Legacy: What will you leave/ what will you create?

I often reflect on our legacy as teachers, educational leaders but also as human beings. Not that I am morbid, but I do sometimes consider what will be written about me in my obituary and what will be written on my gravestone.  It is a good reality check  when we get lost in our roles as I will not let it be “she was a hard worker”.

I think it is a great question to ask candidates at interview:

• What would your legacy be if/when you leave your current role/ school?
• What could your legacy be if you joined us and moved on in the future?

I am really proud of the legacy I have created in previous roles where I have set up departments, coached/ mentored staff at all levels of their careers to be the best version of themselves, curated whole school events in schools were the performing arts were not valued, set up federation wide networks and projects like a MAT wide choir. Reading the Ofsted report of the school where I was Vice Principal I can see the work I did to co-lead the school from Inadequate to Outstanding, despite not being there for the inspection. As a headteacher of a start up school everything is our legacy, but we are also conscious that as we move on things will change, but what will remain? Changes in working practice such as flexible working, co-leadership models and part time leadership models I hope will be part of my legacy.

As a founding team of 2 new schools we are conscious that we are constantly sowing seeds for the future. Some days it can be frustrating that we are still nurturing shoots planted last year as it has been a long hard slog and it feels like we should see more growth, but we must remind ourselves we are only 2 terms (8 months) old at the primary and still only 1 year and 2 terms (20 months) old at the secondary. Some days we are trying to run before we can walk.

If you compare our early development as schools to that of a developing child it is a refreshing reality check about our expectations of our team, our community, our students.

An 8 month old’s development:

A whole new world of adventure is beginning to open up for your baby. Many babies start learning to crawl at this age. There will be many bumps and falls as your baby becomes more mobile, but you can help make things safe by child-proofing your home. Your baby may start to become shy of strangers, or cry if you leave him with a babysitter. This is the beginning of separation anxiety. In time he will learn that leaving him doesn’t mean that you won’t come back .

A 20 month old’s development:

Your 20 month old may be able to run, though it’ll take all his concentration, and he’ll probably still be a little unsteady. He may also go upstairs by himself, though he’s likely to need your help on the way down. Chances are, playtime is becoming even more fun as he learns new skills such as kicking and throwing. Toddlers are naturally curious about everything, including their genitals. Just as your toddler played with his fingers and toes when he was younger, he may begin to play with his genitals now. It’s completely natural, and isn’t a cause for concern unless it’s happening constantly. 

We have to remember that we will not always witness our legacy whilst we are in post. This can be hard to accept.  On our tough days, and there have been many this term, when our values and our resilience are being compromised, we have to pause and remind ourselves that our ripple effect of change is not immediate.

As a values-led school with a holistic approach, we are affecting change, but it is a slow change. The change can feel painfully slow as we take 1 small step forward and 2 large steps back most weeks. We need to hold on to and stay focused on the longer term attitudinal and behavioural change that will be a generational legacy. We need to appreciate that we may not see the fruits of our labour whilst we are at the Aureus Schools. It is our young people as they reach adulthood who will lead the change. Our young people are empassioned global citizens who will be the change.

Our community can be challenging, the issues our children and families face are well-masked behind our new build estates. The wider perception of Oxfordshire is warped compared to the reality. Many of our peers from previous, mainly urban schools, are not aware of the level of trauma we deal with on a daily basis. Everyone assumes it is only in urban environments that certain issues are experienced. As a school we have done a lot of training on mental health, wellbeing and Adverse Childhood Experiences. We have done wider reading on Compassionate Fatigue  as the trauma our children have experienced takes it toll on our team in how it manifests itself. Our safeguarding team all have supervision as we are being over exposed to number of cases that could affect our own emotional wellbeing.

Bennie’s blog  about tackling racism, does not dwell on the level of prejudice we deal with on a daily basis.  The prejudice – racism, sexism, misogyny and homophobia – we tackle day in and day out.   The anti-social behaviour in the  community which is increasing, will challenge us further as our students become teenagers. Working closely with the local police has been a positive step forwards. We need to break some of the cycles but know that we cannot do it alone – we need a system wide, societal change to sustain it.

With our school system and our society struggling to survive in the complex and fractured landscape we find ourselves in, now more than ever before, we need to focus on the difference we can make. The culture and ethos at both of our schools is based on our shared vision and values, underpinned by relationships.

Our legacy might not be tangible, nor visible, yet, but we know we are making a difference and creating a different kind of legacy. A legacy that we will not see with our own eyes perhaps.

Hannah, The Hopeful Headteacher

Currently feeling hopeful about:

• Our new staff who we have recruited for September 2019 – Year 3 at Aureus School and Year 2 at Aureus Primary School
• Our student numbers as our first choice preferences have significantly increased at both schools

Currently reading and thinking about:

• I have just read Dear Ijeawele by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
• I am also reading Diversify by June Sarpong

Currently feeling grateful for:

• My new home as it is my safe haven and I have been in a cocoon for the last few days as I recuperate from a tough term
• My friends, family and colleagues who made me feel very loved for my 40th recently

Wisdom from Legacy, James Kerr:

Mental Wealth: Children’s Mental Health Week

Last month we were awarded the accolade of the Gold Mental Health in Schools Award. Only 6 secondaries in the country have received it, and we are the first school in Oxfordshire.

For Children’s Mental Health Week we opened our doors today too share our vision and our provision with others. At Aureus we don’t talk about mental health, we talk about ‘mental wealth’. 20 visitors came to Aureus to experience our culture and ethos, and our partners came to share their collaborations with us.

We were delighted that Lucy Butler, Director of Children Services for Oxford County Council and Richard Venables the High Sheriff of Oxfordshire joined us to celebrate our award.

Mindfulness:

Our DHT for Culture and Wellbeing, Julie Hunter, who is dot B trained, was due to share our mindful start to the day to ensure that all learners are ready for learning but, unfortunately, got stuck on a motorway so had to narrate it instead. Our Student Council explained how Mindfulness prepares them for learning and helps them be emotionally resilient.

Culture for Wellbeing:

Julie presented our ‘mental wealth’ programme, our universal entitlement to all of our students. We pride ourselves on being preemptive, proactive and preventative, not reactive and responsive. Julie spoke at length about our commitment to staff wellbeing so that we put well staff in front of our students.  She was joined by Bogusia our Chair of Governors and Holly and Patrick, two of our Student Council who all passionately shared their experiences of our values-based school.

Provision:

We took our guests for a walk around our school site to share how we have created ‘safe spaces’ and invested in a staffing model to ‘nurture hearts and minds’ to ensure that all can ‘grow, learn and flourish’. Our safe spaces include:

• wellbeing studios
• staff wellbeing room
• Thrive room
• Nurture room
• Sensory room
• Art therapy room

We call our holistic education our ‘Inner Curriculum’, a phrase coined by Dr Neil Hawkes, the founder of VBE. We also shared our VBE artefacts such as our values chandelier and our values totem poles.

