Birthday time for The Burgate School

But at 6.30pm tomorrow, the school gates will open to pupils, teachers, governors, parentsanybody, in fact, who has been connected with the school in the last 50 years, for a grand reunion picnic party.

A firework finale will bring the evening to a close but not before many have will sauntered down memory lane to reminisce about the happiest days of their lives.

Among them will be some of the 220 pupils who first entered the school gates, their faces a mixture of bewilderment and excitement, to take up a place at the brand new Fordingbridge County Secondary School, as it was then known, on a chilly January day in 1957.

The new school, built on land that had previously accommodated a chicken farm on the main road into Fordingbridge (the bypass was to come later), comprised two two-storey buildings, one housing the assembly hall and eight classrooms and the other a practical block with four specialist rooms. The pupils were divided into four year groups with two forms per year and the Salisbury Journal opened its report of that first day by observing that "children and equipment were arriving at the same time when the new County Secondary School at Burgate, Fordingbridge, opened on Monday."

The school's former catering manager Gillian Reid (nee Swatton) was in that first intake as a 13-year-old.

"I was at Hyde primary school and used to play on the common," she says.

"Going to Burgate was quite daunting at first, but we soon settled in and I enjoyed it."

It was not long after leaving the school before Gillian was back, first as a general assistant cook and then as its long-serving catering manager.

Her daughter attended the school and one of her grandchildren is currently a pupil, with another starting in September.

But that is a key feature of The Burgate: it has grown dramatically in size and popularity (every year it is heavily over-subscribed with waiting lists extending to 2020 and beyond) but it remains at heart a community school where generation follows generation.

Another whose children have attended the school is school governor Colin Burt, who was an 11-year-old in September 1957. "I've lived in Fordingbridge all my life and vividly remember the open fields the school was built on," he says.

"I was in the first intake that went right through the school. It was rather frightening after Avonway - Burgate seemed a massive place with lots of teachers doing different subjects.

"The woodwork classroom had a lathe where you could turn a piece of wood and you did metal work using a furnace.

"I'd never seen a science lab before and there was a gym with a vaulting horseit was really exciting."

In February 1958, the BBC broadcast an edition of Any Questions from the school with Freddie Gristwood in the chair and Bernard Levin among the panellists.

By now, a steadily increasing number of pupils in brown uniform were making their way to the school which, in 1962, changed its name to The Burgate County Secondary School.

Its first headteacher, Mr Labdon, retired in 1967 to be replaced by David Benfield and in 1969, Any Questions was once again hosted by the school, this time as part of the Fordingbridge Festival.

In March 1972, the Journal reported on an unusual extra curricular activity when 36 first year pupils took to the skies for an aerial view of the school as part of a geography lesson.

Sadly for today's Year 7s, the activity has not been repeated.

While the rest of the county underwent reorganisation into the comprehensive school system, The Burgate had to wait until 1980 when it became the last school in Hampshire to gain comprehensive status.

It reopened in September of that year as The Burgate School, with 454 pupils and 31 teachers. Having seen the school through the transition, Mr Benfield retired to be replaced by Alan Hollands as head teacher. "It celebrated its 25th anniversary in the first year I was there - I think we had a church service and a tea party," Mr Holland says.

"There was quite a lot of growth while I was there.

"The school had been very successful as a secondary modern but it's different when you have children whose expectations are greater.

"It does its best for all the pupils - you ought to expect the best children to achieve but it also looks after those who aren't academic."

In 1983, Celia Nicholls was appointed Mr Hollands' deputy and when he left in 1988, Mrs Nicholls became head, a post she holds to this day.

The school's growth and achievements have been many.

There have been glowing Ofsted reports, and national press and government recognition of the school's standards of education.

School productions have been mounted and sports trophies won, overseas education trips have been and gone, with Fordingbridge's French twin town Vimoutiers a regular destination,.examination results have steadily improved and the school's brown uniform has given way to the now familiar Burgate blue.

Premises have expanded to accommodate an increasing student population - which necessitated the introduction of a one-way system to ease traffic congestion in the main building's corridors in the 1990s.

Sports commentator Murray Walker was at the school in 1994 to open the new drama block and science facilities.

The following year, TV presenter Esther Rantzen and her husband Desmond Wilcox opened the new Sixth Form Centre.

Today, building work is underway to add a £1.6m extension to this facility, pupil numbers top 1000 and the school is working towards gaining specialist status in the humanities.

The last word, however, goes to Mrs Nicholls.

She said: "I am very proud to have been at this wonderful school for 26 of its 50 years.

"I feel very privileged to have been involved in so many of its successes."

She cites the teamwork from staff, governors, and the local community including pupils, parents and the businesses and organisations who lent support, as all being crucial to the school's success.

"I believe that this has been the underlying secret," she said, "and consider myself extremely fortunate to be working in such a supportive and appreciative community."