AFTER 14 years at Hereford Sixth Form College two teachers are moving on to pastures new- with one planning to build a home on a Scottish island.

Mat Walters, head of drama, is taking up a post teaching drama at Guernsey Grammar School and Sixth Form Centre in St Andrews.

While drama tutor, Colin Thompson, is retiring with plans to build his own house on the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides.

Between them they have produced theatre ranging from Cabaret, Return to the Forbidden Planet, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, and Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet at Hereford Cathedral.

Other successes included the formation of the Performing Arts Academy which gave students the opportunity to extend their studies and take the Trinity examinations specifically for the performing arts.

The Upstage Production Company was also created to give students opportunities in all aspects of theatre ranging from directing, promoting, make-up, set design and lighting.

The department became so successful at sending students to audition for the National Youth Theatre (NYT) that in the end NYT representatives decided it would be easier if they came to the college.

Once news of their departure broke on Facebook it went viral reaching almost 16,000 people.

The department’s final production - Thornton Wilder’s Our Town – was followed with current students paying a fun, and sometimes emotional, tribute to both tutors which culminated in a video that they had compiled from former students.

Cheri Whitehouse and Helen Wingrave will start at the college in September.