Partners:

Being outward-facing and collaborating brings value to our community.    Our best practice session enabled us to share who we are working with and why. Micro presentations were shared by:

• Lucinda Powell – Oxon MH & WB Network
• Dan Knowles – Oxfordshire Mind
• Sophia Cleverly – Relax Kids Oxfordshire
• Lisa Harker – Art Room & Place2Be
• Me on behalf of  VBE
• Liz Dawson & Rachel Bostwick – MH in Schools Award

Each contribution demonstrated that we believe we are ‘stronger together’. Lisa summed it up as our “pluralist approach” to collaboration. A phrase I will be magpie-ing!

I also gave shout outs to Charlie Waller Memorial Trust, Dr Pooky Knightsmith, Edukit , Clare Erasmus,  Mike Armiger and Paul Dix and the Pivotal Approach – partners we work closely with but who were  not present on the day.

Family Dining Experience:

Our visitors also experienced our community time and saw first hand how we invest in our relationships. We believe that we are what we eat, a focus on healthy eating underpins our values-based culture. We use our lunch times as an opportunity to connect and build our relationships with students.

Vision to Provision:

We are 4 nearly 5 terms old and are still a work in progress, but we are proud of what we have achieved to date.  Our consideration of why we do things and the choices we have made of how we do things have led to what our school looks and feels like. Subtle choices about the structure of the day and what we call things are nuances of our values based culture.

Our Choices and Intentions that have become our DNA and our USP at Aureus:

1. We do not need bells, we line up for lesson start.
2. We start every day with mindfulness.
3. We do not set, we believe in mixed ability.
4. We have coaching groups, curriculum groups and global citizenship groups.
5. We do not allow mobile phones on site, we do not have white noise from radios.
6. We do not allow packed lunches on site, we have a family dining experience.
7. We have mixed year group coaching groups and all belong to a faculty.
8. We have coaching  time not tutor time.
9. We do not set homework, we have optional extended learning.
10. We have personal development time, not enrichment time.
11. We do not do detentions, we use restorative practice.
12. We have created safe spaces for students and for staff.
13. We have invested in the staffing and infrastructure of our Nurture, Thrive and Student Welfare Team.
14. We have all had training from CAMHS and we have staff becoming experts in Thrive, mindfulness, MHFA and counselling.
15. We underpin our schools’ culture and ethos with our values.
16. We are a STEAM school and we celebrate the Arts.

Each choice comes together to develop our approach in creating a happy, healthy school where we ‘nurture hearts and minds’ that our community may ‘grow, learn and flourish’.

Check us out on BBC Oxford Radio from 7am on 5/2/19 and BBC South News from 6.25pm/ 10.30pm news!

Hannah, The Hopeful Headteacher

Currently feeling hopeful about:

• Schools working with the Carnegie Centre to secure the Mental Health in Schools Award
• Educators making a difference by doing things differently
• After watching Resilience this week – we are hoping to get a licence to encourage more schools to become ACE aware.
• Come and join us on March 27th at the Oxfordshire Youth in Mind Conference 

Currently reading and thinking about:

• Here are some quick links to articles I have read this week:

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/stress-anxiety-depression/talking-to-children-about-feelings/

https://www.mentallyhealthyschools.org.uk/

https://www.childrensmentalhealthweek.org.uk/Research

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/one-of-the-largest-mental-health-trials-launches-in-schools

https://www.fenews.co.uk/press-releases/25190-one-of-the-largest-mental-health-trials-in-the-world-launches-in-schools

• I am also looking forward to the publication of Clare’s book: Mental Health and Wellbeing Handbook  

Currently feeling grateful for:

• Julie for her vision and tenacity in making it come to reality
• Liz for her coaching and support for achieving Gold
• Bogusia  for being  a chair of governors who has invested a lot of time in investing in additional reading
• Lucinda for leading the Oxfordshire MH & WB Network
• Our Aureus team who are passionate about mental health and wellbeing

Nurturing Hearts & Minds: Putting Arts at the Heart

Part of our vision as a STEAM school is to raise the profile of the Arts.

We are a school that has consciously put Arts at the Heart of our culture, ethos and community.

We are very  fortunate to be the home of the The Didcot Art Room so we have an art therapy provision on site.

This month we are delighted to be exhibiting our art work produced by our community over the last year at The Cornerstone, our local Arts venue. It was fab to be at the opening with proud students, parents and staff. Standing in a gallery space, with every piece on show produced at our school, accompanied by our talented choir, brought a tear to my eye.

 

I have had many proud moments as a Headteacher over the last 2 years, but the most memorable ones have all involved or been linked to the Arts:

• Shakespeare Schools’ Festival 2017 and 2018  – we have performed Midsummer’s Night Dream and As You Like It in local theatres
• Boys do Ballet – we are home to a ballet school and a principal male dancer came and worked with our students for a day
• Sports Day 2018 – we celebrate alternative sports and invited parents along to watch
• Voices of Aureus – we now have a school choir, a school song and peripatetic lessons
• Royal Albert Hall – we performed This Is Me with Makaton alongside 500 other children from Oxfordshire
• STEAM Days – we have one termly and our last one was focused on the Arts and Music
• Official Opening – our Aureus School Choir performed with our Aureus Primary Choir for the first time

We are also delighted to be working closely with the local Arts Council to fund collaborations with artists:

• Lorna Carmen McNeill – worked with our students on a light installation and we have a fabulous values chandelier hanging in our hall
• Michael Condron – is nearly finishing his installation in the local community, he has been based at Aureus and our students have worked with him on the sculpture
• Claire Costello – is currently working with our students on a mosaic inspired by our motto: Nurturing Hearts and Minds

We have a small but brilliant team. What Laura our Art lead achieved in year 1 and what Abi our Art technician, Kate our DT teacher, Hannah our Music Lead and Drew our Drama Lead and the Arts Faculty Leader have achieved half-way through year 2 is really very impressive.

The future shines bright as our Arts faculty are growing and we are excited to be recruiting DT, Dance and Media teachers to add even more passion, skills, experience and collaborations to our dynamic team.

We are also excited to be working towards the Arts Mark. The feedback  from everyone who attended the Nurturing Hearts and Minds exhibition sums up what art means to us all at Aureus.

