Charity launches drive to inspire
poorer students to aim for the top

A group of hand-picked students from schools across Barnsley, Bradford and Leeds will work with mentors from the Teach First charity over the next two years.

Teach First recruits top graduates to work in schools in challenging circumstances. The charity’s Higher Education Access Programme for Schools (HEAPS) is already run in London and the West Midlands and is now being expanded to Yorkshire.

It will be launched tomorrow at the Leeds West Academy.

Jess Easton is a Teach First ambassador who currently teaches at the Bradford Academy. She saw first-hand last year what HEAPS can do for students and is excited about the programme coming to Yorkshire for the first time.

She said: “Last Easter I had the pleasure of acting as a maths subject mentor at the annual HEAPS Cambridge Easter School. Many of the pupils attending schools in low socio-economic areas are more ambitious and driven than I had first thought, and the residential was a reminder that it is our job as teachers to help these children realise their full and unique potential.

“I am now so pleased that HEAPS will be running in Yorkshire, enabling our pupils to experience everything that the programme offers.”