our improved performance in recent years. In August our Year 11 class of 2012 achieved the best results in the school’s history, a huge cause for celebration for our entire community.

As we continue to deliver a high quality education to the community of the Colne Valley, we are also developing our curriculum to reflect the rural  heritage of the school. In the past, the school was renowned for its pioneering farm. Our “Growing and sustainable living” course is the  latest addition to the Colne Valley curriculum and  is an academically rigorous 21st century  slant on rural and horticultural studies. The course has been developed and delivered by local tutor Steve Smith, drawing on contacts with community and environmental groups in the valley and with Huddersfield University.

This nationally accredited course encourages students of all abilities to consider key issues affecting them locally and globally and provides progression routes to college  and university. Not only do students learn how to grow and sell organic produce but they will be taught how to consider sustainable food production by reducing the miles involved in transporting food.

“The course is closely linked to the context and heritage of the Valley. For example, students recently did a walk which concluded with a reading of some of his poetry in Marsden Mechanics by Simon Armitage (an ex-student of the school), Professor of poetry at The University of Sheffield”

Colne Valley students also made excellent use of the developing links with Huddersfield University on Soil Laboratory Day when they joined undergraduates in analysing soil samples from the school growing areas and from around the valley.