This year, for the first time, The Sunday Times has awarded its International Baccalaureate School of the Year award to the state funded academy Hockerill Anglo-European College in Bishop's Stortford.

After a rich and varied history, established in the 1850s, Hockerill underwent a dramatic transformation in 1998 to become one of the country’s first specialist language colleges and chose the International Baccalaureate Diploma programme as the only course of sixth form study.

This year, 99% of its candidates passed the IB and the average point score was 34.7 which is almost five points higher than most students taking the IB across the globe.

Interestingly, for a state school based in the UK, it actively welcomes children from overseas. The college has over 700 students and around a third of these are boarders from Europe and from expat parents in China, the Middle East and the Caribbean.

Principal Simon Dennis commented in The Sunday Times how the school has a unique international focus within the state sector, “The other day I was walking through the school and I heard the students speaking not only English but French, Japanese and German not only to each other but to members of staff.”

"We are focused on creating global citizens. For young people the world is changing and expanding very rapidly and we want to prepare our pupils not just to be able to work in their local area but to work anywhere in the world."

Hockerill offers a varied programme of languages including French, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Japanese and Mandarin. And, equally significantly, offers close working and cultural links with a network of partner schools throughout Europe.

Mr Dennis is also hoping to take the exchange programme into the Middle East and, according to The Sunday Times, is currently negotiating with the Abu Dhabi Education Council.