I resolve …
10th January 2025
Happy New Year.
I hope that the return to school/college/work has been manageable. Despite the weather and conditions under foot/wheel, it seems to me that it’s been a remarkably good week. The conditions have challenged us all but, as always, we have risen to that challenge, and it seems that it’s been a very positive week in our schools and in the college.
Have you set any resolutions?
To resolve is an interesting verb. The dictionary definition of ‘to resolve’ is this does give us an interesting nudge to how we might conduct ourselves.
verb
1.
settle or find a solution to (a problem or contentious matter).
“the firm aims to resolve problems within 30 days”
2.
decide firmly on a course of action.
“she resolved to ring Dana as soon as she got home”
You’ll have your personal resolutions, or not, as the case maybe, but at an institutional or trust level these definitions seem to fit very nicely with how we work, what we intend and the approach we always take.
It is undoubtedly the case that all who work in an educational establishment find solutions. It comes with the territory. Our daily working experiences are almost always full of challenges that need a resolution, a way forward and reckoning. As we work with the children and young people and our communities we are bound to remain calm, focused, adult and professional, occasionally in the face of determined behaviours, and less than perfect manners. Whatever the day throws at us we find that ‘way forward’. You will know that it can be really, really hard on occasions but we will always find the navigable route – often with a smile, good humour and patience, sometimes despite the behaviours of those we are working with.
And as a Trust we have a firm course of action. We know what we stand for, we know how we are going to work, we understand our communities and we work to improve the experiences and outcomes of those associated with us. At the start of this calendar year, I take the liberty of reminding all of our underpinning vision – the crutch upon which we rest.
Vision:
Inspire Learning Trust is committed to offering all of our children and young people a truly inspirational, outstanding and ambitious educational experience; preparing them for learning and life. We are committed to Educational Social Responsibility
‘Inspiring lives, creating possibilities, shaping futures’ – Sitwell Junior School
‘Everyone succeeds’ – Winterhill School
‘Inspired to achieve’ – Oakwood High School
‘A tradition of achievement – a future of opportunity’ – Thomas Rotherham College
At the start of 2025 I resolve to uphold the tenets upon which we were founded and within which we continue to operate. I do that with optimism and a strong belief in all of our children and young people and in our communities.
I use this message to regularly point to the successes that we’ve had in our schools and in the college. It’s absolutely clear that we are all high performing but it’s great when that is also recognised more widely. We take the league tables and lists with a pinch of salt – we don’t run our institutions on the basis that we want to manipulate or manage data, however, when success is recognised, we should point to that recognition and celebrate accordingly. .
In early December both Oakwood and Winterhill, , were identified by the Rotherham advertiser as two of the best schools in the borough (https://www.
And just before the Christmas break the Advertiser ran another article about Rotherham’s primary schools. In that article Sitwell Junior School was ranked the seventh best performing primary school in Rotherham – that’s out of the 120+ primary schools (https://www.