CUMBRIA Children's Fund has recently been the subject of an OFSTED inspection, which included visits to eight projects involving young people across the county.

The inspection report released by the fund's steering group praises those involved in the Heartstone Project, which included children from Kirkby Stephen and Appleby Primary School.

The pupils came together at the Pennine Gallery at Rheged to exhibit and explain their art, collage, textiles and written work on themes of intolerance and prejudice. Their audience included representatives of community organisations, the police, local authorities and the Cumbria Children's Fund team. The work on display was created by pupils right across the primary age range.

Cumbria Children's Fund director Jane Humphries said: "Heartstone uses stories and photography to build contact, communication and understanding across different nationalities and cultures as a challenge to racism and intolerance.

"The Children's Fund purchased the story packs for the schools to use and this exhibition is a chance for pupils to display their work and to share what they have learned."

Children from schools in Kirkby Stephen, Orton and Appleby made presentations to the audience, explaining their work and, in the case of Appleby, even demonstrating the drumming and wellie dancing that they had used in their exploration of African culture.

Jane said: "We are a government agency spending taxpayers' money and working with 5-13 years olds across the county so we must meet the highest standards. The Children's Fund team in Kendal and each of our locality co-ordinators' across Cumbria were also included in the inspection and we were delighted with the inspectors' report.

"The report also highlighted three areas for improvement. We still need to play our part in making the work with young people across Cumbria more coherent and we also need to find ways of evaluating the impact of what we are doing more effectively. The third area that the inspectors picked up on was the need to involve young people in the planning and decision-making. That is certainly an area where we have made progress recently and we look forward to doing even more to help Cumbria's young people shape their communities and their opportunities for the future.

"I am really encouraged by the report as it clearly shows that we are doing the right things and, through partnerships, making progress in the right way too."