Ian Matthews, headteacher of Greendown Community School in Grange Park, has announced he will be leaving at the end of the school year in August 2001 to pursue new challenges in the education system, applying his skills as an Ofsted inspector and a headteacher performance assessor.

Appointed in early 1985, he moved with his family to live in West Swindon when the school building was just a steel frame. When Greendown opened in September 1996 there were thirteen teachers, two support staff and 125 year 7 children. Now there are 1,230 children and 102 people employed on site.

Ian explained that the school was at a successful point in its development and he wanted to give governors and a new appointment as much time as possible to prepare for the future. "Greendown has the largest role in its history and this summer's GCSE results at fifty four per cent were the best ever. This a probably the best point to make changes; the governors have the time to make the right appointment and the transition to a new head can be as smooth as possible. The important thing is to minimise the disruption to the teaching body and the education of the children.

"Following the good Ofsted report in 1999, a new person will have the time to get their feet under the table and drive the school forward in preparation for a future inspection."

He added that recent developments at the school made it particularly attractive to applicants for the job. "Education is under enormous pressure from all sides," he said. "But the improvement in standards right across the age and ability range is very pleasing, so is the performance by boys at GCSE. Our investment in the Future School computer based maths tuition system to cope with teacher shortages which affect all schools, and our involvement in the broadband internet project puts Greendown at the forefront of innovation. Underpinning this is the commitment from enthusiastic staff and solid management systems."

School gets hyper-speed connection

Dean Scott shows Julia Drown MP her picture on the swindonlink site whilst Claire Hogan shows off the high speed connection to Michael Wills. Daniel Rashid-Thomas, Andrew Basson, chair of governors, and teacher coordinator Chris Denley in the background.

Students at Greendown School can now access the internet at lightning speed, thanks to a government funded project to exploit the power of broadband technology.

Both Swindon's Members of Parliament, Michael Wills and Julia Drown, attended the launch of the super fast connection at Greendown School on 10 November with education representatives and students from schools in the Learning Force Regional Broadband Consortium, made up of local education authorities covering Bath and North East Somerset, Gloucestershire, South Gloucestershire North Somerset.

Broadband allows data to be transmitted forty times faster than the average home computer. For example a page heavy with photographs on The Link web site www.swindonlink.com might take 50 seconds to download. At Greendown it appeared instantly.

Addressing the assembled officials and councillors North Swindon MP Michael Wills, who is also Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Learning and Technology, said that every school will be connected to the internet by 2002, but the eight consortium across the country being funded by Department for Education were exploring how the next level of internet technology will change learning in schools and at home.

"At the heart of learning is the teacher, to inspire and motivate and provide what a computer cannot. But the barriers between home and school are breaking down fast; children will use computers before coming to school, after school and at weekends, accessing courses and researching information to help them with their studies."

He added that because broadband technology is at the cutting edge, the pilot projects were needed to explore how it can be used best and to test different ideas. Apart from the speed of finding information, students will be able to talk to others live using video links and can watch a teacher at another location giving a lesson, either live or by a recording.

A major part of the project involves schools creating content based on courses and information on local points of interest; students for example can explore the rooms at Lydiard House. The Learning Force consortium is also creating pages aimed at students, pages for teacher development, and creating links to sites which have been quality assured for educational value.

Greendown student Claire Hogan is finding the broadband connection useful in her research for school work. "It really is quick to get information. You don't have to wait for pages to load."

Teacher Chris Denley, Greendown project coordinator said the technology was showing great benefit in the short time it had been available. "It has increased the productivity of internet based lessons tenfold and has fostered a new-found enthusiasm for computer based learning. The students are using the internet with much greater confidence and have improved no end in terms of their research skills.