THEY’RE building their field of dreams – and their dream for a funding boost came true.

Wilberlee Junior and Infants School came top of the Examiner’s Schools Collect for Cash – collecting the highest number of tokens per pupil.

Readers collected tokens in the Examiner to win their share of £11,000 – thanks to Barclays.

And the children of Wilberlee will use their win to cultivate a project they’ve called their Field of Dreams to help boost their environmental activities.

Sue Crowther, reception and year one teacher, said it was thanks to the hard work of the parents and pupils, including Melanie Clegg and her son Eli who rallied others.

“We were so excited when we were told,” Mrs Crowther said. “We’re working on our Field of Dreams project where we’re getting a playing field where we can have environment projects.

“We’re hoping to grow vegetables and plant fruit trees – it will be a brilliant extension of the school.”

Wilberlee has just 62 pupils and their amazing effort paid off in two ways – they scooped £2,000 for the highest number of tokens per pupil.

But they also came second in the table of the highest number of tokens overall – which earned them another £1,000.

They were beaten in the latter category by Netherton Infant and Nursery School, who got the £2,000 for outside projects.

And there was a big community effort backing the school – Netherton residents with no connection left their tokens for the school at the village Co-op and Carraday’s newsagents backed their token campaign.

Claire Butterworth, a teaching assistant and acting chairman of the PTA, said they would use the tokens to buy maths and reading resources.

She said: “We’ll get things like clocks and scales for maths so the children can learn different things and new books.

“We haven’t told the children yet, but this is the third year in a row we’ve won something – we came fourth, third and now first so we’d like to thank everyone who got involved.”

And another school celebrating is Helme Junior and Infants School who won £2,000 for the best suggestion in financial education.

And they’ve a grand idea to educate the children and generate some income.

Teacher Julie Bligh-Smith said they would make and sell bookmarks during their Power of Reading year and are considering buying hens and selling their produce.

The class four teacher said: “We’re looking at ICT packages that will help us make bookmarks which we can produce.

“We are focusing on reading – it will be intertwined in everything we do. Bookmarks are a lovely way we can create a product which we can sell and reinvest in books for the school library.

“It’s about helping the children grow and understand about money and business skills.

“I told my class and they were very excited – it’s really good news.”

Marie Morris, community business partner for Barclays, said: “It was amazing to hear about the plans that some of the schools have for helping their students understand more about money.

“We believe we can make the biggest difference to society when we focus on the areas where we can share our core expertise to make sure our actions really count.

“We invest in projects that build financial inclusion, financial capability and support enterprise because its where we feel we can make the biggest social impact for the communities we serve.’’

She added: “Through our flagship UK Community Programme, Barclays Money Skills, we are investing £15m over three years to help one million people build the skills knowledge and confidence they need to manage their money more effectively.

“The partnership with the Huddersfield Daily Examiner will help us achieve this.”