The Gwen Mayor Trust was established by the EIS in memory of Gwen Mayor, the primary 1 teacher at Dunblane Primary School who was killed alongside 16 of her pupils in the 1996 tragedy.

The purpose of the Trust is to advance education by providing financial support for projects in connection with the arts, culture, music or sport. Gwen Mayor’s daughter and a former colleague from Dunblane Primary School are among the Trustees to the Fund. All primary schools in Scotland are eligible for Gwen Mayor Trust Funding.

The Gwen Mayor Trustees recently approved their grants for the year ahead, providing support for projects which will benefit hundreds of young people and their school communities across Scotland.
Here we look back at some school projects that benefited from Gwen Mayor Trust funding last year.

Strathmore Primary

Strathmore Primary is based in Forfar, Angus with a roll of approximately 250 children; the majority of which are SIMD 2. In August 2024, I carried out a survey to determine if any of our children received music tuition either privately or at school; only 5 children (2%) did via the cluster woodwind teacher.

I then ran brass taster sessions with P4/5 children to see how many of them would be interested in learning a brass instrument and the results were overwhelming, with over 1/3 of the children wanting to get involved.

Alongside funding from the Gwen Mayor Trust, a donation from the brass band I play for (Forfar Instrumental) meant that the school was able to purchase six brand new brass instruments. My first six learners (P5/6) have been taking part in brass lessons on a Friday lunch time since April 2025 and have even played in front of the whole school at the end of term service in June 2025, which they absolutely loved!

Having asked the children how they feel about being part of the group, the word that was by far the most popular was ‘fun’, but what they don’t yet realise is that they are also developing self-confidence, building resilience and learning a skill that will, hopefully, take them places in the future.
Lynsey Mathieson, Class Teacher

Alves Primary

We used the Gwen Mayor Trust award to purchase Makey Makey kits, enabling pupils to design and play their own ‘digital’ cardboard guitars as part of a Beatles-themed topic. The kits have already been trialled in class, with pupils experimenting by sending morse code messages.

The topic combines STEM with Expressive Arts, as pupils form their own bands and perform at our end-of-topic “Sharing the Learning” event. Our prototype guitar, inspired by Bo Diddley’s iconic rectangular design, has been a key step in planning how to refine the build and integrate other technology so pupils can make music – and even write their own songs. All you need is love… and a Makey Makey kit.
Grant Campbell, Class Teacher

Blairhill Primary

With the reward we received from the Gwen Mayor Trust, we were able to purchase our new library of diverse texts. All of our staff and children, from Nursery to Primary 7, will now be able to access and use a range of diverse texts in their learning. These books will be used in our context lessons, health and wellbeing sessions and also to develop literacy skills.
Carol Porterfield, Acting Principal Teacher

Colyton Primary

Thanks to the funding provided by the Gwen Mayor Trust, we have been able to add new planters to our garden, along with tools to undertake a wider range of gardening activities. With help from parents, we built and filled the planters enhancing our outdoor space.

Growing from seed, sets, or bulbs, we have been able to cultivate vegetables that thrive in our climate, nurtured and cared for them, and successfully harvested potatoes, courgettes, and carrots, with parsnips still to be harvested. Our veg has then been used in a variety of cooking experiences with pupils, including making potato soup, carrot smoothies and courgette jam.
Lesley McFarlan, Class Teacher

St Catherine’s Primary

This is an exciting and ongoing project within the grounds of St. Catherine’s Primary School in Gallowhill, Renfrewshire. Working in partnership with our children, parents, staff, local artists and volunteers. We transformed a 400sq meter derelict area, formally the site of our janitor’s house into a usable interactive S.T.E.M and HWB learning space for our school and community.

Each primary stage has responsibility for creating and maintaining their own space within the garden. Our pupils were consulted and were engaged from the initial planning stages, through construction and organising the opening celebration which was attended by representatives of the council, the community and local journalists.
Marie McLaughlin, Headteacher

Statements from the children about Our School Garden

P6: I really like going out into the garden as it is relaxing looking at all the flowers and plants. It smells lovely too! Cassie
When I go out into the garden I feel that all my stress flows away. Ohene.
I hadn’t planted before. I really enjoyed learning from others and working together to do this. I look forward to planting more flowers and looking after the ones already in the garden. Noah
I enjoyed making QR codes for the other children and adults to scan so that they could find out about the different plants, herbs and vegetables. Agatha

P5: Dominik & Serena ‘It helped me think about nature, like flowers and wildlife’
Anaya ‘It’s nice and peaceful and relaxing in the garden because of the beauty’
Sophia ‘It helped me think about animals and insects in the garden like bees, wasps, squirrels, foxes, cats and many birds’
Pola ‘It makes me feel calm and wild because of the pond and the trees’
Luigi ‘It’s really quiet and it helps me to think because I’m in the fresh air and it’s peaceful’

P4: We love being able to go out into the garden. It’s so much fun! We are able to do lots of different things – from reading to art. It makes learning much more interesting. My favourite thing so far is our nature photography lesson. We were able to use the iPads and take them outside to photograph items from a list that Mrs McSherry had given us. Back in class we were then able to crop/edit the photos using the tools on the iPad. It was so cool! Oskar

P3: We enjoyed planning, exploring, investigating and looking after the garden. After working and learning in the garden we feel calm, relaxed, joyful, happy and proud of how all our hard work looks.”