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St Mary's Grammar School, Magherafelt

By Sue Leonard

"What I like really like about this school is that if you give the children an opportunity they don't just take it, they grasp it with both hands," says David Lambon, headmaster of Magherafelt's very successful and busy Catholic grammar school. From the challenge of cycling across Northern Ireland for five days in the pouring rain to get their Duke of Edinburgh gold award to performing at the Royal Albert Hall in the Schools Proms or entering a Young Innovators' competition and coming 4th in the world, pupils really do throw themselves into school activities with spirit and determination.

The students' impressive achievements outside the classroom are only surpassed by their outstanding academic performance inside it. St Mary's Grammar School, Magherafelt has a long tradition as a high achiever among schools in Northern Ireland but this year it has outdone itself, recording its best results yet. A remarkable 59.7% of A-level papers were awarded an A grade and 26.5% merited a B. At GCSE, a striking 65.5% of the 1,515 papers sat achieved an A* or A. Taken together, they represent the school's best ever set of examination results. The hard work put in by St Mary's pupils puts it in second place in Northern Ireland and moves it up to 32nd place overall. It ranked 55th last year.

Lambon attributes the impressive results haul to a number of factors including a good year group, a strong focus on revision and preparation for exams and personalised learning, as well as committed, hard-working staff. "Pupils are hungry," says Lambon, who became the selective coeducational school's first male principal when he was appointed in 2004. "Parents appreciate there is a culture of excellence and achievement," he adds.

Founded in 1927 by Monsignor John Ward, the local parish priest, to provide secondary education for Catholic girls, under the direction of the Sisters of the Holy Family of Bordeaux, St Mary's started out with just 10 pupils. It flourished and grew throughout the 1940s and in 1978 began enrolling boys, with 37 joining 587 girls. Today it has 1,100 pupils drawing children from the counties of Derry, Tyrone and Antrim.

Lambon praises the vision and hard work of his predecessors, saying it is them rather than he who should take the most credit for making the school what it is. He speaks of former inspirational heads such as Sister Immaculata O'Connor, who as principal between 1977 and 1995 formed the Friends of St Mary's to raise funds to finance a £6m building programme which included a large sports hall, fitness suite, sixth-form study area and general purpose classrooms, and Una O'Kane, Lambon's immediate predecessor, who is widely associated with further enhancing the academic reputation of the school and increasing its extracurricular programme.

Lambon has been doing a pretty good job himself. The school got a glowing report from inspectors last year. They commended St Mary's on its inclusive pupil-centred ethos, the high levels of professional commitment and dedication of teachers, the excellent standards achieved by pupils in public examinations, the quality of the teaching and the outstanding leadership and vision of the headmaster.

"The quality of education provided in this school is outstanding," the report concluded. "The educational and pastoral needs of the learners are being very well met. The parents and the community can have confidence in the school's capacity for sustained self-improvement."

The list of A-levels is long and impressive, ranging from English literature and theatre studies to history and applied business. On leaving, 97% of pupils go to university. In May 2007, St Mary's was designated as a specialist school for science, which has lead to investment in more staff, specialist equipment and computer technology.

The status also helped it spearhead personalised teaching and learning, which has now been extended to other subjects. Form teachers work with pupils on an individual basis setting targets and monitoring progress and, in addition, a number of A-level subjects including science, maths, music and home economics have timetabled periods for teachers to spend extra time with individual pupils. The school carries out assessments on pupils in year 11 and 13 to establish what students might expect to achieve in public exams and then encourages and supports them to aim higher.

Progress is tracked using a range of data. The emphasis is on personal improvement rather than wholesale improvement across the school. "We want to raise their individual performance," says Lambon. However, the school's results show that when every child is trying their very best, the knock-on effect is that the whole school benefits. From this year, revision courses will be offered in all GCSE and A-level subjects.

St Mary's also collaborates with the other four secondary schools in the town, sharing its ideas and facilities and benefiting from those of the others. In the sixth form, students can undertake subjects at other schools if they are not available at St Mary's because of timetable clashes, while pupils from other schools can choose to study at St Mary's. The collaboration is part of the personalised learning approach. It extends choice and gets staff working together.

Everyone buys into the St Mary's experience: students and teachers. "What makes it so special is that every single member of staff is involved not just as a teacher but with extracurricular events," says Lambon. One teacher currently on paternity leave came in to coach the football team because they had a match coming up, and every teacher was involved in the recent school play Sean O'Casey's Juno and the Paycock.

Pupils fit in a raft of activities between classes from concerts, carol services and lunchtime theatre to public speaking, debating and literary competitions, in which it has a record of success. On the field, there's plenty of action with a wide range of sports on offer, from athletics, golf and rugby to swimming, badminton and tennis. The school is best known, though, for its camogie (a combination of hockey and lacrosse) and Gaelic football teams, which are among the best in Ireland.

To widen the experience of pupils, the school organises theatre outings and trips abroad. Recent destinations have included countries such as the US, Japan, Switzerland and Ecuador.

Senior pupils are encouraged to do something for the school or wider community to develop a sense of citizenship and responsibility. Older students coach children from feeder schools at sport and act as mentors in science and drama for younger pupils, or simply inspire them through their own deeds. When pupils came back from doing their Duke of Edinburgh's gold award they spoke about it to younger pupils. "We show pupils what they can do by the role models they have in front of them," Lambon says.

And those pupil role models have role models of their own - the staff. "In many schools they talk about strong leadership," says Lambon. "I find in this school every single member of staff is a leader. They all know exactly what is required and they do it willingly."

Change is on the horizon, though, for this highly selective and very successful school. Like other grammar schools in Northern Ireland, despite the ending of the national 11-plus last year, St Mary's is still selecting pupils with its own entrance test, but not for much longer.

While the education department cannot prohibit independent selection tests, it frowns upon them and so do the Catholic bishops in the province, who have decided that selection should cease by 2012. The 11-plus has been deemed to unfairly advantage grammar schools in terms of enrolment and sustainability, as funding at less popular non-selective schools has suffered through falling pupil numbers.

Education, the bishops say, is not primarily about the excellent academic performance of some, but about helping all young people develop as rounded human beings.

St Mary's usually gets 200 applications from children who have successfully completed the 11-plus, and about 90% of whom score an A in the test. "It is going to be a change for all of us," says father-of-two Lambon. "We have no choice.

"Rather than be obstructive to change we want to embrace it to achieve the best education for the town."

Lambon admits it won't be easy. "To make a quantum leap from a highly academic selective school to a non-selective environment takes time. We offer 27 A-levels. The vast majority are academic rather than vocational. We know that we have to change but it is going to take a number of years to do so."

While doubtful that a non-selective school would produce 60% A grades at A-level, Lambon says St Mary's did not set a target for the school; targets came from individuals. The school will use the same system of getting each child to achieve their very best. He also says that the whole community buys into education whether it is selective or not and that all schools in the town are popular and oversubscribed.

"I am uniquely fortunate that the staff I have are excellent and very hard-working and consequently whatever change is on the horizon they will do their best for every pupil," says Lambon, who is keen to point out that academic success isn't everything. He'd be as happy seeing the football or camogie team winning the all-Ireland finals. "That would bring joy to all the school," he says.