Hannah, The Hopeful Headteacher

Currently feeling hopeful about:

• The profile we give to celebrating the Arts at Aureus
• The community Arts Partnerships and the collaborative projects we are working on

Currently reading and thinking about:

• There has been a lot shared recently about the research into the teaching of music
• We are starting our Arts Mark journey as an opportunity to review our provision

Currently feeling grateful for:

• Our brilliant Arts Faculty: Drew, Laura, Kate, Abi, Hannah, Charlotte & Chris
• The Cornerstone for hosting our exhibition
• Abi brown for making the magic happen & for connecting us with artists
• Our artist partners – Michael, Lorna, Claire and Rachael
• Our staff who were #10%brave enough to exhibit their own art work alongside our students

Feeling Blessed: Sibling Schools

It has been a FAB-U-LOUS start to the new academic year.

Being the founding headteacher opening a new secondary school was an exciting prospect last September. Our first year at Aureus School was full on but fantastic. We established lots, we achieved lots, we learnt lots. This September we have opened our new primary school. Our sibling school Aureus Primary School. We are just as excited a year on, opening our second school, but we are calmer, as we have a reference point for lots of the newness to build on from last year.

As an English teacher, who encourages learners to interpret the pathetic fallacy in texts, it has felt appropriate that the sun has been shining on us all week.

So Monday 3rd September was a memorable day as our Aureus team grew from 25 to 70. We can no longer fit our team into the community room nor the library for  training sessions and meetings. We now need to use the main hall to fit everyone in.

The scale up has been significant. Recruiting 45 new team members means that we interviewed in excess of 220 candidates last year. We have been inundated with applications for roles, when we long list we keep our talent pool interested in Year 2,3, opportunities as well as the live vacancies. When we shortlist we usually interview 4 candidates for operations and 6 for teaching roles. We have appointed a fantastic team and have still only paid for 3 adverts out of our 70 roles! All of the money saved goes into the staff professional learning budget. We take PLD very seriously, we are committed to our staff being life long learners.

So this year we have 17 team members based at Aureus Primary School and 53 team members based at Aureus School, but many of them are doing specialist operations roles across the two schools, such as Finance, Admissions, Catering and Site. Longer term we will have teaching roles across both schools too. As I shared the numbers of student and staff numbers over the next five years, as we grow from 25 staff and 120 students to 200+ staff and 1600+ children, I took a few deep breaths.

We spent out first day together reflecting on our values, discussing how they shape our culture and ethos, sharing how we can work together as a team on providing a holistic, values-based education for our 2-16 learners. The GLF Schools MAT is an extended family of schools, we celebrate our individuality but share our mission for education that enables our communities to grow, learn and flourish. Our Aureus Schools are siblings,  we will share our vision and values but we will interpret and embody them in a personalised way. We are not an all-through school  as we are on two sites, a 10 min walk/ 5 min drive apart, but we will come together for community events and once we have KS2 we will be able to collaborate more on the curriculum.

There has been a palpable nervous energy in  both schools all week. The 45 new staff have been understandably nervous getting their heads around new roles, new systems, new faces and a new culture. The founding team, our trail blazers have also been nervous as our small bubble, our intimate team dynamic, has changed. Everyone has a lot of change to manage, so we have taken a few moments to reflect on this.

As we welcomed our 210 Year 7s (our Class of 2023) to Aureus School on Wednesday our school began to fill busy. For those of who have come from large urban secondary schools, it began to fill like a ‘proper’ school! As we welcomed our 120 Year 8s (our Class of 2022) back on Thursday, they too were feeling apprehensive: who were all of these small people invading their space? We all have a lot of adjusting to do! My welcome back assemblies invited our learners to reflect on their Hopes, their Dreams and their Fears. We acknowledged the fact that everyone is feeling a myriad of feelings and that is okay.

Whilst the secondary team adjusted to having triple the students and double the staff in the building, the primary team spent the week in training: a new assessment system, a new phonics programme, a whole school singing curriculum. The team bonded before my eyes, the school came to life as resources were unpacked and classrooms were prepared. On Thursday Sue Webb joined us from VBE to scope the teams values. As I dipped in and out of the session emotions were high and relationships were strengthened as the team met each other with their core values, their shared vision and their collective mission.

Everyone on our Aureus team is on the same bus, heading in the same direction. A values-based recruitment process has enabled us to attract and recruit a team who are passionate about a holistic, inclusive education model. As I sat in on training sessions and meetings, I heard our values reflected back to me, I heard our shared language used, unprompted. The time and energy we have invested in our culture and ethos makes the strategy easier to implement as our why and our what is clear, it is just the how that will evolve.

In September, our value of the month is Wellbeing, we will nurture the students, the staff and the parents through the stress points of the transition into a new school, a new year group and a new role. Mindfulness is a core part of the inner curriculum at both schools. At the secondary 360 students will do a carousel of activities each morning to mentally and emotionally prepare them for learning, at the primary 110 pupils will have a micro mindfulness session at the start of each learning session, settling them as the come into the classroom from break, lunch and playing outside.

Friday was our history-making, legacy-building moment at Aureus Primary School as we formally welcomed our Reception, Year 1 and 2 pupils in to their new school for the first time. As parents, carers and pupils lined up outside our stunning new school to sign in, I smiled at the pride our pupils had in our lovely school uniform, I welled up at the beaming faces radiating their joy at joining us. I think there were more tears (of joy) from our team than there were from the children and their parents!  The pupils settled quickly into their new learning environment as their parents and carers settled their nerves with a cup of tea in the school hall.

More shared team training mid-week saw Ann Marie Christian joining us for a hard-hitting safeguarding session and our week ended with Mike Armiger from Pivotal Education delivering a dynamic session on our restorative culture with relentless compassion at its core. Our staff had spent their first week with us and had met our pupils so they could now reflect on how our values come to life in how we interact with our stakeholders, how we model our values and nurture hearts and minds, how we embody our high expectations and deliver our challenging curriculum in a holistic way.

Our first week as Aureus sibling schools was a whirlwind of activity – I met myself travelling between the two schools on several occasions and I left stuff at the wrong school/ on the wrong desk more than once but that is the change for me to get my head around, how I clone myself to support two teams, how I split my time and attention to nurture both schools. This year the plan is that I will be spending a half day at each school each day so that my presence is felt and I am a constant in both schools.   Once we settle into the routine of our working days and weeks I will review this in discussion with my four Deputy Headteachers.

So I am feeling blessed. Blessed for the opportunity to be an Executive Headteacher, blessed to now be a primary school leader after leading in secondary schools for 14 of my 15 year career, blessed to have recruited a brilliant team, blessed to have attracted a parent body who are as passionate about a holistic, values-based STEAM education as we all are!

Hannah, The Hopeful Headteacher

Currently feeling hopeful about:

• Year 2 of Aureus School and a bigger operations team to support the growing teaching team in embedding our routines and systems.
• Year 1 of Aureus Primary School and nurturing the hearts and minds of our 2 year olds who will hopefully one day become our 16 year olds and amazing Aureus Ambassadors who are values-led global citizens.

