Rotary Club of Heywood speaking awards

The Rotary Club of Heywood, Councillor Peter Rush and pupils of Matthew Moss High school, at their annual public speaking event

The Rotary Club of Heywood and the future Lord Mayor were entertained by the pupils of Matthew Moss High school last night, at their annual public speaking event.

The school retained the shield, presented each year by the Rotary Club for young people who impress them with their oratory skills.

“It’s a really prestigious event,” Councillor Peter Rush and our future Lord Mayor said, “It’s no easy thing to stand in front of a group of professional business people and talk unaided for an event like this. Some people never achieve this in their lifetimes.”

The young people have been working hard on their themes, including “Footballers Wages,” “Does Modern Art Deserve the Title Art”, “Why Karate is not an Olympic Sport,” and “How Colonialism has affected Politics” for many weeks in school and were understandably proud of their achievement.

“We have a real passion for communication here at Matthew Moss,” said Ms O’Neill, an English teacher at the school. “Not only is it a part of our GCSE programme, but much of our learning is project based. The young people can choose an area that interests them and work on it with real development and skill. We were always confident that they would do us proud.”

Matthew Moss offers a wide range of courses to its young people, including Project GCSE, begun in year 9.

This GCSE allows learners to answer an essential question that interests them and contact specialists from outside school, giving them life skills they wouldn’t get ordinarily. Some of the talks were based on the questions they had answered for themselves. The students brought in a wide range of items for the members to look at and spoke about events they had organised within school.

The students charmed the Rotary Club so much that they said they would be happy to have them back to speak at other events not part of the public speaking dinner.

The Rotary Club does a great deal of work for charity in the Rochdale area, and supports its local schools.

Ian Birchenough, Chairman of Governors at Matthew Moss and a huge supporter of local projects, including the regeneration of Springfield Park. He commended the youngsters for having the confidence and the hard work to see this through, especially as there are so many demands on schools at this time.