School of the Year 2025
Donna Hay Award for Impact 2025: Recognising the impact of outstanding schools
School of the Year Award 2025
This year's School of The Year award goes to West Bromwich Collegiate Academy!
We've loved working with this school over the last few years, and were blown away by all of the amazing ideas that were entered by the school to our Showcase this year. Seeing our course delivered across so many classrooms and to so many students in the school is inspiring. We're also incredibly grateful for the number of responses we've received to our feedback surveys, which really helps us to improve our offering and communicate our impact. We're delighted to be working so closely with West Bromwich Collegiate Academy, and look forward to continuing to work with them for years to come!
Q&A with Zoe Maisey from West Bromwich Collegiate Academy
How do you think Apps for Good supports young people with the skills required to succeed in life and work?
Apps for Good courses teach students valuable skills that they can use in a wide range of curricular areas, and skills that are also important for the workplace. Students enjoy working collaboratively to complete a project-based audienced learning task about something they feel passionately about. They also develop holistic skills such as caring for their communities.
Can you share examples of where you have witnessed the course having a positive impact on a student?
There are so many examples of students developing confidence when presenting, or in different collaborative group roles. There are also many examples of students developing core skills like evaluation and adapting their ideas. We also get to see our future programmers shining and using their skills to build something truly amazing that has purpose. It is also wonderful to see some of our less academic students flourishing and sharing their ideas so confidently.
What do you think are the main benefits associated with engaging with Industry Volunteers?
It is such a valuable experience for our students to engage with Industry Volunteers as they get to practise presentational and interview skills with people in the industry. They get to develop professional dialogue and build skills that will be so useful to them in the future world of work. Students have pitched to experts from huge well-known companies, which excites them and also makes them ‘up their game'. As a class teacher, I have also had parents ask, 'did my child really have to present to someone from LEGO?' We value giving our students these opportunities as students in this area and demographic don’t always get these opportunities so it is vital we provide these. Our Academy believes that our students can be the equal of any students across the country, and Apps for Good is one way we can help our students to realise this.
Tell us about how your students respond when they’re working on something that matters to them?
It certainly makes them more engaged and focused on their project, because they are creating an app for a cause that means something to them. They think about ways they can improve life for communities that are close to them, and work to create solutions to problems. This is positive social change as they are not just thinking about making profit, or themselves, they are thinking more altruistically.
How does Apps for Good support your school’s broader strategy?
The Apps for Good course links very well to our school ethos of ‘Being Decent’ as students know it is a decent thing to help others and can put this into practice. It also gives them an opportunity to participate in audienced learning which gives them real purpose to their studies - something we aim to do.
Would you recommend Apps for Good to other schools looking for new ways to teach computing?
I would definitely recommend the Apps for Good courses to other schools - they are engaging, interesting, full of purpose and an innovative way to deliver key curriculum content. We deliver these courses every year and plan to continue.