HEADMASTER’S FOURTEENTH BLOG – HARK THE HERALD

On Friday night I had two Oxford PPE hopefuls in my office for a final tutorial with their glorious leader. I nodded appreciatively as they spoke about things I didn’t understand, and waved an approving hand whenever quotations I didn’t recognise from philosophers I’d never heard of were cited. I then asked both students to offer a solution to the Eurozone problem in sixty seconds, but immediately got lost when one of the pupils described the European economy in terms of arcane political theory. Finally, I was asked if philosopher X was responsible for theory Y, and I said I didn’t know. We all shook hands and off they went to Oxford.

********

Consider the humble tea towel. No, seriously. How elevated it must feel when, once every year, the soap suds are left to drain away of their own accord because the proud rag adorns the head of a Pre-Prep shepherd. If “Come to the Manger” lacked a Cecil B. DeMille budget, it sure hit home in the lumpy throat department. (This may be because the play was not marred, as was a production some years ago, by a fight breaking out among the three wise men). Meanwhile in Prep we had “The Peace Child” which should be compulsory viewing for some of the role models (sic) playing in the Premier League. The Seniors turned in a transcendental “Midsummer Night’s Dream”, while tonight we have a charity concert (staff and pupils performing) for the flood victims in Thailand. And yet .. and yet ....  a prospective parent told me yesterday that Bromsgrove is still perceived to be dominated by sport. I will set my reply to music and have a dance troupe deliver it.

**************

I am going to sing “Baby I love you” at the Charity Concert. Why? Because you should never trust a pop song that purports to say more than “Baby I love you.” Look at the lyrical abominations that have arisen as bands try to say things beyond the proper metier of pop (which is teen angst round the soda fountain). I mean, what’s this about?

"I drew a line,
I drew a line for you.
Oh, what a thing to do.
And it was all yellow."

 And they’re millionaires. Millionaires I tell you.

***************************************** 

In the middle of Gordon Green stands a Christmas tree. Yesterday evening, as darkness fell, we had a two hundred and sixty strong floodlit CCF Review on the south side of the tree, overseen by a naval Commodore. To the east, at the same time, in a brightly lit Routh Hall, pupils chatted, served and performed at our Christmas party for local senior citizens. North, our many caterers were busy in their kitchens preparing hundreds of evening meals, while to the west, the administration workers processed a myriad online forms and accounts. And on the other side of the world, a different Bromsgrove School also prepared for Christmas. And the children there will, from time to time, be thinking of a place a long, long way west of them. An ancient, special place where for hundreds of years, young people have looked forward to this time of year. And from where I, the most fortunate of Headmasters, now offer Season’s Greetings to you all.

ESPRIT DE DOORS - THE HEADMASTER’S THIRTEENTH BLOG

I was explaining in our Senior School assembly recently that whereas many countries will only define a civilised environment after analysing moral, intellectual and artistic advancement, the British do it on the spot by watching how a child behaves in the vicinity of a door. Open a door and let others through, and you are a Renaissance youth, beloved of adults and numbered among the blessed. Try to go through a door before an adult, however, and you a reprehensible Visigoth, toppling the towers of empire and determining in three second that visitors will choose another “more civilised” School for their child. Never mind examination results: British Schools are really all about what happens near doors.

*************************  

International parents may not know that we have a chain of fitness centres in the UK called David Lloyd. (David was a great British tennis player. That’s not the same as a great German or Russian tennis player, I admit, but David got the ball back over the net sometimes and is subsequently a national treasure. He is now a hugely successful businessman and discerning art collector). In the Bromsgrove branch of David Lloyd there is, understandably, much talk of Bromsgrove School. My gym-based Stasi (when they are not working the School car parks in trenchcoats and walky-talkies) duly keep me informed. This week, for example, I was given a peculiarly (and, I pray, untypically) David Lloyd take on the number of pupils supposedly doing a certain course in the Lower Sixth. It was wrong by a factor of ten. A factor of ten!  When exasperated, the Cherokee Indians famously declared: svgi inageehi giniyaluga. It means Let's go hunt for some wild onions.

