“Our school is a crucible. Learning here is inevitable and irresistible. We are different elements that interact, creating something new as a result. Sometimes we are consumed in the reaction; sometimes we become something new. Either way we will add something new to the world around us - something the world will be a little bit better off because of.”

100Voices school prospectus

Notes

We meet here, in this space, not because we always have done, or because it is expedient to do so, or because it’s ours, or because it has a wonderful sense of light with breath-taking views whichever way we look, or because there are enough chairs so we can all sit down (although all these things are true), but because we know what will happen when we all get together: special things; magic.

We know from experience what happens when we struggle together towards something that we all really care a lot about. The heat is intense; things fizz and bubble. We know that we will become something new and that we will be adding something new to the world - something we believe the world will be a little bit better off because of.

It wasn’t always like this

Before this there was that. And we can now see that that wasn’t much to write home about. We were all so compliant and dutiful and cautious and deferent, pushing our impulses down, out and away as we sought to satisfy insatiable entities which had done nothing to earn our respect. Not any more.

Visitors call us subversive. We do kind of like this, but our response is always the same: to us it is natural, and obvious, and we genuinely can’t understand why it’s not like this everywhere. And we are not being disingenuous when we say this.

Inbuilt mega-schism

We stand at a threshold. We can look forwards and we can turn and look backwards. We find ourselves doing both, though the backwards glance is only ever confirmatory now. It steels us. We know how we want to be with our young people; we know how we want to use the precious time we spend together. It has been hard and we do wobble, but while we find ourselves looking back, there is no way we can ever envisage going back.

If there are some at the threshold who just want to be there for the energy, we will come over and say hi. We will offer a hand (and gently tug).

If others want to peer over the line just to see before returning home we do understand why that might be.

And if other others want to stay where they are, then fine.

But not for us. We have crossed the threshold and we only look back to check we have left footprints.