HIDDEN among rows of houses in west Newport, Somerton Primary School is a treasure trove of educational ideas and opportunity – and not just for the pupils.

The school prides itself on creating an atmosphere to help develop young minds in their learning adventure, but it does not neglect other key demographics intertwined with school life.

Community matters remain close to the ethos at Somerton – so much so that parents of the pupils are also being taught and guided to help their children flourish.

With an active engagement in helping break down cultural barriers all against the educational backdrop, the school is a source of delightful sounds and smells all centred around its core principle – learning.

The school is set for a new guise in the New Year, as a new headteacher steps into the fold to take the school into the future.

Fiona Rutledge will be ending her four-year tenure as headteacher in January 2016, with Nick Penn from Pentrepoeth Primary School in Bassaleg in place to take over.

It is with a heavy heart that Miss Rutledge will leave the school in the New Year, but she has seen a noticeable improvement at the school during her leadership.

Miss Rutledge is confident that even with the minor upheaval, Somerton will remain in safe hands and can continue to improve.

“The staff at this school are second to none and the school has moved forward tremendously in every aspect during my time here,” said the headteacher.

“I have every faith that this will continue under the new headteacher and I firmly believe that with this team of the present staff and Mr Penn arriving, the school will remain in safe hands.”

To give the children at Somerton the optimum learning experience, the school incorporates a range of different schemes into its schedules.

Some of these initiatives use external companies such as Gwent Education Minority-Ethnic Service (GEMS), Newport City Homes and Upbeat Music while other are solely operated as in-school projects.

Ideas such as the walking bus and ‘Cool to be in School’ are widely used by the pupils at the school, and the headteacher has seen improvements across the age range, particularly with the latter.

“As with all schools across Wales, we are keen to boost our attendance,” said Miss Rutledge.

“The aim is 95 per cent across all the pupils at our school. It is tough but the parents are on board.

“Our ‘Cool to be in School’ initiative has shown signs of promise and we have seen that since this was introduced, the attendance of our children has improved,” she added.

Classes with the best attendances are announced in assembly, and the winners receive an extra prize for achieving the highest percentage – their photograph taken in a pair of bright red sunglasses.

“In our assemblies, we announce the figures about school attendance and we find out which class has the best attendance,” said Miss Rutledge.

“The children get into the whole event and it can get a little competitive but this is a part of showing how the children want to be in school and create exciting new initiatives.”

The aspect of community and the impact it has at Somerton is on display from the vibrant wall displays down to the activities as part of the school day.

The school has worked hard to get parents of the pupils on board and every Friday, the school holds coffee mornings which parents are invited to attend.

“We are very lucky to have employed a family engagement officer – Cheryl Thatcher – and she has done a great job in running our coffee mornings for parents,” said Miss Rutledge.

“They are invited in and if they need support with helping their child’s literacy, numeracy or behaviour and Mrs Thatcher will work with them and offer the support.

“We’ve worked with Newport City Homes to secure funding to run cookery workshops for families and these are a fun and practical environment as it develops literacy and numeracy skills at the same time,” she added.

An obstacle which is slowly being overcome is the language barrier as some of the parents and pupils are from backgrounds where English or Welsh is not the primary language.

“It is great to see the parents of children from non-Welsh backgrounds integrating and being so keen to do so,” said the headteacher.

“The parents are keen not just for their child’s language skills to develop but in some cases, they wish to improve their own.

“Since we started running these sessions, the language skills of our pupils, and parents, whose first language isn’t English or Welsh have improved exponentially,” added Miss Rutledge.

The work of GEMS, an interpreting service, and Newport City Homes has helped to make Somerton a more inclusive society, which is very pleasing to the headteacher.

With these two outside agencies being mutual beneficial for families, the school also works with Upbeat Music but this venture is solely for the children.

The musical group work with the children to help improve numeracy and literacy among the pupils, but additional benefits have come to the fore.

“Since we have started working with them over the past year or so, we have noticed a marked improvement in our students,” said the headteacher.

“Our upper Key Stage 2 pupils took part in drumming workshops and this was a great outlet of energy for our children.

“As a by-product of this, the behaviour of our children has come on leaps and bounds,” added Miss Rutledge.

With the Christmas Bazaar and productions coming over the next few weeks, the outgoing headteacher reflects on her final few weeks at Somerton before moving to Mount Pleasant Primary School.

“The benefits of this programme are so visible and the buzz of those classes shows that we are right to pursue and promote these sessions with our outside agencies,” said Miss Rutledge.

“The children are happy while learning and the parents are engaging with them in these activities and we want to have a fun, exciting, vibrant and engaging learning environment which welcomes all.”

Fact file

Headteacher – Miss Fiona Rutledge

Pupils – 172

Age range – 3-11

Staff – 24

Head of governors – Alan Speight

Motto – Learning, playing, growing together

Report – 2011 – see previous SOTW