The future of weekend schools that help underachieving children with extra English and maths classes has been secured with a £262,000 grant.

Harrow Weekend School, which provides classes at Norbury School in Welldon Crescent and Stag Lane Junior School in Collier Drive, have been providing supplementary classes for approximately 100 struggling pupils since May 2009.

The project has now won funding from grant-making organisation the Paul Hamlyn Foundation to be expanded in a partnership between Harrow Council, Barnet Council and Afghan community group Paiwand.

Pupils are nominated for the classes, which also run at Whitefield School in Brent Cross, by their teachers, and the results have been impressive – 89 per cent made good to outstanding progress in maths at Stag Lane last year.

Headteacher Helen Evans said: “The funding award is excellent news and it will allow us to expand to increase our Saturday school from 40 to 100 pupils.

“When we started up two years ago, we decided to focus strongly on core subjects, English and maths and it has proved to be a huge success.”

Teachers at the weekend school track the progress of the pupils and report back to staff at their main school to make sure progress is tracked and capitalised on.

Some of the pupils are also given classes in English for Speakers of Other Languages.

Portfolio holder for children, schools and families, Councillor Mitzi Green, said the school had proved to be “highly successful” in helping underachieving children.

She added: “This generous award means that this good work can continue to expand and develop. 

“It is an excellent example of what can be achieved by partnership working between the council and community groups.”