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Many happy returns Gordonstoun’s
Manyhappy returns
Gordonstoun’s three Rs strategy to reintegrate pupils back into school after lockdown will also serve as a blueprint for when they have to navigate the inevitable pitfalls of life, writes Principal LISA KERR
The Covid-19 pandemic showed us that we can take nothing for granted. You probably fought to keep your business running and battled with social and travel restrictions. When you did so, what skills did you call upon? I suspect your strength of character and resilience were as important as your intellect. We all had to dig deep.
The events of the past two years have demonstrated the importance of the broad range of skills that young people need to succeed. Gordonstoun has always been a pioneer when it comes to teaching skills for life, not just for exams, but when our students returned after lockdown, we recognised that this approach was more relevant than ever. We were honoured to be named Boarding School of the Year in the Independent Schools of the Year 2021 Awards for an approach which involved a very different set of ‘three Rs’.
AN EDUCATION FOR LIFE
(thereby becoming the first senior school to educate an heir to the British throne) was built upon the idea that young people need to be challenged in order to develop skills such as resilience, responsibility and compassion. Over the years this has been inaccurately depicted as a tough regime of cross-country running and cold showers. But the reality is that pupils learn teamwork on our ocean-going sail-training vessel, develop resilience on expeditions into the Scottish Highlands and grow a strong sense of service to the community by volunteering to be lifeguards or members of the Coastguard. Thus, they develop skills which they can draw upon as they face life’s ups and downs, whether or not they are living through a pandemic.
INDOMITABLE SPIRIT
This approach formed the basis of our first ‘R’: Resilience. To help reinforce resilience, we quadrupled our outdoor education team. Sunday rest days were dispensed in favour of coasteering; the local cliffs were rigged with ropes for abseiling, and a pair of resident swans found themselves rudely disturbed by
PRINCE CHARLES FOLLOWED IN HIS FATHER’S FOOTSTEPS BY ATTENDING GORDONSTOUN
THE SCHOOL’S CAMPUS IS A 17TH CENTURY MORAYSHIRE ESTATE SPREAD ACROSS 150 ACRES
THE BENEFITS OF BOARDING
• A rich programme of activities which build skills for life • Professional support with academic staff available around the clock • Opportunities to go on adventures, perform on stage, play an instrument, take up a sport and be sociable • Your child will be surrounded by professionals who are highly skilled and experienced in looking after children and managing the challenges that come along • Your child will build firm friendships and a lifelong global network • Rural campuses offer additional safety, allowing more freedom than children might enjoy elsewhere • It’s easy to keep in touch every day, and there are regular breaks to allow for family time and visits home • The whole family becomes part of the school community, building friendships which continue long after the child graduates from school • An experienced team that’s used to helping nervous children settle in and overcome their fears • Excellent career progression and a CV bursting with all the skills employers look for
Outdoor pursuits are popular at Gordonstoun
groups of children learning how to paddle a canoe (although it didn’t stop the swans from successfully raising four cygnets and forcefully staking their claim to the lake!). Every pupil enjoyed several expeditions into the Scottish Highlands, and a second yacht was chartered to operate alongside the school’s existing sailtraining vessel. We became the only school still operating overnight sail-training voyages.
Our second ‘R’ was a reconnection with nature: we erected parachutes, gazebos and tipis in the campus woods to provide new outdoor learning spaces which have proved so popular that they will survive long after the crisis has died. Boarding houses were given personalized braziers for evening fires and a winter funfair took place on the lawn complete with a brightly lit, full-sized ferris wheel.
The third and final ‘R’ was a recognition that the return to school needed to be carefully managed. After the trauma caused by so many months of isolation and uncertainty, a return programme was built around the CHIME mental health recovery framework. This has been shown to help people recover from trauma by focusing on connectedness, hope and optimism about the future. We created activities to rebuild friendships, adventures to look forward to and even art therapy classes.
REAL RATHER THAN VIRTUAL
We often focus on the damage caused to Generation Z by the pandemic but we all know that, even in better times, life is never plain sailing. Many of us will have faltered in our response when faced with the enormous challenge of the pandemic, but just because we failed in one aspect of our response this doesn’t make us a failure. Presenting young people with challenges helps them learn that moments of weakness are normal and that they can support each other to reach the best outcome. Regardless of coronavirus, Generation Z are the first generation whose childhood has included the permanent presence of the online world where they need to navigate the positives and pitfalls of social media. Gordonstoun is receiving increasing numbers of inquiries from parents who want their children to escape from the pressures of the ‘always on’ culture and have a ‘real childhood’. By providing real rather than virtual experiences, we show young people how to control this digital world rather than letting this digital world control them. I can tell you from personal experience that, when you’re the crew of a sailing boat in the middle of a gale on the west coast of Scotland, there’s no time to update your profile and little point in worrying about your appearance! I can see from the faces around me on campus that our students have also learned this lesson: they form meaningful friendships; campus is noisy with excited chatter, not a quiet place where students are hunched over their screens.
HRH The Duke of Edinburgh recognised the importance of challenge. It was his experiences at Gordonstoun, which led him to give his name to a national programme of challenging activities to support young people’s development. In 1954 Gordonstoun’s own student award scheme was translated into the Duke of Edinburgh’s (DofE) Award which now gives hundreds of thousands of children around the world an opportunity to take on life-changing challenges.
There will always be tests of character, whether personal or professional. The pandemic has shown us that society needs leaders who are not only confident but adaptable, resilient and compassionate. These are the skills they must develop at school to navigate an uncertain world. The word ‘character education’ has become overused but there is a reason why it works. The Gordonstoun motto, ‘Plus est en vous’ or ‘There is more in you’, is as relevant today as it was when the visionary educationalist, Dr Kurt Hahn, founded the school in 1934.
As pupils returned after the pandemic, the school’s outdoor education team was quadrupled in size
Today, Gordonstoun students enjoy harbour jumping
His experiences at the school inspired Prince Philip to start the Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme
