Orleans Park School in Twickenham is a winner for a presentation and video entered for the Western Front Association's Malcolm Doolin Memorial Award.
Nine Year 4 students were excited when they discovered our local First World War Belgian story, especially since Orleans Park is the direct descendant of the school attended by (almost) all the Belgian children living in Twickenham between 1914 and 1918. They followed up with intensive research online and at Richmond Museum and Richmond Local Studies Library and Archive. Here they identified our Belgian Refugee Project Leader, Helen Baker, and invited her to the school to interview her in July. Helen then showed them round East Twickenham's surviving Belgian heritage sites, taking in the Belgian shops, Belgian-occupied houses, and the Richmond and Twickenham First World War Belgian Refugee Memorial on the riverside outside the former Pelabon Munitions Works. These showed up prominently in the video.
It has just been announced that the team won the Second Prize of £250 for their school in a year when the quality of entries was described as particularly good.
The students were ably supported by Orleans Park teachers Mrs Sweeney, Mr Stone and Mr Lane, who sensitively left the planning, decision-making and realisation to the students themselves.