Mr Close, Ladies and Gentlemen, Girls

In 2009 the Board asked me to do a presentation on future trends in education as we had started looking at the next stage of school development. I began the presentation with a quote from Bob Dylan with which some of you will be familiar:

“There’s a battle outside and it’s ragin’. It’ll soon shake your windows and rattle your walls, for the times they are a changing”.

I looked at it a few weeks ago and didn’t know whether to shudder or laugh at the spooky aptness of that quote.

But the times have changed and will continue to do so and among all the things that we have learnt this year one of the most powerful is that change happens unexpectedly and that change forced upon us can also have positive effects that we could not have envisaged.

In this year when we have all had to reach to our inner resources, we have had to find courage and energy and hope. A source of inspiration has been you the students. You are amazing. Thank you for being yourselves, for being normal, for being thoughtful, courageous, compassionate, for your focus, for valuing laughter and fun and for your ability to get on with what had to be done; for your tolerance of room changes, trucks, noises, dust, mud, puddles, the nice toilets disappearing, the awful bell, losing lockers and common rooms, paths, doors sticking, windows that wouldn’t open and a gym where a ball could bounce where you least expected it to. And all the while many of you were dealing with disrupted lives at home. Thank you to those who have shown leadership – to the senior leaders and the clan leaders in particular, because you have ensured that we carried on, had fun, and that school spirit was alive and strong.

You have all learnt more about yourselves and your world this year than you would ever learn in a classroom, and more than you probably realise. It’s not been easy but you have shown the kind of determination, courage and perseverance that is not usually required. This will serve you well all of your lives.

There have been several prizegivings where I have talked about the importance of developing resilience and adaptability and creativity, to see themselves as part of a community, to be able to work through change and difficult situations. And these are also some of the things that I mention as being really useful in those metaphorical backpacks that I often refer to at the beginning of the year. The back pack of tools, behaviours and values that is carried everywhere and that will help you live your life well. This year we had to really dig into those backpacks. Suddenly those words had real meaning and we have all been tested.

The windows have indeed shaken and the walls have rattled. In fact they have done a lot more than rattle. Walls have come down and in more ways than the obvious.

This year, which began with hope, with plans, with a sense of moving on, has taught us that there are many ways walls can come down and many effects, expected and definitely unexpected.

We did not expect to have to relocate everyone in Te Koraha and to take down two buildings, but nor did we expect that as a result of having to create new spaces we would learn so much and move in our thinking.

I began this year in my beautiful office. By March I was with 16 others in what I referred to as the typing pool in the yet unopened Helen Kitson Function Centre (and what a stroke of luck it was having that just completed), and by June we had progressed to offices all over the campus, mine in the reformatted prefab along with the main office and other members of the senior management team. Working in an open plan situation in the Helen Kitson Centre, surrounded by the contents of the stationery cupboard, the school’s art works, printers and copiers, teaches you a lot. We all learnt more about each other and what we do and we developed a sense of camaraderie that was important. The same has continued in the new main office and other working areas around the school. I have found I know far more about what is going on. The students’ Monday morning trek to the office for nail polish remover has been enlightening!

Schools have traditionally been places with fairly rigid walls. Classroom walls, and invisible walls between staff and students, between subjects. This year has forced many of us, staff and students, to work in shared spaces, to work together, to learn together.

The staffroom, also known as the Helen Kitson Function Centre, has been a storage area and a space shared with students, and many staff, eating their lunch at one end, have enjoyed some of the Christian Living speakers. Only recently we were lucky enough to hear the legendary James, the Attitude speaker, and this week we were able to enjoy the junior speech contests. When I was working with Year 12s earlier this term I was acutely aware that the same staff on their lunch break had heard the same lesson at least four times – as a teacher it is an excellent experience, although sometimes a little unsettling, to know that others are seeing and hearing what you do. But we are a learning community, and by sharing spaces, by sharing learning, by seeing more of what goes on in all parts of the school, by opening the doors and moving some of the walls, we begin to break down territory issues. By more staff and students sharing spaces we create better relationships, new ideas, better understanding and a more effective community.

Amongst students there has sometimes been a perceived division between boarders and day girls. This year day girls have been on the boarders’ patch – for Maori lessons in the Sit, with the counsellor, at speech and drama, even some sessions in the Sky lounge. None of this is ideal and it is not forever but it has taught us that we can break down some of those divisions. Thank you boarders.

The new F block classrooms have proven popular, and point the way for the future in their use of glass and light, unlike those in Fergusson. Teachers and students can see into other rooms. They can spill out into the central space. This brings an unexpected sense of collegiality and sharing, something to build on when we look at future planning.

The demolition of Fergusson and the Hall opened the school up to the street and we have a new view of the school, a new perspective – and a very green one that has been well used for relaxing, playing sport, having fun. The feeling of space is good. The inner heart of the school is now far more visible to our community and this openness is reflected in other ways.

At the time of the earthquake I was hugely impressed by the number of girls who got stuck in and helped others – shovelling, baking, cleaning, delivering water. Recently as I have been reading the Year 13 profiles, the extent of this community involvement for this year level alone has been startling. Hours of community service are listed on many of these profiles and I know that pattern is replicated throughout the school. It is well documented that to do something for others is one of the most positive and beneficial things you can do and so many of you have demonstrated this. These actions helped you grow and move on.

