A CHURCH project that has been helping schools in south Oxfordshire for almost a decade has won a national prize.

TrinityLearning, based in Abingdon, was chosen for a United Reformed Church Community Project Award at a ceremony in Nottingham on July 7.

Rosemary Perrow, who has been education officer for TrinityLearning since it was created in 2009 as an outreach scheme of Abingdon’s Trinity Church, said: “We were very aware of the stresses on our schools and wanted to do something to help.

“Once schools realised they could trust us they were biting our hand off and I think really appreciate the community wanting to support them.”

There are now more than 70 volunteers, representing 12 churches, who do everything from mindfulness workshops to helping manage school gardens - working with 26 schools spread across south Oxfordshire.

One of the most successful of these projects has been Hello Abingdon, where youngsters are asked to engage with what is going on in the community and produce a newsletter.

This has now been rolled out to almost 20 schools.

Ms Perrow said: "Although there are lots of challenges facing schools what I think is positive is there is more awareness of the need for these added extras, especially around mindfulness and you don't get the same dubious reaction to suggesting say yoga for the children as you once would have."

On winning the award, which was this year shared between four finalists, Ms Perrow said: "It was lovely to get that recognition of what we have been doing for the last nine years, and the face the judges had us all win meant we could just enjoy sharing experiences."

She added TrinityLearning plan to use the £2,000 prize to set up a Thinking Books project to encourage reading discussion, as well as fund training to increase the skills of those who already volunteer in schools. She added TrinityLearning was in the process of becoming a charity to further expand.

To volunteer email trinitylearning@gmail.com