School wins top award

A Newark secondary school has won a national award in recognition of excellent teaching and pupils’ achievements in psychology at A-level.

The Magnus School has been presented with the 2009 Good Schools Guide A-level award for boys taking psychology at an English Comprehensive School.

The Good Schools Guide aims to highlight excellent teaching in individual subjects.

The award is made on the basis of the school’s psychology results for the three years from 2006-s8, the popularity of the subject compared with similar schools and of the success that pupils achieve relative to the other exams they take.

The school’s head of psychology, Mrs Su Staunton, said: “I’m pretty surprised to be honest. I’m the only psychology teacher at the school so I just do it my own way and it obviously works.

“Boys don’t tend to be as interested and they don’t have the same work ethic as girls so I’m really pleased with the results.

“The students have worked really hard. It’s their achievement.”

Mrs Staunton said the subject was very popular and about two thirds of the sixth-form studied psychology.