The First Blog Standard Comprehensive?

The forensic team from the Science Department have this week been trying to solve a mystery. Someone has taken the ultra modern, beautifully designed school notepaper and performed an act of vandalism.

Instead of the neat, crisp lines and clutter free, 21st century image, a heap of logos has been scattered over the bottom of the page by some amateur graffiti artist. Even worse, The Sports College and Arts mark Gold logos have been defiled by the presence of new symbols.

Year 8 parents this week received letters printed on what looked like official South Dartmoor paper. But soon the phone lines were blocked with puzzled parents trying to find out what the new designs meant for their children’s education. Good question.

Creator of the original paper, graphics expert, Martin Burt- the man who has single handedly changed the meaning of the controversial term, intelligent design- will today join the Science Department to see if the culprit can be tracked down.

One theory is that this may be the first example of artificial intelligence at work. Richard Penhale, ICT Systems Manager believes this might really be a South Dartmoor first. Could it be the computer wot done it?

We are, of course, proud to be one of the very first Sports Colleges (only six in the country when we attended our first national conference in Loughborough eleven years ago). So that logo goes on.


Then there’s our training school, again one of the first and really making an impact. Arts mark gold is a third time winner- nine solid years of excellence. We haven’t even recognised our leading edge status (in the first selection again) or Trust- the first in Devon and only thirty on the scene so far.

So where do all the logos go? We tried adding them on to the paper a few years ago and there was no space left to write anything. We could still add some new ones gained recently. Each one represents significant achievement.

For example, why don’t we include SIMS Reference Site? Well, er … hands up if you know what it means. Or there’s the BECTA ICT Mark. Shall we test you on that one? Investor in Careers- that’s a bit too easy to guess. Investor in Work Related and Enterprise Learning? That one almost fills the blog, never mind the note paper. Then there’s Investor in People… Investor in ……….

Yes we want to celebrate achievement and a school that aspires must surely inspire its students. Even this blog, I’m told by my colleagues, is a first- so while we’re definitely not bog standard we may soon be blog standard. In all the best mystery stories, you have to wait to hear who done it. So answers on an email (postcards definitely not accepted) to Peter Kensington who may even, at this very minute be teaching a Year 11 class some forensic Science. Got him!