Currently reading and thinking about:

• Our new staff will be reading From the Heart by Dr Neil Hawkes this month, our trailblazing team will be reading High Challenge, Low Threat by Mary Myatt and I am going to proposed to our Aureus Leadership Team that we read Legacy by James Kerr.

Currently feeling grateful for:

• The brilliant training from Ann Marie, Sue (VBE), Jo (Voices), Natalie (GLF), Gareth (RWI) and Mike (Pivotal).
• The patience of our team as we navigate start of term issues with IT and orders!
• My fabulous PA, Zoe, who has kept the plates spinning this week, across two sites!
• Our brilliant Deputy Headteachers, Nicola, Kate, Bennie and Julie who are swans gliding through any chaos and keeping the calm at both schools.

Pressing Pause: Reflections & Recalibrations

We broke up ten days ago for the summer and I pressed pause. I needed to breathe.

It has been a really full on founding year as a new Headteacher of a new school and I was feeling physically, mentally and emotionally zapped. More so than I have ever been before. The fatigue was compounded by the early termination of my May half-term and the stressful start to our final Summer 2 half-term due to the Daily Mail!

When I say that our last 7 weeks were full on, it is probably an under statement! I felt like I pinged from one big school event to another across our two school sites and was on an assembly writing and delivering conveyor belt!

At Aureus School – our Year 6/7 transition days (in Didcot they do 2) had to be split as we could not accommodate all 240 for 2 days with the size of our current team; we held a successful Year 6/7 parents’ welcome; we continued to hold open events for prospective parents and carers. At each I ‘shot the elephant in the room’ and spoke directly to the headlines. We held our final Governors’ meeting of the year, we held our end of term/ end of year celebration assembly and we hosted our inaugural Sports Day. None of these events are different to other schools, but each was our first, each was planned and delivered by our small team in our huge site!

At Aureus Primary School – we had the site final completion and it was signed over to us; we continued to log our ever growing snagging list; we prepared for and passed our Ofsted pre-opening inspection; we did multiple site tours for our new parents, carers and pupils; we hosted our welcome evening.

Interviews for our operations team, which is tripling in size next year, took up a lot of our time in the summer term but we have made some brilliant appointments for roles at each school and hybrid roles across the two.

Our new staff induction day was epic – there was a moment of dawning as we welcomed 45 new staff members for the day. 45 new members of staff, for which we have not paid for a single advert! Moreover for which we have interviewed in excess of 250 candidates! I love recruitment but it does feel like a full time role some weeks!

In sharing our vision and values, in reflecting on our culture and ethos, in detailing how we would scale up, I had a moment.  I realised how far we have come as a team, and I realised how much we have achieved in Year 1. As I played Emilie Sande’s ‘Wonder’ I was taken back to our induction day last September. It honestly seems like a life time ago! Time passes so quickly in schools, I remember someone saying to me in my NQT year not to wish away each half-term to a holiday, but we all know we do this. The momentum this year has meant we have needed seat belts and crash helmets at times!!

All of these whole school events were done around the normal exam marking, data entry, report writing and Parents’ Evening cycles but for us we only have 11 teachers, including me, who all teach all 120 students, so this was also intense! No wonder we were on our knees.

So week 1 of our official summer holidays I was still spinning, my head was still busy, my To Do List for school and home was still epic. As for the state of my house, my washing/ ironing pile and my fridge, well, they were feeling neglected to say the least!

So how did I start to recalibrate?

A staff night out with cocktails and dancing set the tone for my first weekend off. Nights out have been few and far between this year. Weekends have been about sleep and recuperation. The weather was still beautiful so I then hung out with friends who had come to visit and we chilled out on the river. The real treat came on Monday when the alarm did not go off, I still woke up like a robot at my standard 5.30am, but I rolled over and stayed in bed. This felt like the biggest treat as I  normally bounce up and out.

I have learnt over the last 15 years that for me going away on holiday straight away does not work. I need to tie up loose ends and get my environment tidied, resources organised and admin completed to go away guilt free and truly rest. So I went in to school for 3 days – I spent a day with my School Business Leader to sort our finances, a day with our Primary Deputy Headteachers to get things ready for our opening and a day with my PA to get our start of year organised.

Around our office and admin sorting our fabulous site team sorted a very long list of jobs for me so that the site will look spic and span to welcome our new staff and students in September. My Site Manager, my School Business Leader and I reminisced on a year ago when it was just the 3 of us rattling around in the massive school all by ourselves, before the staff and students started. It felt like a full cycle had been completed.

Each night I slept a bit earlier and a bit deeper, each morning I woke a little later and felt a bit more chilled. My osteopath tells me my body is like a tightly coiled spring and I felt the coil slowly begin to uncoil.

My first proper day off, not in school, was spent in London, ironically. I had a lunch date with Shirley Drummond and Jill Berry to catch up on our last 12 months, preceded by my emergency jabs and visa appointment for Mozambique as my personal ‘life-min’ was somewhat in disarray. Over a long leisurely lunch there was much laughter, lots of story telling and quite a few cocktails. A tradition we started last year when Shirley had just completed her first year and I was in my designate role. Jill and her book ‘Making the Leap’ have been a source of advice and inspiration for both of us on our journeys to headship.  #WomenEd friends and support network are invaluable in having those professional conversations that your non-teaching friends and family do not really get nor need to get. I did then go home to Devon for a long weekend and was less tired and work focused than I normally am as I had already decompressed!

As my mind began to settle I began to reflect more deeply on Year 1. A quote I keep going back to is one of my favourite by Maya Angelou about surviving v thriving. We have most definitely been in survival mode this year. I don’t think any of us could have anticipated how difficult it was going to be at times, how demanding and draining it would be. It is a cliche but it has been an emotional rollercoaster. The highs and lows have been quite extreme at times. I have felt the need to be both a rock for everyone on my team but also an emotional sponge for them. The role of emotional supporter also extends to our vulnerable students and their families  – some of who I have spent a considerable amount of time with this year too.

As a DHT this was also my role but it has intensified as the buck now truly stops with me. I feel very responsible for our team who have made career and life choices to join us on our journey. I feel very protective of our students who topped us back up again with their lovely values thank you cards to show gratitude to all staff members on the last day. I feel the pressure from our parents/ carers who took a leap of faith on us, on me last year.

I think that is the major difference of becoming a Headteacher, I have always been heavily emotionally invested in the school and community I serve, but I feel the level of accountability more keenly. Not in a results, inspection pressure but in a people and relationships pressure. I just don’t want to let anyone down!

This year group, our founding students, are also always going to hold a special place in our hearts. The Thank You cards, messages and presents we received from students and parents/ carers were indicative of our successful year.

