Downing street reception for 2009 Teaching Award winners
UK winners meet PM Gordon Brown at Number 10
Teaching Award winners from this year’s Class of 2009 were invited to celebrate their achievements at an afternoon reception hosted by Prime Minister Gordon Brown at 10 Downing Street.
Gold plato winners, who scooped top awards at the Teaching Awards UK ceremony, visited Number 10 alongside 60 silver plato winners from this year’s cohort of outstanding professionals.
The celebration for the Teaching Awards ‘Class of 2009’ included exceptional teachers, headteachers, teaching assistants and school governors. Winners of the DCSF Award for Sustainable School of the Year 2009 were also present.
On the eve of the party Gordon Brown said: "You never forget a good teacher and the Teaching Awards recognises that important sentiment. The professionals that I welcome to this event have had a major impact on their pupils and students, and have inspired those in their schools to achieve. I congratulate them all for their creativity, their passion and their professionalism."
Winners were announced at a UK ceremony broadcast on BBC2 Sunday October 25, hosted by Christine Bleakley and Jeremy Vine. The programme reached 900,000 viewers – a ten per cent rise on last year.
The Prime Minister clearly had excellent teachers in mind when he wrote about the value of the profession and the need to trust them in a 1,100-word article in The Times Educational Supplement on Friday (October 30). He wrote that as a boy at Kirkaldy High School he learned ‘you never forget a good teacher’ and that he was now on ‘a very personal mission’ to nurture a new wave of social mobility, fulfilling the potential of all young people.
He wrote: ‘Any country that lags behind in education will lag behind in economic recovery. So, for me, there is no job more important to our collective futures than being a teacher.‘
We are blessed with a fine crop of great and dedicated professionals - the “best generation ever”, according to Ofsted - driving change, innovating and raising ambitions of schools and pupils.
‘So it is to teachers that we now turn and in them we must now place our trust; drawing on their expertise, passion and commitment with a fresh approach fit for the time.’
Caroline Evans, chief executive of the Teaching Awards said: ‘We are delighted that the Prime Minister Gordon Brown is paying tribute to the ‘Class of 2009’ at 10 Downing Street and we thank him for that. Our winners change children’s lives forever and, without them, schools would be very different places. They are terrific ambassadors for education who deserve recognition and who remind us to value all that is good in schools today.’
The eleven winners of UK Teaching Awards 2009 who attended the 10 Downing Street reception were:
Edward Vickerman, winner of the SSAT Award for Outstanding New Teacher of the Year
Elaine Loughran, winner of the Award for Special Needs Teacher of the Year
Liz Quinn, winner of the Royal Air Force Award for Headteacher of the Year in a Secondary School
Dan Lea,winner of the Becta Award for Next Generation Learning
Patricia Gribble, winner of The TDA Award for Teaching Assistant of the Year
Maxine Pittaway, winner of The DCSF Award for Enterprise
Cardinal Wiseman Roman Catholic School and Language College in Coventry is winner of the DCSF Award for Sustainable Schools.
Steve Mills, winner of The BT Award for Teacher of the Year in a Primary School
Angela Palin, winner of The National College Award for Headteacher of the Year in a Primary School
Dan Walton, winner of the Award for the Teacher of the Year in a Secondary School
Mike Vening, winner of The Ted Wragg Award for Lifetime Achievement
