GAZETTE & HERALD: HEADteacher Tony Cleaver will tomorrow bid farewell to Chippenham's Sheldon School.

Since Mr Cleaver, 55, took charge of Sheldon seven-and-a-half years ago it has grown from 1,100 to 1,570 pupils and has leapt from 53 per cent of GCSE students scoring 5A* to C grades to 65 per cent.

The school has also won a string of awards for sporting and academic excellence. But despite his pride in helping Sheldon establish itself as one of the leading secondary schools in the country, Mr Cleaver said he felt it was time for a change.

He said he has not given up his love of education but will now become an education consultant working with education authorities and helping to train teachers.

"I think most people will tell you they like being at Sheldon and to have that feedback from youngsters is a great reward," he said.

"There are some things I won't miss like the paperwork, but I shall miss the people.

"I think we have some great young people here in Chippenham and you won't find any better anywhere in the country."

One of Mr Cleaver's proudest achievements was when Sheldon won Government recognition for being one if the best schools in the country when it became the first school in Wiltshire to be awarded Beacon status in 2000.

In 2002 Sheldon became one of the first specialist science schools in the UK and won the Sports Mark Gold in 2002 from the Sports Council in recognition of its outstanding sport.

Mr Cleaver, a former English teacher who has three grown up children, said one of the strangest episodes in his tenure occurred in 1999, when a Government agency rang him in the holidays with a £1.2 million 'take it or leave it' offer for a new arts centre.

He said: "It was amazing. We suddenly had a new arts centre completely out of the blue."

Mr Cleaver's successor will be Gerard MacMahon, from Bristol, the current deputy headteacher of Balcarras School, in Cheltenham, which has the best A-level results for a comprehensive school in the southwest.