**************************

I always thought Aristotle tutoring Alexander the Great was the coolest teacher/pupil combo I had ever come across. However, I had the good fortune to sit next to Sir Eric Anderson at a lunch this week. Sir Eric has been Headmaster of three Schools, Provost of Eton and Rector of Lincoln College Oxford. He is an expert on Walter Scott and a hundred things besides. And he has also given Aristotle a run for his money, for in his time, Sir Eric has taught: Prince Charles, Tony Blair and David Cameron. Who knows if right now, in Bromsgrove, a young teacher is inspiring a trio of future Titans.

***************************

Anyway, back to the door thing. For the days immediately following my announcement, I witnessed moments of bewilderment and terror as pupils neared these oblong arbiters of human decency. Even with no adult in sight, Bromsgrovians were scanning the horizon to ensure that by no conceivable means could they be accused of letting a door close on someone. Pupils were hesitating before open doors even when no one was coming the other way, fearing the threshold as one might a portal to the planet Tharg. I saw one pupil hold the door open at lunch only to find hoards of pupils filing through and setting him back a hundred places in the queue. Indeed, had I not relieved him, he’d still be there now. Thinner, but with his skeletal fingers clutching the handle. “After you” has become as common a phrase as “Any chance of some more chips, please?” We are in a golden age –the Athens of Pericles – and it may even last to the end of the week.

THE HEADMASTER’S TWELFTH BLOG – DAISY, DAISY

Long standing readers will recall the summer of torment when I inexplicably rubbed Factor 50 suncream into my eyes rather than adopting social norms and applying it to my skin. Well, I went one better last half term and damaged my ligaments in a curious cycling accident. Curious because the cycle in question was nailed to a gymnasium floor. Let me explain. Dismounting with butch gusto, I forgot to extricate my right foot from the strap. I duly fell into the lady cyclist next to me (my right foot still attached to my own bike). Since this unfortunate lady was listening to her I-Pod and in a state of blissful detachment, the sudden appearance of my head in her lap was unsurprisingly followed by a panic-induced flurry of blows to my face. As I was still strapped in to the next door bike and therefore unable to move, I had no option but to lie there and take the beating like a man.

******************* 

I’m not sure I have ever been as proud of the School as I was on Remembrance Sunday, and not simply because of the levels of respect, smartness and discipline on display from our pupils. More because those pupils represented over thirty nations who had spent periods of the twentieth century engaged in the most terrible conflict with one another. After our services, I watched British, Russians, Germans, Chinese, South Africans and a host of other nationalities walk away together into the crisp, bright morning. Sometimes, life really can be obviously and upliftingly symbolic.

****************** 

On Wednesday evening, the third annual Bromsgrove Foundation Lecture was held in the Lansdowne Club, off Berkeley Square in London. The superb Dame Julia Cleverdon gave the collective conscience and intellect of a one hundred and fifteen strong invited audience a thorough shaking. Dame Julia (one of the Fifty Most Important Women in Britain according to The Times) has herself a list of achievements as impressive as Smokin’ Joe Frazier’s uppercuts, but readers of a noble vintage will extend serious respect when I tell them that she once worked in .....wait for it ...  Industrial Relations at British Leyland in 1972. While the import of this position may be lost on younger readers, venerable observers will surely acknowledge that Damehood is poor reward for what has to be industry’s equivalent of climbing Mount Everest in leotard and flippers while carrying a Yak.

***************** 

I should add that when the gym staff pulled me off the terrified lady and the situation was explained to her, she apologised. Despite feeling and looking like a pizza (puffy and bulbous at the extremities but fine in the middle), I apologised in turn for entering her life so abruptly and without proper introduction. As the staff applied ice to an ankle growing quick as bamboo, I struck up polite conversation with my onetime assailant and discovered that the lady had young children and was thinking about appropriate schooling. Ever the trooper, I suggested, through my tears, that she take a look at Bromsgrove. She said she would. She hasn’t.

THE HEADMASTER'S ELEVENTH BLOG

Keen to excite the parental body beyond all human imaginings, I thought I might remind you of the fact that Bromsgrove is a founder member of HMC.

“Well I never!” you cry, pouring your cornflakes over the floor: “how undeniably thrilling.” Indeed, I can almost hear the scattered applause around the globe.

Or, more likely, are you actually saying: “HM what?”

