PUPILS and staff at St Laurence School in Bradford on Avon have celebrated the re-launch of its new-look Connect newsletter.

Nine Year 13 pupils aged 17 and 18 helped to re-design and produce St Laurence Connect after being set a project by Adam Lawrence, the school’s head of graphics.

At the launch on Wednesday evening, head teacher Fergus Stewart said he was “delighted” with the results of the student-led ‘live design’ project.

“It’s an excellent publication and I’m really proud of what they’ve done. We wanted to refresh Connect and bring it into the 21st century.

“We have used the new technology available to us to improve the graphic design and photography and to produce it in an electronic format for distribution.”

So far, the school has published two online issues covering terms one and two and four more are being planned to cover the whole school year.

The publication aims to celebrate the successes and achievements of the whole school community, as well as imparting information about forthcoming events.

St Laurence Connect is magazine-style in format and design and is produced collaboratively between staff and students through an after-school club.

The students who worked on the editorial and graphic design are Mollie Cottam, Robyn Brown, Amy King, Erin O’Neill, Tabitha Charlton, Lucas Gibson-Gleave, Dan Fawcett, Rae Blundell and Lily Brown.

Alumni Officer Katherine Allard is the editor-in-chief. She said: “The idea was to create a more contemporary look and feel to this publication, where the focus is on celebrating the achievements and successes of the school community.

“This project was presented to a group of Year 13 students as a ‘live’ design brief and they worked collaboratively with teachers and staff to produce a professional-looking publication.”

Mr Stewart said feedback on the new-look St Laurence Connect has so far been good. “The group has set a big challenge for students coming up after them and we hope they will be able to take on the mantle.”