TO celebrate the 50th anniversary of Redditch being designated a new town, students in year nine at Tudor Grange Academy Redditch were challenged at a special assembly in April by members of Redditch Local History Society (RLHS).

The group asked the students to research and create a project that showed how the town has changed over the last 50 years.

Daniel Stanley, one of the finalists, said: "After a history lesson our business studies teacher, Miss Peerce showed us a basis layout for our presentation witch we used to help make our presentation.

"We decided we wanted to do something different so Tom decided to go talk to his granddad and find out how the old town developed, the result were some amazing facts about how life has changed - for example, Tom’s granddad remembers being sent from school to the shops to buy sweets for the teachers! “

“On June 5 we had to present our project to members of the local history society. We felt a mixture of excitement and worry when we found out we were presenting first.

"After everyone finished their presentation we all left the room so the judges could decide who had won.

"When we went back into the room and found out that we had won, we felt proud and excited that we came top in our year group. We would like to thank all the judges from the Redditch Local History Society and our amazing teachers, Miss Preece and Mr Connolly.”

Derek Coombes, for the RLHS said “All the presentations was very interesting and provided the history society with an insight into how the younger generations see local history."