Taking on my first headship, changing trusts, relocating, agreeing to being Executive Headteacher in Year 2 before Year 1 was even finished, project managing two builds and founding two new schools could not have pushed me further from the minimal comfort zone I have. Not much phases me, but this change leadership is different to the turn around school improvement I am used to leading.

The magic for us has happened in our conviction in doing things a little bit differently, in our boldness in challenging the traditions of our system.

So I am off to Mozambique for 2 weeks with the Action Aid and Women Leading in Education team. A brilliant opportunity to totally detach from reality, to dislocate ourselves from our emails, from twitter and from thinking about work. Some time out to consider how I will move from surviving to thriving in our 2nd year.

Hannah, The Hopeful Headteacher

Currently feeling hopeful about:

• Our trip to Mozambique with Action Aid.
• Our opening of Aureus Primary School in September.
• Our second year for Aureus School.
• Our brilliant new team and the energy, ideas and expertise they will bring with them.

Currently reading and thinking about:

• I read a brilliant piece yesterday about creating a good school culture which I will share with the staff in September.
• I really enjoyed Jill Berry’s blog on do less and achieve more – encouraging us to subtract rather than add.

Currently feeling grateful for:

• Surviving Year 1, relatively unscathed!
• The resilience my parents have instilled in me as it got me through this year.

Nurturing Hearts and Minds: Our Values Audit

This week we had our Values-Based Education audit from Dr Neil Hawkes and Jane Hawkes. We are delighted that we have now officially been awarded our VBE Quality Mark! We get asked a lot what being a VBE school means, how we planned our vision into provision and why we chose our approach.

I have captured my thoughts and reflections on our VBE journey below ahead of some presentations I am doing on how it has impacted our school.

What is our school Vision?

Our mission statement is ‘Nurturing Heart and Minds’. We strive to strike a balance between the academic and the emotional development of our students. We are committed to a holistic educational approach that focuses on the whole child development. A values-based education means that our values shape and frame our decisions and our actions in an integrated way. 

How do our values underpin our Culture & Ethos?

When the Leadership Team started to plan our provision we agreed some non-negotiables and some principles that would define our approach. We decided that daily mindfulness practice and weekly gratitude practice would top and tail each day and each week. We also made a commitment to our food education, an approach that would nourish our students to enable them to flourish. We all agreed that the social skills developed in a Family Dining Experience would develop the softer skills in our students.  We all use the Pivotal Approach as our behaviour tool which is based on a restorative justice model, this is underpinned by a ‘Relentless Compassion’ in how we work with our young people, many of who are quite vulnerable. 

How did we scope our Values?

As a new team, in a new school, located in a new community, we spent our first few days together last year in an extended induction. Our first day of INSET together focused solely on how we would #GrowLearnFlourish. Sue Webb, a VBE trainer, led the full day of reflections, discussions and coaching style conversations about what had shaped our moral compasses. We considered what kind of young people we wanted to co-create at Aureus and what sort of ethical vocabulary we wanted them to acquire. 

How do we teach our Values? 

We distilled our individual values down to a collective core of 12. This means we focus on and explore one value each month and then repeat the cycle. Each week starts with an assembly that introduces or develops the value, e.g. last month it was resilience and this month it is integrity. At the end of each assembly one of the children reads our values homily. Every assembly is followed up by an individual reflection task and each week 10 students are nominated for our weekly reward of #HotChocFri for their embodiment and exploration of the value. Every lesson has a focus on the values with a reference to it, so that each day and each week the understanding of the value is being embedded. Our family dining experience and inclusive ethos model the values we want to see.

How do we show our values in our environment?

As a new school we have a lot of white space and the school is a blank canvas. It was quite overwhelming how much space we had to fill when we first moved in! We have taken a slow and steady approach to the creation of values inspired art work. Each student has been involved in the creation of our   Values Totem Poles and our Values Chandelier which are proudly displayed in our main hall. Art club  each term produce a new art piece such as our Nurturing Hearts and Minds canvases in reception. 

How do our values shape our student wellbeing programme?

At Aureus we do not have tutors, we have coaches and our Coaching Groups meet at the end of the day to reflect on what has happened before they go home. Our days start with our Mindfulness programme. Students rotate around sessions on Mindful Strategies, Mindful Art, Mindful Movement and Mindful Reading. Our afternoon coaching sessions include the delivery of our Global Citizenship curriculum. Within the core curriculum our interventions have emerged into what Neil and Jane call our ‘Inner Curriculum’ Our Art Therapy Room, Sensory Room, Nurture Room and Thrive Programme develop the emotional awareness and resilience of our students.  

How do we explore our values in our SMSC programme?

Our Global Citizenship programme helps our students to develop their sense of identity and their sense of belonging. We develop a social consciousness and a local, regional, national and international perspective. All of our students committed to an #IWILL pledge at the start of the year. Our SMSC, PSHE and Citizenship components are integrated into a fluid, thematic delivery.

How do our values underpin our rewards and sanctions?

We reward students for showing our values. Stickers in lessons, Postcards for going above and beyond, #hotchocfri nominations are weekly rewards. Each term we have the formal awards of Certificates and Badges. Our sanctions start with restorative conversations, restorative meetings and restoration time where the values are discussed. It is explicit in our communication with parents and carers which of our values has been contravened and we reflect on how to embody the value moving forwards. E.g student x is being isolated for contravening the values of kindness, respect and diversity in his use of prejudiced language.

 

What did the values audit involve?

The audit was 1 full day at the end of our first full year. 2 Auditors from VBE joined us to shadow a normal day at Aureus. Our Student Council delivered a Values Assembly, then the observers participated in staff and student led activities including a learning walk of mindfulness, lessons, coaching and our personal development programme. They sat and chatted to staff and students in our Community Time, including students who were being rewarded and sanctioned for their values-led behaviour. The day finished with a Parent Voice session with our Parents and Carers’ Association and The Art Rooms summer showcase. I didn’t print anything!

What was our feedback?

We had a reflection session at the end of the day where Neil and Jane, together with the researchers who were shadowing them, gave us feedback on what they have seen, heard and absorbed. I found the feedback quite emotional as my heart swelled with pride in some of the things they said about our students and our community. They were particularly impressed by our students’ “communicative competence” in expressing their understanding of our values and why they are important, moreover how they will help to guide them in the future. Sue has recorded some of their responses and will publish some of their stories which we are excited to read and listen to as they were umprompted/ unscripted.

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What are our next steps?

We are a year in and will strive to embed what we have started and develop the next layer of our values-based education, starting with inducting in 40 new staff and 360 new students! Our plans for the future include nominating Values Ambassadors (students) and Values Champions (staff and parents). Engaging Values Partners such as Dauntless Daughters for Equality, RWS for Resilience and Educate and Celebrate for Diversity. We will launch a Values Newsletter capturing our activity such as the #MyValuesStory writing competition which one of our students won their age category for! We will start to build our Values Library and are looking to underpin our Values with the VIA Character Traits at Neil’s recommendation. I am most excited about our Marketing Officer producing video content with our students and one of our new Lead Practitioners doing action research into our values ethos and the impact it has in time.

