Oropesa is a town with a population of 3,000 people. The town preserves its medieval origin, with an outstanding castle built in the 14th century (that nowadays hosts a luxury hotel and restaurant) and other monuments such as churches, convents and monasteries. During the annual medieval festival that takes place in April locals wear medieval costumes and people from miles around enjoy the medieval market and its multiple plays, activities and shows.
Some of our students come from small villages closeby for example Lagartera, famous for its exquisite embroidery, and Puente del Arzobispo, known for its ceramics, similar to that of Talavera de la Reina, one of the main towns nearby.
Oropesa is on the route from Madrid to Lisbon, and can be a good spot to visit both of them, as well as Toledo and Cáceres, (World Heritage cities) and the medieval Trujillo. The mountains of Gredos are excellent for hiking and climbing.
The students have a rural background, and their families range from middle to lower class. We have only 26 students from foreign countries, (13 from Rumania, 4 from Ecuador, 3 from Morocco, 2 from Brazil, 2 from Paraguay, 1 from China, 1 from Bulgari). The students come from our town and other 13 villages nearby. The socioeconomic level is medium and low. We don’t have any refugees. The population live mainly on tourism and rural activities as farming and agriculture. There is a small number of students with special needs (25 mainly due to intellectual factors or learning problems)
It is a local school that gathers students from Oropesa and all nearby villages. With some programs, as “Ecoescuelas”, we meet regionally with other primary and secondary schools on an annual basis. We also travel once a year to France/United Kingdom with the students of the third course of ESO.
Although we are a small and rural center, we think we are great, that is why we have participated as speakers in different congresses, as well as organized different projects at national level (Pilod Project MEC, European Days in La Rioja, Congress of Directors of Granada, Summer Courses of the Escorial (Madrid), Bilingual School Congress in Santander ...)
For some years we have also hosted a group of students from USA for a week sharing our daily life with them.
In general, the expectations of our students are very varied. Some students just finish the compulsory secondary school and access to the job market, while others continue their studies and access the University.
As in all rural areas, there is a minority of students with a low motivation, but we have a big majority who thinks in going to University to continue his/her studies, mainly in technical or medical studies
We take part in some projects, about ICT in education, bilingualism, CLIL... As institution, we were recognized in 2010 with the 3rd prize at National level to the quality in Education, the “Marta Mata” Awards. We have also won the first prize of the “Tú puedes hacer" contest, for our environmental project.
We have also developed many innovative projects during the last years. We are currently working on one named “Potenciando el talento y la alta capacidad en los alumnos” about developing methodologies to attend students with high capacities.
ICT is used in the school not only as an object of learning, but as a methodological resource in different subjects.The students take part in literary competitions, scientific, etc., depending on the profile of students and teachers. Logically having vocational studies, they do practices outside the school, in companies of the area
This is our first step on the internationalization of our secondary school. Although we have worked with French schools in order to do a school exchange, and with other English Speaking schools in some e learning projects