Toot Hill Secondary School, Bingham, awarded National Citizen Service (NCS) Gold Champion status

A school has been awarded National Citizen Service (NCS) Gold Champion status for the second year running for the contribution and involvement of their pupils in summer holiday social projects in 2018.

Toot Hill, Bingham, was one of just 14 groups attaining the status throughout the East Midlands.

A total of 100 pupils signed up to the scheme, making them the second-highest performing school in terms of sign-ups.

The NCS Awards were instigated by then Prime Minister David Cameron in 2011 and are designed to encourage the voluntary personal and social development of 15 to 17-year-olds in England and Northern Ireland.

It is the country’s fastest-growing youth movement.

NCS project manager at Toot Hill, Debs Mason said: “Our pupils have been amazing, fantastic. Their commitment has been just phenomenal.”

The project takes place over four weeks in the summer, starting with a week’s camping at the Tawd Vale Scout camp in Lancashire, followed by a week at the University of Nottingham where participants learn how to live independently and practise skills such as public speaking, budgeting and planning the socially useful activities that will aid and enhance their community for weeks three and four.

Projects the students came up with included creating a sensory garden for Ash Lea Special School, Cotgrave, and hosting a 1950s-style tea party for elderly residents of the Beauvale Care Home, Bingham.

The school also won Gold Champion status in 2017 and now has hopes of making it three in a row.