How can you find out more?

Dr Neil Hawkes has written two books which I highly recommend: From the Heart and Inner Curriculum. He has also recently delivered a TED talk at  #TEDxNorwichEd

How can you get involved?

We are delighted to be hosting two VBE events next term:

• World Values Day 19/10: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/world-values-day-tickets-46999969173
• VBE Conference 2/11: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/vbe-2nd-annual-member-schools-conference-tickets-42842109904

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Hannah, The Hopeful Headteacher

Currently feeling hopeful about:

• The ethical vocabulary our young people are developing.

Currently reading and thinking about:

• I am reviewing Wholesome Leadership by Tom Rees for TES.

Currently feeling grateful for:

• Meeting Sue Webb through #WomenEd otherwise I would not have know about VBE, nor met Neil and Jane!

 

 

 

The Trolls Under the Bridge: Leadership Resilience

As we opened our new secondary school in September 2017, we made some philosophical and some ideological decisions which we do not consider to be bold, innovative and radical, but common sense. To others it seems we are quite extreme.

No homework. No setting. No detentions. No shouting. No bells. No packed lunches.

We made a list of our non-negotiables and have stuck to them.

As a values-led school with a team who are committed to nurturing hearts and minds through an inclusive, holistic approach to education we have focused a lot on creating our culture and ethos right.

Our 12 core values shape our inner curriculum, our global citizenship and our approaches to rewards, sanctions and assemblies. Our values are developing into an ethical vocabulary for our community.

 

Like at most schools, at the end of each assembly we have a reflection. I wrote our Homily to bring together our values into a tangible commitment to ourselves and our community:

“We strive for excellence by embodying the Aureus community values. We respect one another, ourselves and our environment. We strive to treat everyone equally. We champion diverse voices and different ideas. We are kind and we show empathy for others. We are courageous in the face of adversity. We show resilience when it is needed. We reflect on our wellbeing so that we may all be healthy and happy. We act with integrity; our actions are our values. Our hearts are full of love, for ourselves, for each other and for life. We act responsibly at all times. We encourage each other to be 10% braver and build our confidence. We live our values, every day”.

Our students speak articulately and confidently about what our values mean and how we should live them. Our students and our staff strive to embody our values in our decisions, our actions and our behaviours. We do not always all get it right, but our rewards and our sanctions speak to the value shown or contravened so that real learning takes places.

In the last few days our values of courage, resilience and integrity have been tested. But most of this has been directed at me as the figurehead of the school. I have received a lot of adversity, both professionally and personally. My resilience has really been tested as my eyes have bled reading the personal attacks. Despite this, my integrity remains in tact. I have not cried, I have not sworn, I have not lashed back at the vilification of my character, at the body shaming  nor the hashtag to have me sacked.

My roots are working really hard to hold me upright, I am bending but I am not breaking.

It has clearly been a quiet week at the newsdesk of our National Tabloid Press that they have felt compelled to run a piece about us in every outlet. Is this really ‘hot news’ when our policy has been in place for 9 months? One anonymous parent has created quite a stir.

I have been called a “Dictator” for being an assertive lead with a clear vision. I have been called “Draconian” for not budging on our expectations. I have been called a”lefty sandal wearer”, which would be more accurate if it was changed to “liberal pump wearer” but perhaps would not be as catchy. I have been called “fat” and my “bingo wings” have been commented on – for the record I started Couch to 5k 6 weeks ago to get in shape, and have lost a few pounds, but this will spur me on to run harder and faster.

To counter the hashtag and calls to have me sacked, surely a catchy future Headline for the Mail, the Mirror, the Star, the Express, the Metro to run could be:

Headteacher sacked for serving water.

Headteacher Dismissed for banning packed lunches. 

Headteacher removed for insisting on family dining.  

How ridiculous would that be? The masses are calling for a Headteacher to be sacked because a school has principles around their food education.

It is not that I do not have feelings, that I am not taking it personally, that words do not hurt me. It is not that I am not taking this seriously, because I am, but I will not allow the loud shouty voices nor the hateful insults sink in. My values are my shield.

Moreover, I have spent every day of the last 15 years investigating, challenging and sanctioning prejudice. I have spent considerable hours challenging bullying, on and offline.

We wonder why our children in our schools need this input from their teachers, until we see how adults act on line. In the words of one of my supporters who messaged me they are “vicious vultures”.

The 1000s of comments about us, about me, are mainly very misinformed. They are hateful. They have twisted what we are doing and why we are doing it.

If you are interested in finding out more about our Food Education you can read my article in TeachWire. There is also an article in their catalogue about our pledge to truly lean into Diversity. Moreover, our website is informative and transparent about everything we stand for. If you read our Google reviews we are complimented regularly on our inclusive culture and ethos, on our happy students, on our delicious family dining experience. If you are going to point your finger and blame or judge, please do it from an informed place.

We have an expression in the #WomenEd Steering Group to starve the trolls of their oxygen. This is what I have been doing the last few days. I have held my head up high, I have shielded myself with my values. I have drawn strength from the positive and supportive messages I have received from our school’s parents, from my friends and family. I have not been drawn in. I have kept my emotions in check. I have sat on my hands and I have bitten my tongue. We learnt the hard way when #WomenEd started that it is more powerful to say nothing. The silence is more infuriating for the aggressors than responding to their angry, loud, noisy monologues.

The article that went live a few days ago stems from one parent who complained. I am going to emphasise that one discontented parent has created this storm in a tea cup. See the original post in the Oxford Mail.

We have met with a few of our parents this year who were not fully behind our vision. We are a start up school and it is a difficult journey to align the parents and the staff when the school is being built, ideas are forming and plans are evolving in parallel to the admissions and transition process. We have worked hard to work with our parents and carers. We have made who we are very explicit to our prospective parents – all 850 of them who came to our open event for 240 student places.

With our food education policy, we have worked with our community to get them to buy into our vision and commitment. We have  listened to our parents and to our children, we have responded and our catering offer has evolved.  We have invited our parents in to experience it first hand for themselves.

The majority of our parents are very happy with our offer and understand how important our family dining is to our culture and ethos.

This parent did not get the response they wanted, they started a conversation on Facebook, they went to our Governors and they went to our MP. At each step we have communicated and explained our stance. We introduced sandwich bags as an option as they wanted packed lunches, we have subsidised their lunches for most of the year to work with them.

We appreciate they are frustrated, but do they appreciate the potential damage they have done by going to the press? Do they appreciate the distress they have caused to my team? Do they appreciate the stress they have created for me/us during my well-earned half-term? Do they appreciate the ripple effect this could have on our school community and on our students?

