Announcing our brilliant new Sixth Form Head Girl and House Captain teams in assembly this week led me to reflect on how we can empower others through leadership.
Speaking to my new student leaders, we discussed how serving others, bringing about change and further improving the experiences of our community, is both humbling and the best experience in equal measure.
As a team, the pupils will all bring their own unique perspectives, learning quickly from each other and valuing the support they provide each other. For me, leadership is all about bringing people with you, aligning others with your vision and championing the successes of people around you. The book ‘Grit’ by Angela Duckworth has some fantastic quotes; one that resonates with me most is “some people get 20 years of experience, whilst others get one year of experience 20 times…in a row.” It is not always about the quantity, but the quality of our experiences that help us grow and develop as leaders. When approaching student leadership in our school, we support them to ensure that their learning curve excels over time by giving them a range of opportunities and guidance.
Our leadership theme for the Head Girls and House Captains will be ‘Stronger Together’ and it is this message that we weave through our work every day.
In my presentation last week to our Year 7 offer holders, I talked about my belief in needing a village to raise a child and how our collective endeavour enables us all to thrive. It was a great pleasure to meet many of our new families at our offer holder event and we look forward to them joining us this September.
The high calibre of our new pupils and the insight into their lives that we saw at interview, always reminds me of the privileged position we are to work with such bright young people.
Mrs Emily Codling, Headmistress