The long and winding road

6th June 2025

Welcome back after whatever half term break you had. I hope it was a good and productive week.

And, Eid Mubarak to our Muslims friends, colleagues and community. I hope you have a lovely weekend.

The festival of Eid al Adha relates directly to one of the five key pillars of Islam: Hajj. Hajj is the annual pilgrimage made by Muslims to the holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia. It takes place during the final month of the Islamic calendar. Every year, millions of Muslims from across the world make the journey to Mecca, from wherever they live. Every Muslim should endeavour to perform Haj at least once in their life, if they are able.

All of the major global religions have a similar tenant; the concept of pilgrimage or journey. And whether you are religious or not the idea of the journey has always and continues to be seen as important. You’ve only got to watch one of those TV reality shows where ‘the journey’ is at the heart of the televisual experience (if you want to understand this you must watch Peter Kay’s Britain’s Got The Pop Factor).

I could be glib but there really is something in this. When we are talking about school or college improvement, thinking about pupil or student success it is important that we don’t just head off doing stuff. We work hard in consulting on, drawing up, sharing and re-iterating our vision, ethos and principles – the destination, if you like. The journey is the… ‘what we’ll do to get there’.

Too many schools and colleges just do. They don’t know why they do what they do, they just do because it’s always been done. If we are going to truly affect change we need to be focused and direct. We know what the destination is, we work out what is the most effective route, we select the mode of transport and off we go. We have a purpose to our journey. And in this framework the journey then has meaning and can be enjoyable. If we know what we are doing and why we are doing it the process is far more meaningful. This is the same with and for our children and young people. If they are aware of not only what they are doing, but why they are doing it, then the learning is easier and more fulfilling.

I’m reminded of the words of the famous walking book author Alfred Wainwright: he said … “one should always have a definite objective, in a walk as in life – it is so much more satisfying to reach a target by personal effort than to wander aimlessly. An objective is an ambition, and life without ambition is … well, aimless wandering.”

Muslims performing Hajj are on a spiritual as well as a physical journey. They know what they want to achieve and have set out how they will reach their goal. We respect and celebrate that.

Whether we’re performing Hajj or not we are all still on a journey. We are all going somewhere. Some of us have thought about the destination, the objective, and have planned the journey. I’d suggest that in these cases we will feel far more satisfied, able to lift our heads and look around, enjoying the way we have chosen to tread. Just as our best learning experiences in the classroom, the lab, the studio, the stage or the sports field are when we know where we are going and have planned the journey carefully.

‘Life is a journey. When we stop, things don’t go right.’ Pope Francis

‘We don’t receive wisdom; we must discover it for ourselves after a journey that no one can take for us or spare us.’ Marcel Proust