Message from the headteacher

My fabulous PA designs a very tight schedule for me which is how it comes to be that I have 15 minutes to write 500 words for this newsletter piece. Start the clock.

I love schools and in particular this school. I am not one of these headteachers that writes things on Twitter or LinkedIn and I HATE going to external meetings and conferences. What I really enjoy is being out and about in school getting amongst students and staff. This is why lockdown was such a challenge for me and also why I have HATED having to isolate whilst having Covid over the last 10 days. I am so THRILLED to be back in school I can’t even tell you.

Amongst the highlights of today was my chat with some year 12 girls about their career aspirations. Amongst them there was a prospective lawyer, a medic and a ‘don’t know’. It was the ‘don’t know’ with whom I most closely associated. She asked me when I had decided to be a teacher and I told her I hadn’t quite decided yet (I’d quite like to have my own icecream van, just so you know). My point to her was that not knowing what you want to do with your life is not something to be worried about whether you are 16 (like her) or 52 (like me). Life has a way of leading where it wants you to go eventually. All we need to do it be open to trying hard and willing to take a risk or two.

I visited every classroom today as usual but my most fascinating conversation was with a student as he waited for his bus. I asked him (as I tend to do) ‘what was the most interesting thing you learnt today?’ He told me that he had been fascinated by a type of electrical component whose diagram showed that apparently it absorbed rather than emitted light. Evidently the lesson had ended before the teacher got to explain how this occurred so Ben and I spent a few minutes discussing what kind of cell it might be and how and why it would absorb light. People often forget what schools are - they are places where younger people come to figure out the world under the guidance of slightly older people. When you come to work every day remembering this, the politics, organisational and legal constraints are much easier to deal with.

Finally, I just want to say thank you to all those lovely students and staff members who have welcomed me back and asked me how I am after being off sick. One student filled me in on the teacher who had covered one of my lessons in my absence, ‘they were BRILLIANT’, he said, enthusiastically. My face must have fallen a little because the student then added, ‘what I mean is that they were a better teacher than you…but…’. He was just about to think of something to soften his criticism when his bus showed up. The thing is I would have been offended but I know the person who covered for me and it’s true, they are definitely a better teacher than me. Bet they can’t stick a flake in a cone like I can, though.

We are Highfields.

Andrew Marsh Headteacher