Mr Burnie’s Blog

“So long, and thanks for all the fish”

Reading broadens the mind. So if you have yet to encounter Douglas Adams and his Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy trilogy, I would certainly recommend the series of books to you as a way of spending some of your summer.

I will be spending some of the summer with my head in some other books, brushing up on the trickier parts of the A level Further Mathematics syllabus as I prepare for a more classroom-based existence from September. Indeed, my office is pretty much packed up, and this column represents one of the last ‘official’ duties in the discharging of my responsibilities as Deputy Head (Academic). In search of inspiration for this short piece, I have reviewed the content of the other Leadership Likes columns that I have written during my tenure. Topics range from the more procedural aspects of my job (Learning Walks, Exams, Coping with Stress!), to my own learning experiences (exploring Virtual Reality headsets, having my hands cast in plaster), to the more obscure (New Year’s Resolutions, the Champions League final). However, the one column that particularly grabbed me was on the theme of community, which I wrote at about this time last year. I have always found that the best thing about working with people is the people, and this is a sentiment that very much rings true at Croydon High School.

This school week has been typically busy and enriching, with the following just a sample of the events and activities taking place: the Lower School Galactic Challenge, an Oxbridge talk from recent alumnae, Lower Sixth Geography field work, the stunning Lower School Summer Production, the Year 9 Debating competition, the Year 9 Reading Project, LAMDA exams and the inaugural Sports Department Dinner tomorrow evening.

Without your daughters’ enthusiasm and appetite for learning none of this would be possible, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank them all for their sustained commitment to the school, and you, parents, for your continued support of them (and us!). This level of dedication is undoubtedly matched by my colleagues, and it is only proper that I sign off with a heartfelt thank you to all of them for their unstinting hard work in providing your daughters with an exceptional education, for their support of me in my role over the last two years, and for making my time here so memorable.

Chris Burnie

Deputy Head (Academics)