A national award has recognised the performance of a head teacher who has dedicated the past ten years to turning the fortunes of her school around. Hawa Bibi Laher OBE was one of over 20,000 nominees in the Pearson Teaching Awards and was awarded ‘Silver Winner’ for ‘Head teacher of the Year in a Primary School’.
The mother of three has turned Spring Grove J I & N in Huddersfield into an ‘outstanding’ school as recognised by Ofsted.
She was praised by the judges for placing pupil voices as central throughout the school and for her pupils being highly motivated, engaged, showing outstanding learning behaviours and the high aspirations they hold for themselves.
Bibi was delighted with the award but believes the achievement is a reflection on everyone associated with the school. She told Paigaam, “I’m happy and humbled at the same time.
“I think I won when I went through the first round, when my teachers and parents and children spoke of all the positive things they had to say [to the assessors visiting the school].
“For me that was even better than the award itself.”
“It’s not just me, it was the school community, the children, the teachers, it is an award for all of them and they are all very very proud.”
The school threw a surprise celebration once finding out Bibi had been announced as a winner and it’s not the first time they have had the opportunity to do that.
In 2011 Bibi was awarded an OBE by Her Majesty the Queen for her contribution to teaching. In 2009 she was named on the ‘Most powerful Muslim women in Britain’ list by the Equality and Human Rights Commission and she became the first Asian head teacher in Kirklees when she took the post at Spring Grove.
Bibi was nominated by Debbie Kelly, deputy head at the school, and the judges cited growing up in apartheid South Africa as playing a key factor in believing education is the key to freedom for every individual to improve their life chances.
