EDUCATION manager Alison Gagg has been shortlisted for a national Lifetime Achievement Award for her work at Buckfast Abbey.

The Council for Learning Outside the Classroom has shortlisted Ms Gagg for her ‘Outstanding Contribution’ to such learning.

She was initially appointed as part of a one-year project to set up an education service for the Benedictine monks at Buckfast Abbey, 30 years ago.

But she is still there, heading up a learning centre which offers an extensive range of programmes and events for children and young people.

More than a quarter of a million schoolchildren have visited the education centre since Ms Gagg opened it in 1985.

She said: ‘I am very grateful to the community for wanting to set up the education department in the first place and for their continuing support of the work we do for local schools.

‘The abbey places great importance on education, always an important aspect of the Benedictine ideal, and provides essential funding to carry on inspiring the hundreds of school children who visit each year.’

A spokesman for the abbey said: ‘Ms Gagg has developed an enormous variety of workshops and resources over the years for a wide range of ages and abilities. All are rooted in a desire to make learning an active experience.

‘The centrepiece of the abbey’s educational offer is the hands-on education centre, which explores a myriad of different ideas and themes from building to bees.

‘This was initially created at a time when interactive exhibitions were fairly new in the UK and the bulk that did exist were mostly science-based.’

The spokesman added:?‘The philosophy of education provision at Buckfast has largely been driven by Alison’s belief that children should always be given the chance to encounter the “real” wherever possible.

‘So, on a visit, pupils meet and question real monks, handle genuine archaeological artefacts and encounter live honeybees.

‘There are some exceptions to this quest for the genuine, however, such as when they meet Alison in the role of a strict “spymaster” – with more than a little touch of Judy Dench as M – or catch the plague in a Black Death workshop or when early years pupils explore the site through the eyes of their very own monk teddy bear.’

Ms Gagg is a ‘passionate believer’ in out of classroom learning. She has set up a system of six-month paid internships for new or recent graduates with an interest in education outside the classroom.

She said: ‘The chance to pass on knowledge is one of the most refreshing aspects of my job.

‘The benefits of out of classroom education have been well researched and expounded on. As practitioners, our job is throwing pebbles in the pool. We never see how far the ripples go or where they end up, but we should always know we have started something.’

When asked for a memorable moment during the last 30 years, she replied: ‘I remember when a small boy was so overwhelmed by our huge stained-glass window that he fell over backwards.

‘What a wonderful thing that beauty can make a child forget to stand up! My favourite phrase in any curriculum document is awe and wonder.’

As part of the Buckfast Abbey Education Department’s 30th anniversary this year Ms Gagg organised a successful Christian storytelling festival in July, believed to be the first of its kind in UK.

Ms Gagg is shortlisted alongside three other candidates for the award.

The awards are decided by online public vote through www.lotc.org.uk. Voting closes on November 13.