What do our students achieve?

By the time you read this, we will have had the last formal days of teaching for our wonderful grade 10, and grade 12 students. These are always strange days; closure sits oddly with our culture of beginnings and openings. They are also weeks of reflection, and as well as looking ahead with excitement, we have also been helping the students to look back, to see how far they have come, and to better understand their experiences.

This may seem premature (there are some small events in the next few weeks that are weighing heavily on all our minds, I know) but it is vital that we acknowledge that teachers know, what parents know, what future employers will know, and what research tells us: that our students’ futures are not determined by their exam results; that their effort, drive, passion, intelligence and creativity are not summarised by a single number out of 45, or a string of letters. Their successes are measured in the quality of their thinking, the integrity of their actions, and the strengths of their friendships. And these are such that we are confident that the future is bright.

All these are too closely linked to separate

So what have they achieved? The short answer is that it is far, far more than I can recount here, and you will know it better than I can. Their individual moments may have been

• when they held their nerve in that Theatre performance;
• when they made the connection with their Service partner that neither will forget;
• when their team pulled together when they had begun to doubt they could win
• when they had the beautiful ‘aha!’ moment in their favourite lesson, and realised that deep understanding is a reward in itself
• when they made a more beautiful sound in a music concert than they had thought possible;
• when they discovered that someone who looks and sounds completely different to them, and whom they initially disliked, could be a close friend;

Those are specific moments, specific events. But what they add up to is your children consistently committing to being the best they can be; and in doing so they have grown a community; and rightly, now outgrown it. We will miss them.