PUPILS  from St Matthew’s Academy won an award – and some high praise – by creating an Amazing Space for street kids in Chile.

Last term, Mrs Cannon’s S3 Spanish classes and Miss Corr’s S3 Graphic Communications class were involved in a project which saw them putting both their Spanish and design skills to the test in an interauthority challenge.

The brainchild of Louise Whyte from SCILT (The S c ott i s h Cent re for Language Learning) based at the University of Strathclyde, the project was inspired by the popular Channel 4 programme George Clarke’s Amazing Spaces.

Pupils were tasked with designing thei r own ‘Amazing Space’ in either Chile or Bolivia. They then had to present in Spanish to their peers. The St Matthew’s students’ ideas included a boat which could double up as a medical centre in Chile as well a sustainable farm school for children living in rural Bolivia.

But it was Adam Shank’s imaginative use of shipping containers to create a safe space for street children in Chile, which was selected as St Matthew’s entry to the final at Strathclyde University on April 24.

Assisted by Blake Leishman, Jim Walls, Joshua Smith and Dylan Neil , Adam then presented his design in Spanish to an audience of VIP’s which included Sir Jim McDonald the University Chancellor and representatives from the Spanish Consulate in Edinburgh.

Their stand out performance and Adam’s design won praise from the judges and led to them winning ‘The Peer Choice’ Prize on the day with St Thomas Aquinas in Glasgow being judged overall winners.

The boys and their classmates who cheered them on at the final were a credit to the school as were their opponents from St Thomas Aquinas and St Margaret Mary’s in Glasgow and St Peter The Apostle and Clydebank High Schools to theirs.

St Matthew’s als o managed to achieve one of the main aims of the project namely by having the quality of their work praised by the master himself, TV’s George Clarke via Twitter.