Excellence, Opportunity, and Happiness – these are the words that groups of students, parents, prospective BGS families and staff most strongly associated with BGS when a survey was undertaken a few years ago. And these words keep coming to the fore in our everyday conversations and when inspectors survey the school during their visits.
Our motto, Hoc Age or ‘do it’, describes how we behave, our daily, grounded routine – get cracking, no nonsense, a very Yorkshire diet. Excellence, Opportunity, and Happiness speak to school identity and character, the things we notice when we elevate ourselves above routine and take in a wider perspective, a longer time frame.
I’m a straightforward sort of chap and intuitively get Excellence and Opportunity, and also Hoc Age. For me, it goes something like this: make the most of your opportunities by working hard and thus achieve excellence – bish, bash, bosh.
Happiness, however, is, for me, a more elusive quality.
Our alumni, Old Bradfordians, mainly old boys but some younger men and women too, tell me, with emotion at times, that they feel a change at BGS. They say it’s a much more inclusive, kinder, and happier place than it was. I hear this often. And it makes me proud, in part because deliberate changes have been made to make it so.
Very recently, an old boy, an alumnus who has gone on to live a successful life, working and living internationally, and mixing it with the great and good, wrote to us with the following personal reflection, which he is happy to share:
“I have always loved our school, am proud of it and could understand what it and my father were trying to achieve for me, even as a child. However, the school frightened me to death so much of the time … Even in the Scout Troop, for example, you received a belting if you couldn’t tie a reef knot behind your back! … activities such as school camp were scary too. I regret that, when looking back, there are literally only a handful of happy memories to recall.”
He goes on to say:
“Would I be where I am today without BGS?… I doubt it, but I sincerely believe my life may have been so different, far more rewarding, successful and happy, had there been a different foundation and an empathy to pupils in those years.”
Finally, he closes with this:
“Firstly, I would ask all the BGS staff to genuinely read between the lines when ‘reading their pupils’ and be aware! From what I see and read, this is now the policy … Secondly, strictly adhere to your three motivating objectives, but place HAPPINESS first. Happiness is the KEY. Without it there is nothing of substance.”
These are one man’s memories of course; however, his recollections chime with those of others. Times change, things move on, but his words provide a window into the experiences of some, not all, who have attended our school
Whilst happiness can be prized above all else, there is a nuance, a question that we might wish to explore. Does our school, any school for that matter, have a responsibility to make people happy? Should policies and explicit action be put in place to deliberately foster happiness? One famous old school has taught ‘happiness lessons.’ What about BGS?
Schools can provide opportunities to discover meaning and fulfilment; schools can establish high standards and help people to meet them to achieve excellence; and schools can provide pastoral support for those times when folk need a little extra help. But happiness, it could be argued, is something that human beings have to find for themselves.
In essence, schools can create the conditions, the opportunity for us all, students and staff alike, to be happy. But again, without wishing to sound too much like a stuck record, it is the individual who has to possess the capacity and propensity, the open mind and disposition, to convert this opportunity to be happy into actuality, to make it happen.
And sadly, not everyone will. And those who do find happiness, shouldn’t expect to be happy all the time – that’s unrealistic, and I’d say unhealthy too. Good mental health overall requires a little rough and smooth in life. As others say, it’s not about avoiding the storms when they gather, it’s about learning to dance in the rain.
As I told students in our assembly recently, my message to them, as a starter for further refection and discussion was: ‘don’t look to others to deliver happiness. Look to yourself, your beliefs, attitudes, and behaviours’. We can all dance in the rain and the shine – if we choose to.
“As others say, it’s not about avoiding the storms when they gather, it’s about learning to dance in the rain.”
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