Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you

It’s been a very long time since I wrote a blog like this, and so much has happened since I have.

Not only have I undergone a huge change in work, moving from a school I had worked at for 11 years, five of them as Headteacher, but my wife and I welcomed our son, Archie, to take our family from three to four.

September 2025 was certainly a busy month! In fact, everything has been incredibly busy since.

Back in 2022, when I had written my 75th blog as a Headteacher, I explained my reasoning as to why I started it, stating that I was keen to gain some exposure for the school I worked in initially, but then it morphed into something else - something more important. Something deeper.

Back then, I recorded the following words:

“I’ve grown very much attached to the weekly routine of getting my thoughts down to explain how the College or indeed myself, may have been shaped by the events of that week, and have tried to stay as honest as possible about my thoughts and feelings, whether they be happy and positive ones, or rather more bleak and pessimistic. Most importantly for me, however, writing my weekly blog is a source of catharsis, and, along with running, something which enables me to try and make sense of it all. Professionally, it gives me the best chance of maintaining my composure in a role which requires it as a fundamental skill.”

I guess then, with a return to doing this, now that I’m starting to make sense of what has been a rather momentous year in my life, and now that I feel ready to do so. Archie turned one a week or so ago - it seems like the right time to get back to it.

If I’m being honest, I’ve missed it during my hiatus. I’ve missed the ability to rationalise my thoughts in this format, to take the time to consider how I’ve been feeling over the past twelve months, to consider what has gone well, and what maybe could have gone better. To take time for myself to just stop and think.

So that’s what I intend to do with this piece, and as I write a new blog every week.

Firstly, it seems pertinent to explain my new setting as Headteacher.

Egerton-Rothesay school is unique, but I guess every school says that.

I genuinely think, however, that you would have to go a very long way to find a school more unique.

The students who come here make it an incredibly special place. One of the most abiding phrases I started to incorporate into the last year is that ‘If you’ve met one of our pupils…you’ve met one of our them.’

They are as ‘one of a kind’ as the school is.

They are all incredibly different in so many ways, with a range of needs, and some very complex within that, but they share a universal approach to school life while here which made me feel very much at home, almost instantly.

It is an overwhelmingly supportive and encouraging community where each and every student is valued for who they are, rewarded on their merits, and motivated to be the very best they can be.

The staff are also incredibly special.

They have engaged with me from the start, and have wanted to support the ambitious programme of change which we have been aiming for, providing honest thoughts in surveys to inform change, providing their thoughts transparently in pulse readings, submitting ideas which have stimulated further positive momentum and unfailingly going above and beyond to make the school a more encouraging environment for the students we have.

Our young people love being at ERS and the staff are a major part of that.

I was happy to welcome a couple of visitors to ERS this week. At a point in the day, in most schools, which would be a time of chaos - lunchtime - they both commented on how calm, happy and warm the environment was. These three words sum up very well what life at ERS is like.

One big thanks I should give is in having been so warmly welcomed into this community - by staff and by students. It felt very much like home very quickly, and once the school has you close, it tends to give you a very warm glow - a feeling that you really are doing an incredible amount of good with children who need it most.

Making the move to a fully specialist school could have been seen as a rather daunting one, but it actually came quite naturally to me, probably because it reignited something within me: the question of why I got into teaching in the first place.

And that has and always will be met with the same answer: to help provide opportunities for those most in need of them.

ERS offers a calm, safe, and supportive environment for pupils with a wide range of additional needs. These include Speech, Language and Communication needs, Autistic Spectrum Conditions, ADHD, Dyslexia, Developmental Coordination Disorder, Dyscalculia, Dysgraphia, and Social, Emotional and Mental Health (SEMH) difficulties. 

We work to ensure that each child is encouraged to achieve their individual highest potential.  We want each individual to be valued for who they are, and we want each member of our community to fully respect and be respected by others. ERS, therefore, aims to provide an environment where learning can flourish, enabled by excellent teaching and care.

To be part of that every day is special - it is a privilege - and it is immensely fulfilling.

I will seek to provide a weekly insight into this each week. 

As a side issue, from time to time, I’ll also discuss things in my life away from school.  I’m running a marathon in Frankfurt on October 25th - my second - and I have a clear target in mind following a summer of consistent training and gradual build up. It’s been an important hobby of mine - it keeps me fit, sound of mind and sound of body. Running has increasingly become an important part of my life.

I closed that 75th blog with some thoughts:

“Without my regular runs, I feel stodgy, irritable and unhappy with myself for not having made the effort. I guess, in a rather similar way, blogging is my intellectual workout, and I know that I’d be far worse off without it.”

I’m going to make a commitment to bring the weekly blog back - because I know it will make me better at my job, better at home and feeling better about myself.

It also represents a chance to ‘unplug’ myself, reflect and then reconnect with a renewed sense of vigour - and we all need time to do that sometimes.