Education

Gosforth Academy Pupils Named Runners-Up in National Translation Prize

Gosforth Academy students were North East area winners and national runners-up in the 2026 Anthea Bell Prize, one of the UK's biggest young-translator competitions, out of a record 25,000 pupils.

Gosforth.org·22 July 2026

A group of language students at Gosforth Academy has just done something quietly remarkable: they have taken on nearly every secondary pupil in the country and come out among the very best. In the 2026 Anthea Bell Prize for Young Translators, the school's entrants were named North East area winners and, in German, national runners-up — placing them near the top of a field of around 25,000 pupils from more than 530 schools across the UK.

Local pride at the top of the table

The prize, now in its sixth year, is run by the Queen's College Translation Exchange at the University of Oxford and named after the celebrated translator Anthea Bell, whose credits range from the Asterix comics to the fiction of W. G. Sebald. It challenges pupils to translate authentic foreign-language texts into fresh, natural English — a task that rewards creativity and a feel for language as much as accuracy.

Gosforth's German entrants, Julian and Sidi, were crowned North East area winners and went on to finish as runners-up across the whole of the UK. In Spanish, Mani was also named a North East area winner, while classmate Rachel earned a highly commended from the judges. For students in Years 9, 10 and 12 to place so highly against tens of thousands of others is no small feat.

Why translation, and why it matters

Modern languages have been under pressure in schools up and down the country for years, so it is heartening to see Gosforth pupils not just taking part but excelling. The full results were shared by the academy, which credited the hard work and enthusiasm of its language students.

The academy's Spanish teacher, Ms Guillen, called it "a huge achievement and recognition of the hard work, motivation and commitment shown by our students." German teacher Ms Schneider added that it was wonderful to see students translating authentic texts creatively and competing successfully at a national level.

For a competition that has grown into one of the largest of its kind in the country — you can read more about it via the Queen's College Translation Exchange — Gosforth Academy's showing is a genuine source of local pride, and a reminder of the talent on the doorstep.

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