I don’t think they realised when they went to the Oxford Mail that it would go viral. I don’t think they intended to make me/us a Headline in every National tabloid. I don’t think they meant to make me the victim of online abuse for the last 72 hours. I don’t think they meant to incite racist, islamophobic, xenophobic, sexist, misogynist and bigotted or to put me at the centre of this storm.

I have blocked at least 50 twitter trolls who have been hateful to me online. I have tried not to read the thousands of abusive comments from facebook trolls and keyboard warriors, what I have done is reflected about the bigger picture:

• Most of the comments and criticisms are not from our school community.
• Most of the comments and criticisms are not about education and do not mention children.

I care about our school. I care about our children. If this had happened to one of our community, staff, student or parent alike I would support and protect them. I hope the parent who started this, who was not prepared to put their name it, has also reflected. As if this happened to their child, our student, we would do our utmost to support and protect them, to keep them emotionally safe, because that is what a values-led school does.

So until this storm passes, my anchor is in. These quotes have never been more pertinent than they are right now:

Ships were not built to stay in the harbour.

Rough seas make the best sailor.

And on a #WomenEd note, I do wonder if the tabloid readership would have been as hateful had I been born a man? In a time when we have a teacher recruitment and retention crisis, and not enough people willing to step up to be a Headteacher online hate campaigns like this do not help!

This educational leader is converting criticism to praise, is going high instead of low and will continue to rise above the hate. The haters will make me stronger and even more committed to what I believe in.

Hannah, The Hopeful Headteacher

Currently feeling hopeful about:

• Our young people – they are becoming the Values Ambassadors to shape our future society.

Currently reading and thinking about:

• The 100s of DMs, emails, tweets and texts of support and love I have received from my PLN.

Currently feeling grateful for:

• Having a brilliant staff team who are unshaken by this storm.
• The love from my PLN – each message has helped.
• The kindness of strangers – some people have reached out to me who I do not even know.
• The following words of wisdom sent to me to keep me resilient and strong!

From Summer Turner:

From Carol Campbell:

From Ruthie Golding:

From Claire Cuthbert:

Our 200 Days Celebration: Glorious Aureus

 

Tuesday 27th March 2018, was a landmark for us in our  history at Aureus School as we celebrated our 200th day and our official opening. We opened our doors to our visitors, partners & friends who came to celebrate with us.

We reflected on how much we have achieved in our first two terms in a student-led assembly. Our CEO, Jon Chaloner, our Vice Chair of our School Strategy Board, Bogusia Wojciechowska,  our Oxfordshire County Council representative, Allyson Milward and local resident William Darley who found the Didcot Hoard that named our school,  joined us in reflecting on our journey from an idea, to a building, to a school, to a community.

Our students shared their ‘Magic Moments’  from our first two terms together including Mindfulness, Family Dining, Personal Development Time, PGL, Student Council, Shakespeare for Schools and Hot Chocolate Friday!

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Our guests all had a student-led tour of our beautiful facilities to experience the Aureus Way. Our staff and students showcased our different daily activities within the  values-based education they experience at Aureus. It was great to have our Mayor, our local councillors, our community and our collaborative partners all there to share our celebration.

Being outward-facing and developing partnerships to bring value to our community is central to our shared vision and values. We were delighted that we had supporters with us from VBE, SSAT, Whole Education, TES Institute, Ambition School Leadership, Oxfordshire Teaching Schools and a number of our local primary school headteachers too.

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We celebrate Arts being at the Heart of our school and have connected with lots of local artists and art organisations. We are proud to be the home of the Didcot Art Room, an art therapy space. This was an opportunity for our guests to see for themselves our stunning Art Installations from our STEAM provision. Thank you to Lorna Carmen McNeil who created our Light Up Your Life chandelier that hangs proudly in our assembly hall from the inspiration of the Didcot Mirror, held proudly here by Sue Wright from Oxfordshire Museums.

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Dr Neil Hawkes officially opened our Sensory Room sponsored by Kitbox & our Thrive Room sponsored by McCarthy Stone. He has recently published his new book called The Inner Curriculum and he acknowledged that is exactly why we have created these 2 safe spaces at Aureus to nurture our most vulnerable students to enable them to grow learn and flourish. Sue Webb, one of the VBE consultants has been instrumental in helping us to scope and frame our values-led school.

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Thank you to our fabulous catering team for a delicious afternoon tea including Aureus cupcakes. Thank you also to EagleSSL for our stunning fruit trees to symbolise our GLF mission to grow, learn & flourish.

The last 2 terms have flown by. The momentum of opening a new school is like a whirlwind of activity as each day, each week, each half-term  there is so much for us all to do. All educators and school work hard but this really had required a new level of energy, commitment and resilience! Thank you and well done to all involved with Glorious Aureus – it is a team effort that has made us a success. The STEAM dream works because of our brilliant extended team.

Hannah, The Hopeful Headteacher

Currently feeling hopeful about:

• Our next 200 days – where will we be/ what will we have achieved by Christmas?
• The feedback from our School Evaluation Review today
• Our VBE audit in the summer
• The opening of our primary school in September
• The brilliant team we have recruited to join us in year 2 at Aureus and in the opening year of Aureus Primary

Currently reading and thinking about:

• Inner Curriculum – Dr Neil Hawkes new book
• Leadership Matters  – Andy Buck
• The Simple Guide to Child Trauma – Betsy De Thierry

Currently feeling grateful for:

• Our fantastic team at Aureus School
• Our support from GLF schools
• Our STEAM collaborations
• Our community partners

Global Mindset, Global Community: Global Citizenship

To celebrate #IWD18 and to help our Year 7 students understand why we need to #pressforprogress,  we held a Global Citizenship Day this week to develop awareness and deepen understanding of our values of Diversity and Equality.

Being an outward-facing school we have been overwhelmed by the number of invitations we have received to connect and collaborate with so many brilliant organisations who can bring value to our school community and who can help us give our Year 7 students a global perspective to contrast their life experience in Didcot, Oxfordshire.

The UN Global Goals for sustainable development inform our weekly Global Citizenship programme of activity that Julie Hunter our DHT curates superbly. At Aureus we do not do PSHE days, SMSC audits, Citizenship lessons – we have one integrated programme that integrates all of this key learning into one cohesive and coherent delivery.

We used this day as an opportunity to develop some partnerships through a carousel of thought-provoking workshops. It was a fantastic opportunity to expose our students to external voices and experiences whilst exploring the rights of girls. Our values of respect and responsibility  were developed as our students’ understanding grew.

