Before half term our ‘eager readers’ met to vote for their favourites from the eight books they’ve been reading for the Carnegie Award. To mark the occasion, the library was decorated with themed bunting, while a specially-baked cake and biscuits added to the party atmosphere. We were privileged to be joined by Mrs Ellen Krajewski, Chair of the CILIP judging panel who chatted with our students about the books, their likes and dislikes and answered their questions about the judging process. We will be seeing Mrs Krajewski in a Q&A session when we watch the streamed Award ceremony. Ellen has been involved in shadowing for many years but she made a point of telling me how impressed she was with the maturity and interest shown by our young people – they were a credit to themselves, me and the school.

I was really pleased to hear the students asking “Please can we do this again next year?” and making comments like “I loved being part of this group”, “It made me read books I wouldn’t normally have read”, “I loved discussing books with other shadowers”, “The group is warm and welcoming” . Between them they have read 62 books since March, with Emily Williams and Jhanavi Tiwari managing to read them all!

After a very close vote, we had to take the scoring to decimal places, the Bushey Meads Choice was Run Rebel – a book tackling issues like abusive relationships and arranged marriage, written in verse – with a score of 8.9/10. This was closely followed by Echo Mountain, a more traditional story scoring 8.6/10. This year the voting has been changed so, as well as group vote, each student who took part in shadowing could submit their own vote which will count towards the ‘Shadowers’ Choice’ to be announced alongside the Award winner on 16th June. So, the voice of Bushey Meads students really will be part of the story.

I, too have thoroughly enjoyed working with this amazing group and am very proud of the commitment they have shown. Well done and thank you for making this a great experience!