This community focus wasn’t confined to the students; with the kitchen staff opening the kitchen to cook for St Johns in the two weeks after the earthquake, and everyone contributing to the amazing baking effort for Ronald McDonald House.

Our student body took on a new look when we reopened in March by welcoming around 45 students from other schools, including the 5 brave boys. We enjoyed the opportunity of having these students with us until their own schools reopened and the feedback we had from them and their parents was heartening, enabling us to see ourselves from someone else’s eyes as well as the chance for others to see us. I think it was hugely beneficial to our own students as well.

One very special relationship has begun this year and that is with The School of Music. Throughout the year we have been a home after school and on Saturdays to many music school teachers and students and it is a relationship that is working well for both of our communities.

More recently we welcomed some Year 10 students from Kamo High School in Whangarei. They stayed with our families and learnt first hand about the earthquake and its effects. The students from the low decile co-ed Northland school and the students from the private girls’ school in Christchurch found they had much in common and much to learn from each other - a valuable experience which we hope is the start of a new relationship. Walls of assumptions and stereotyping broke down. We now look forward to the return trip and our girls experiencing another part of New Zealand. It is rich learning indeed.

 I think we like our new openness to the community in all its facets.

Our focus throughout the year has been to continue to provide the Rangi experience. Some things, such as Drama and watersports have been compromised, but in much of the school life has continued with a surprising degree of normality. We had some spectacular successes in the classroom, in academic competitions such as ICAS in the Big Sing, at Polyfest, in Sheilah Winn – the one bright pure drama event of the year, on the sports field, especially running – and of course some disappointments, which I hope serve only to make us stronger and more determined. And we have laughed together, we have enjoyed bouncy castles, staff/student sports, some tough clan competition and all the things that add so much to the spirit of the school. This year this ability to have fun has been doubly important.

There is a saying – Ka mate to kainga tahi, ka ora te Kainga. (Good emerges from misfortune.) This has been one of 2011’s lessons for all of us.  It has shown that we can find strength, that we are there for each other, that we can face uncertainty and fear. That we are able to adapt and to reassess what is really important to us.

The future is exciting. We have learnt what we can do, personally, as learners and as a school community. We have taken some new steps. We have done what we never imagined we could do – or would have to do. This is an achievement never to be underestimated.  We can open up our spaces, we can move away from traditional buildings and rooms. But there are other walls we can move away from too. Walls that confine good process, that dictate relationships, that restrict creativity and engagement, walls of convention, walls that keep in and keep out. We are exploring new ways to deliver the programmes, new ways to mix year groups, mix people, new spaces and environments in which to move, to connect, to relate, to learn. But all that we do will be based on those foundations that can never be swamped by liquefaction, that have stood each of us in such good stead - the Rangi values, our sense of community, our traditions and heritage, our personal strength and the desire for everyone in this school, staff and students, to be able to be the best they can be in all facets of their lives. Always we aim to inspire, challenge and empower.

And - in an extraordinary year there have been some extraordinary people.

Some of our walls and some of our staff stood very firm and especially those of the Boarding House. It’s been a tough year for the boarding staff; caring for girls who are away from home. Night time shakes are interesting when you have 120 girls and I want to  pay tribute to the staff and the girls, who have supported one another so well.

We are losing this year a special staff member. Kathy Cron is tonight in Wellington receiving the Sir James Fletcher Award for outstanding contribution to Enterprise – a very fitting award. But it was a tough choice for Kathy for this is also her last day with us, as she leaves in a week for a new life in Canada, to be with two of her sons and their families. Kathy has been at Rangi Ruru since 1980 and she will leave such a gap. We wish her well.

This has been a year of uncertainty, of decisions and problem solving. It’s been a hard year to be on a School Board and I want to thank everyone on the Board for the huge number of hours, the extra meetings, the deliberations and the commitment they have all shown. Special thanks to those leaving the Board and particularly to Grant Close, who has stayed on long after he first said he would go, and as he said, after his daughters have left school, (and in fact I prematurely farewelled him a couple of prizegivings ago). Grant has been a rock for this school has given not just time but passion to the school. I’m glad that he is going to continue on an honorary basis.

And the staff – who have kept going in a truly professional manner, done what had to be done, adapted to new surroundings, smiled, taught, led, cared, carted furniture, gone so far beyond the ordinary so that we could be a haven of semi normality amidst the chaos and oasis of excellence. Many have been dealing with their own earthquake difficulties, but their professionalism and genuine passion for the girls and their learning has shone through. I cannot thank you enough.

And so, we are here in this new space to celebrate.  We are all here to celebrate with those who walk across the stage and with those whose achievements are recognised differently. But you all have so much to be proud of, this year in particular. You have grown, you have learnt real life lessons, you have shown strength you didn’t know you had, you have supported each other, encouraged each other, reached out to each other and to those beyond, you have affirmed each other. Your names are now recorded forever on the Fergusson doors as the girls of 2011. Know that you can shape your futures, that you can choose what you will do with next year and the years that follow. Walk tall and feel proud.