The Geography Department at St Edward’s College, Liverpool won the Bernice McCabe Award during a ceremony at Butchers’ Hall, London on Monday 11th March.
Bernice McCabe OBE, who passed away in February 2019, was the founding Co-Director of the PTI and believed in the transformative power of inspiring subject teaching.
The Award celebrates excellence in subject leadership in schools, recognising departments that put quality subject teaching at the heart of the classroom. A £5,000 prize and trophy is awarded annually to an exceptional department which demonstrates the ethos and values of the PTI through their work within and beyond the curriculum.
The Geography Department at St Edward’s College, Liverpool was nominated for cultivating a community of Geographers who enjoy and engage with the discipline in everyday situations promoting geographical identity both outside of the classroom and outside of the school day. This has been achieved through a diverse array of activities which contribute to a cumulative geographical ethos, collaborating with a range of external agencies.
A highlight of the project includes the repurposing of a woodland walk on the school grounds previously overgrown with vegetation and foliage. The Geography Department created the Milankovitch Woodland Trail on a 250 metre stretch of forest with fieldwork experiences integrated into all year groups’ schemes of learning at Key Stage 3 and 4. In collaboration with the University of Liverpool’s sustainability department, the woodland facility was developed through some forward-thinking initiatives such as bug boxes, hedgehog friendly spaces and birdwatching.
Hugh Rayment-Pickard, Co-Director, The PTI said: “The PTI is delighted to announce the Geography Department at St Edward’s College, Liverpool as nominee/commended/winner of the respected Bernice McCabe Award 2024. This award recognises teachers and departments across the country who continually go the extra mile for their students. The award allows the PTI to highlight excellence in subject leadership, and the impact that quality subject teaching can have in the classroom. Many congratulations to this year’s shortlisted departments, and to the tremendous subject teachers impacting young people’s lives around the country.”
John Wilkinson, Head of Geography at St Edwards College, Liverpool said: “The PTI has been a revelation; it has transformed the ethos of our department where curriculum is the beating heart of the student experience inside and outside of the classroom, cultivating Geographers of the future”
Christine Counsell, Chair of the judging panel said: “The Geography department at St Edwards College, Liverpool, had the Awards Panel lost for words. The quality of innovation, the energy with which it is implemented and the depth of the scholarly connections all illustrate a passionate intellectual curiosity, plugged in to the local environment and to scholarship which shows that the work of running a subject department is one of constant, creative renewal. The impact on the pupils’ enthusiasm for the subject had the visitors to the department reaching for words such as ‘unbelievable’ and ‘extraordinary’.”
The trophy awarded to past and present winners of the Bernice McCabe Award was curated by award winning designer, Sophie Conran. The prize money is used to advance the values of the PTI within the winner’s school, fund travel to visit other schools and disseminate the work which has been recognised by the award.
The judging panel consisted of Christine Counsell (Chair), Rod Mackinnon (former Headteacher and Education Consultant), Professor Dame Alison Peacock (CEO of the Chartered College of Teaching), Carolyn Roberts (Headteacher of Thomas Tallis School and Co-Director of The PTI), Professor Helen Cooper (formerly Head of the English Faculty at the University of Cambridge) and Jon Bishop (Headteacher, Robert Bakewell Primary School, Loughborough).