The gifts that need to be handled with care

As schools get to grips with the challenge of meeting the classroom needs of tomorrow's high-flyers, Alder Grange, a state comprehensive in Rawtenstall, is helping to pioneer a project to give youngsters like Kayleigh the specialised help they need.

She is one of 25 pupils at the school who are deemed to be gifted and talented -- a phrase adopted by the Department for Education to define pupils who require extra help to meet their demands in a mainstream setting.

Kayleigh, of Mitton Avenue, Rawtenstall, is taking a new General Studies GCSE course, which is the result of teaching staff nominating the high achievers from the years eight and nine back in 1999.

Headteacher Iain Hulland said: "Gifted children have the same rights as pupils with other special needs and we are addressing this with some pioneering work in the school."

The work is co-ordinated by teacher Sarah Walmsley.

Kayleigh explained: "The course gives us a chance to stretch ourselves and to open our minds to points of view we maybe wouldn't have encountered before.

"It provides us with an opportunity to encounter a world that is bigger than high school and what you are going to wear on Saturday night.

"We cover a wide range of topics, from media to politics and from law and order to art. It's a vast syllabus .

"One thing that is consistent within our lessons is the fact that we discuss issues that we have seen on the news or read in the paper.

"We observe the way certain media groups portray different stories.

"We get a newspaper and examine it thoroughly.

"We never accept things as they are; we always question their motives!.

"If we are lucky, guest speakers come to talk to us -- for example we've had PR executives, social workers, a justice of the peace and a representative from Amnesty International.

"I personally love the lessons as they have a far more relaxed atmosphere.

"It is a place where you can sit and discuss the week's events. It's not a strict "do your work" atmosphere but it's not unruly either.

"We've been out on several trips, for example to HM Walton Liverpool Men's Prison.

"As young and nave as we were, when we started we used to talk about items like David Beckham's latest haircut.

"Now, after three seemingly short years of the course, we talk about terrorism within Afghanistan, politics and serious stories such as the Sarah Payne murder.

"Once we had the chance to manufacture our own boy band.

"It may seem like a really useless task, but it taught us marketing skills, how important image is in the showbusiness industry and much more.

"We also held our own mock election. We ran the campaigns ourselves, publicised them, and hosted an assembly and asked the pupils to vote.

"The politics side was so realistic that there was a lot of underhand behaviour going on!