PUPILS at a West Devon school are benefiting from a unique programme to improve their health and well-being.

As part of the Healthy Schools Plus programme, teachers at almost 200 schools in Devon, including Princetown Primary School, have been given the opportunity to target which areas of health education best meets the needs of children and their families at their particular school.

Based on their own research, schools chose to focus their efforts on one of four key areas of health — preventing teenage pregnancy, tackling drug and alcohol misuse, maintaining a healthy weight and promoting physical activity, or improving emotional health and well-being.

Princetown Primary School focused on healthy eating and the involvement of parents.

Over the last two years NHS Devon gave each school £2,000 to run a creative health initiative based on one of those four areas.

Ali Hirst, head teacher at Princetown Primary School, said: 'The Healthy School Plus programme has had a significant impact on the children's enthusiasm to eat fresh food.

'We have raised the profile of healthy eating and it is really rewarding to see how enthusiastic the children are at lunch time to show all the healthy options they have in their lunches.

'I am especially proud of the number of pupils who had previously never had fresh food as part of their lunch and now come up to me each day and show me that they have an apple or kiwi fruit or some grapes. The healthy eating stickers and trophy award has been a real success.

'We have also encouraged parents to get more involved in the school and this is having a very positive impact on children's learning. Attendance at our parent's evenings is much better and we now discuss their child's progress and achievements with them on a regular basis.'

In total 187 schools in Devon participated in the programme and recently NHS Devon held a special celebration event for those schools whose work was identified as 'outstanding'. They all received certificates in recognition of their achievement.

Dr Virginia Pearson, NHS Devon's director of public health, congratulated the schools on their success: 'We want to ensure children across Devon get the best possible healthcare to meet their needs so I congratulate all the schools that took part in this programme.

Any initiative which supports the physical and emotional well-being of young people and tackles health inequalities should be applauded and the improvements will not only have an enormous benefit to the child but also to the whole school community.'