Tributes as groundbreaking former Doncaster headteacher dies after hiking accident

Former Doncaster headteacher Terry Butterworth has died after a hiking accident in the Scottish Highlands.

Tributes have been paid to former Campsmount and Adwick School head Terry Butterworth who suffered fatal injuries while fell walking in the Scottish Highlands.

Sharing the news on Facebook, his son Adam wrote: “With an extremely heavy heart, I need to tell you that sadly we’ve lost my dad and Fellsman legend Terry Butterworth over the weekend.

"He’d been walking with his friends up in Torridon and suffered a bad fall. It’s been a terrible few days and we’re all numb and in shock.

"The small amount of solace we take was he was doing something he loved with the best of his friends.”

Mr Butterworth was a keen and experienced hiker, regularly taking part in a challenge known as the Fellsman, a gruelling 60-mile walking and running challenge across some of the country’s toughest terrain and held annually in Yorkshire.

Posting on the Fellsman Facebook page, Shona Brunskill said: “Our thoughts and condolences to Terry Butterworth's family and friends, he will be greatly missed and long remembered.

"Besides taking part, Terry has been an amazing supporter to the event as a whole, and the committee, over the years and we are forever thankful. RIP Terry.”

Beginning his teaching career in Bolton in the 1960s before moving to Chorley and then Derbyshire, Mr Butterworth arrived in Doncaster in 1988, taking charge of Campsmount School.

He spent ten years as head at the Norton school before being appointed to take charge of the failing Adwick School after it was put in special measures.

Mr Butterworth took a radical and no-nonsense approach to turn the school around, reportedly once expelling eighteen unruly children in one afternoon, as well as giving 36 their final warning in a purge to boost standards.

Speaking of the task at Adwick when he took over, he said: "I had to do something for the sake of the education of the majority.

"This school has got to go up Mont Blanc. That is the challenge ahead. At the moment, we've managed only to climb Ben Nevis."

Terry's clear-out brought the number of pupils axed from Doncaster's Adwick School to 50 in three years.

He decided on ruthless action when a group of troublemakers aged 12 to 15 refused to tow the line.

Bosses brought him in because teachers faced a torrent of abuse from youngsters described as "out of control."

Following his stint at Adwick, now Outwood Academy Adwick, he became and educational consultant and was part of a team advising secondary schools across Derbyshire and Yorkshire.