LyftaEd

Serdar the founder of LyftaEd flew in from Finland to work with Amjad our AHT on a series of immersive storytelling workshops using the virtual technology platform his team have built. As an English and Media Studies teacher, as someone who travels a lot this resource is brilliant in exploring identity and representation. In the 15 minutes I was in the room we were in a Finnish family’s kitchen meeting a female weight lifter and we met a male ballerina in the Czech Republic in an opera house. The power of technology to transport our young people to places around the globe to create human connections and understanding of ourselves as global citizens is remarkable.

You can find out more about this brilliant platform here.

Oxfordshire Museums

Kelly Smith who works at Pitts Museum, initiate a project with us and a local artist to explore the history of Didcot and how this frames our identity as a school. Her colleague Sue Wright joined us to work with Lorna, a local artist and Laura our Art Lead Practitioner Designate. Using The Didcot Mirror as inspiration, each student has designed a piece to contribute to our art installation for our official opening ceremony in a few weeks’ time. Linking our Roman history with our future as a values-led school through our identity will create a sense of belonging for our students. The art installation entitled ‘Light up our Lives’ will hang above our heads in our weekly assembly.

Pictures to follow when it is installed next week!

Youth For Change 

Shamil and the team from Youth For Change delivered an interactive session on gender equality. The students were very informed about the cultural stereotypes for boys and girls, the social constructs they are defined and confined by. This was a segway to the rights of girls/ women and the challenges they face through the cultural practices of  FGM, ECM and HBV.

You can find out more about their #traintoprotect outreach here.

Sexplain

Amelia is a force to be reckoned with. Delivering brilliant SRE sessions she used play dough as a resource to start a dialogue about sex education. With the prevalence of the #MeToo campaign the dialogue around consent and behaviours/ attitudes to sex and relationships is of vital importance to our students.

Find out more here.

I was really very proud of our students on our inaugural Global Citizenship Day – the feedback we received from our visitors on their sense of self, their understanding  of how they belong, their desire to be changemakers in their community/ our world and their articulation of their values was very touching. Through our VBE frame we focus on the ethical vocabulary that our children have and how they communicate their thoughts and feelings.

Hannah, The Hopeful Headteacher

Currently feeling hopeful about:

• The opportunity to shape global citizens who understand their identity, who have a sense of belonging, and who will contribute positively to the world.

Currently reading and thinking about:

• I am prepping Aureus for the VBE schools accreditation process whilst Julie Hunter our DHT is prepping us for our Rights Respecting School accreditation process. External validation of the work we are doing through our values-based education will help us to educate our prospective parents and carers about our work.

Currently feeling grateful for:

• The teams at LyftaEd, Oxford Museums, Sexplain and Youth for Change who made this day possible for our staff and our students.

The Stranger on the Bridge: Male Mental Health

On Friday we held our 2nd Mental Health Awareness conference for Vulnerable Learners. We are leading the regional grant from the Charlie Waller Memorial Trust to raise awareness of how schools can support our students through their STELLA Project.

Event 1 was a full day conference for 150 people in November with Dick Moore as our Keynote Speaker sharing his journey as a father of a boy who committed suicide. His story of ‘Dancing or Drowning in the Rain’ is rousing. I blogged about it here.

Event 2 was a half-day conference for 75 in March for the teachers, leaders, professionals and organisations to come back together, to connect their ideas and experiences to forge collaborations. Our Keynote Speakers were Jonny Benjamin and Neil Laybourn.

Event 3 is in June and is a #MHWBTeachmeet, we have Natasha Devon as our Keynote Speaker and you can book to join us here.

In between these training days we hold a half-termly MH & WB network meet up to develop working relationships and share resources / best practice across our partnerships. Our next opportunity is on April 23rd and you can book to attend here. To find our more please connect with Lucinda Powell is co-leading the network with me.

We are also using some of the funding to run a Bridging Project pilot supporting Year 6 students through the anxiety of SATs and transitioning to secondary school by training 2 adults in each school to use mindfulness techniques and yoga to help them manage their emotions and reduce stress. More to follow on this one!

For those of you who do not know Jonny’s story, this was the second time I had heard him share it but the first time I had met Neil and heard his story that intertwines.  Jonny shares his journey from despair to hope and recovery. A mental diagnosis at primary when he started hearing voices in his head, a personality disorder diagnosis in his teens, exasperated by  his religion (brought up a Jew) and his sexuality Jonny has struggled with mental ill health for most of his life.

He sets the scenes and takes us to the point when he went to a bridge in London and prepared to commit suicide.

Enter Neil, not Mike. A commuter on his morning route to work. Their story is the power of human connectivity. Two  strangers on a bridge who in a sliding doors moment may not have crossed paths. A commuter who stopped to help a man in distress. Neil reached out to a stranger in an altruistic act of kindness. He saw him. He emotionally reached out to him by starting a conversation. He held the space for him to feel safe. To feel like there was a reason to live.

Jonny didn’t jump. The police arrived (how he was treated by them is another story). Neil went to work and continued on with his life. A parallel life to Jonny who was on a journey of recovery. A random act of kindness that saved a man’s life.

The story could have ended there but it didn’t on this occasion. Jonny’s profile in raising awareness about  mental ill health led to a documentary being made and a hunt to #FindMike (he had forgotten Neil’s name!) A viral campaign started and Neil’s girlfriend saw the media call for the Stranger on the Bridge to come forward.

The really sad and scary part of this story. At least 35 men came forward to say that they had also stopped someone from taking their live on a bridge in London on that same date. 35 strangers intervening to prevent the loss of life. 35 humans in crisis, so desperate that suicide was the only option for them.

 Jonny and Neil were reunited and a bromance began. The two of them have a fantastic friendship and have travelled the world sharing their story to help others. The story filled us all with hope. Hope in the human spirit.

It left me reflecting on so many aspects of my life, my family and our school community.  A local secondary school has lost 4 students to suicide in the last few years. I interviewed for a headship where 3 young people had taken their lives in a short period of time. One of the most gifted students I taught in South London, took his life in his undergraduate year. My aunt has tried to overdose on a few occasions.

Human beings are in crisis everywhere around us – relationships and communication are at the forefront of the solution to the problem we see ourselves faced with.

Hannah, The Hopeful Headteacher

Currently feeling hopeful about:

• Random Acts of Kindness.
• The power of human connectivity.

Currently reading and thinking about:

• I have Betsy Thierry’s book  on Trauma to read, passed on by my DHT Julie Hunter 

Currently feeling grateful for: 

• Charlie Waller Memorial Trust for funding the MH conference and MHWB network via the STELLA project.
• Jonny and Neil for joining us to share their journey.
• Lucinda for volunteering so much of her time to help the regional MH & WB network grow.
• All of the contributors, the speakers/ exhibitors who all shared their time, experience and expertise for free.
• My brilliant PA Zoe who helps me keep lots of balls in the air, each and every day!