HMC, The Headmaster’s Conference. It first met in 1869 and has now grown to well over 200 schools (some with Headmistresses now) which include all those you find in crosswords such as Eton, Harrow etc. A Headmaster has to be elected onto this venerable body, and if your School starts slipping up in terms of results or standards, you get the heave–ho. The annual meeting is next week in St. Andrews, Scotland. The press and senior politicians come along to hear the musings of this veritable swelling of Heads. Ambitious young tyros jostle to be seen with the Head of Eton but run like wildfire if they think they might be photographed with me. I might take my gorilla mask this year to liven things up still further. Floreat Bromsgrovia.

****************************

I was speaking with a group of Prep School children in my office yesterday and we touched on the nature and importance of the CV in later life. It struck me that many of these pupils will be employed in jobs whose titles have yet to be invented. In times long gone you knew where you stood with a job title. One might have said: “Hello, I’m a puddler” or “Would you be in need of a cordwainer? It’s different now: pupils who have just left can expect to be Modality Managers. But what of the future? Well, in and around Silicon Valley, they already have a Chief Dreamer, a Friction Arrestor and, my favourite, a Goddess of the People. How lovely.

************************ 

Finally, the results of the question posed in the last blog. Avid readers will recall I had contemplated the multitude that had passed through this School over the centuries. That got me a-thinking. Could anybody, I wondered, name a band who had changed all of their line up and subsequently enjoyed greater success without a single original member?

In third place, and the most popular answer by far, came The Sugababes. In second place (and surely the most terrifying response): The Wurzels. (I confess I have lost sleep over this. The parent concerned is a highly intelligent and articulate soul, yet openly admitting to knowing this kind of thing is surely tantamount to keeping bodies in the basement). But in first place – by a country mile – The Hallé Orchestra. Since a dodgy first gig in 1858, they have been through literally scores of line up changes and emerged stronger than ever. Great answer. Warm fizzy goodness to a member of the Prep School staff who can now look forward to benevolent Headmasterial glances and rapid promotion.

DAZED AND CONFUSED - THE HEADMASTER’S TENTH BLOG

Righto. Welcome one and all. My top conversation of the holiday was with a prospective international pupil.

“Why Bromsgrove?”

“I have always wanted to see the Garden of England, Sir.”

“But that’s Kent.”

Awkward pause.  Subsequent slow realisation on both our parts that the pupil thought he had applied for Bromley. Further doubts ensue when pupil expresses interest in History (Bromley hasn’t been in Kent since 1963) and Geography (Bromsgrove is over 100 miles away from where he thought he was).

********************** 

Parents have received formal notification of our results and sundry achievements over the summer, so I’d like here to mention something that isn’t on the website or on headed paper. It’s this: more pupils sat public examinations at Bromsgrove over the summer than attend an average Stafford Rangers home fixture, and more public examinations (A level, AS level, GCSE, IGCSE, IB, BTEC etc.) were taken than there are stars visible to the naked eye at any one time. Bravo to the staff who processed the results. Epic.

************************

My butch swaggering around the building sites this summer saw me chomping a Yorkie or two on the living roof of the new sports arena. It really is quite a thing. You could hold a grouse shoot up there. As for scale, I have been taken aback by the size of the new Hospitality Suite. The first floor is a whopping space with wonderful views. So, if you are a parent cheering your children on through horizontal rain this term, salvation is at hand in the Senior School at least. In a few months you’ll be sipping piping hot tea (laced with whatever you keep in your hip flask) in the equivalent of a Royal Box at Wembley, waving cheerily to your bedraggled warriors down below.

***************************

I’m sure all discerning parents watched TV highlights of the High Voltage Festival over the summer. This is the rock festival where one person from a famous band of forty years ago gets three or four younger people to help him recreate the magic of 1973. The bands retain their original names, of course, to give the impression nothing has changed, even though only the bass player is still alive from the original line up. So, instead of calling yourself “Creaky Bob Patterson and Five Young Blokes”, you remain “Washington Farmhouse Kitchen” or whatever you were. I ponder this merely because Bromsgrove is 500 years old and none of the original line up is with us. So, can anybody think of a band without a single original member who became all the better for it? Glass of Babycham for the best answer.

SUMMER TIME BLUES – THE HEADMASTER’S NINTH BLOG

We think a certain Bromsgrove 1^st XI player has just made the most runs ever in a season and, with a double century, accumulated the biggest single score in Bromsgrove history. When I speak of this remarkable feat, I am minded of my own sporting greatness, not least when my mother told me to look out for my little sister on the occasion my Primary School took us to the local swimming baths. Keen to impress my tiny sibling, I demonstrated the art of the shallow dive. Having been forced to witness the demonstration, my sister took time to watch the small pool of blood form on the surface of the water before nonchalantly informing the teachers that her brother was still underwater and less visibly active that one might have hoped. I was rescued by a fully clothed life guard, and rushed to a major Liverpool hospital at where my head was stitched back together.

***************

You might be wondering why I haven’t mentioned the diet for a while.

*************************

Quantum physicists tell us that electrons can be in two places at the same time. I’m not sure what the fuss is about because a decent sprinter on an old-style whole School photograph could pull off the same stunt. However, the quantum physicists seem pretty smug about it, but - if we’re so clever - can any smarty pants tell me why, after a twentieth birthday, one’s shirt remains forever tucked in, whereas until that joyous occasion it can escape the confines of outer garments as if possessed by the spirit of Houdini?

****************

You will be expecting me to say something about strikes and pensions.

****************

This is my last blog for a couple of months, and while I’d love to tell you I can barely type for tears, the fact is I’m about to defrost the sausages and crack open a celebratory Tia Maria. When I was little, I read a magazine called 21^st Century that predicted mankind’s future. In it, jet liners were as large as ocean going ships and flew at five times the speed of sound. Space had been conquered and we had colonies on distant planets. In a state of perpetual peace we lived in mile high cities (unless invaded by unpleasant aliens whom we invariably saw off with aplomb). So when somebody tells me that blogging or twittering is “like amazing”, I can’t help but think of a certain emperor and his clothes. Anyway, I’ll be back in September, and I’ll do as I’m told. But deep, deep down it will always be “Space Cadet Edwards reporting for duty, sir.”

Have a wonderful summer.

BY GOVE, SIR! - THE HEADMASTER’S EIGHTH BLOG

So, just as Britain’s A level students are in the midst of the most important examinations of their lives, Michael Gove says (in language statelier than mine) that the GCSE and A level exam system is about as useful as a chocolate frying pan. Nice timing, boss. For a well intended man with some deeply sensible ideas, our Secretary of State for Education needs to remember that our pupils can only do the examinations adults put in front of them. Telling those pupils while they are in the middle of the examinations that it’s one big dumbed down mess is about as motivational as Vlad the Impaler delivering Thought for the Day.

*******************

While we’re on exams ...  a Senior pupil guide was taking some Year 8s on a tour of the Senior School last week. He said to them that there’s a rumour the Head is going to abolish A level and make everybody do IB. See a previous blog to understand why, were he old enough, this fine young man would receive a bottle of champers. (And see the link on our website’s homepage – next to my mug shot - for what the Head actually thinks).

******************* 

I should be a politician. Here’s the education debate in a nutshell:

·         Twenty years ago: Terminally examined GCSE and A level is too hard. Life isn’t about examinations or learning your history chronologically. Lots more soft subjects, coursework, modules and retakes please. Everyone’s a winner. What’s that? You want a university place with three E grades? You betcha. Celebrity Studies anyone? (Cue dodgy MOR classic “Everybody Is Beautiful In Their Own Way.”)

·         Ten Years ago: Aarrgh! What have we done? It’s all too easy. Millions of A grades in Music Tech and Psychology. Parents and teachers doing the coursework for the children. Thousands of schools pushing soft subjects so they look good in league tables. Nation of idiots. Help! What can we do?

·         2011: Phew. Terminally examined GCSE and A level are just brilliant. Now we’re talking. Maths, Languages, proper British History, no modules, no retakes. Is this cool or what? Look out China!

·         2020 AD ..... Aarrgh! What have we done? It’s all too hard. Life isn’t about examinations or ....

And this will stop when the sheet ice returns and homo sapiens hands the planet over to the roaches.

**********************

Two of our Sixth Form Physics students have been published. One is holding a Cambridge offer and the other is off to study Mechanical Engineering. I called them in to offer congratulations and cheerily asked them to explain to me what their article was about.

Won’t be doing that again.