November 2011 archive

The Young Ambassador, feather earrings and dinner – a winning combination

When I took up my role as President of the Girls’ Schools Association this year, I really wanted to ensure that I used the platform I was given in order to be able to achieve more than just a representation of the value of girls’ education. I say to the girls at school that they …

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Heads of Girls’ Schools: making a real world of difference

I returned yesterday from the annual Girls’ Schools Association which I was leading in my capacity as this year’s President, and I can report that it was an amazing occasion. The programme – based on the theme of ‘Making a World of Difference’ – was extremely full, packed with speakers who stimulated and challenged, and …

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Making a World of Difference: preparing for the annual conference of Heads of the Girls’ Schools Association

Monday marks the beginning of the annual conference of the Girls’ Schools Association, and therefore marks the nearing of the end of my year as President of the GSA. It has been an astonishingly stimulating year, and I shall reflect further on it as the year actually reaches its end, but before this, we have …

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Social media – the good news

Working with teenagers, a considerable amount of the educational discussion about social media focuses on the negative; the time-wasting, the distraction from study, the unhealthy preoccupation with a screen rather than more balanced fresh air and exercise, the reputational risk of posting unwise comments, and the dangers of cyber-bullying. These are all very real issues, …

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A terrifying experience at Tate Britain

It is not often that I am terrified by a work of art, but this would not be too strong a description of what happened to me last Friday. I was in London for a lunch time meeting connected with the Girls’ Schools Association, and because I was slightly early, I popped into Tate Britain …

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Change in the air … Australia is beckoning

I say to my girls at school often that they should make the very most of their lives, as they only have one life, and every moment of it is precious. When opportunities come along, they should be grasped and girls should not be afraid to move outside the comfortable zones in which their lives …

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Remembering the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month …

Today – Remembrance Day – people across the globe will pause for reflection at 11am on 11.11.11 – a poignant combination of figures on a poignant day. Every year in our school assembly around this time I talk about remembrance, and I firmly believe that it is quite right to do so – we should …

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More reflections on Bangladesh: Child Domestic Workers in Dhaka

When I see my Year 7 girls at school, aged 11 and 12, go past me into Assembly each morning, I am struck forcefully by the contrast with their counterparts at the centre for child domestic workers in Dhaka which I visited with Plan UK during my visit to Bangladesh two weeks ago. This centre …

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The fabulousness of girls’ schools!

I have just returned from the Independent Schools’ Show in Battersea, London, where I was speaking in the morning on the subject of ‘The benefits of single-sex education’. In the afternoon, I was on a ‘MyDaughter’ panel of Heads of girls’ schools, chaired by Sarah Ebner of Schoolgate, so I had a double dose of …

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What child marriage really means, and why we should do something about it

Before I travelled to Bangladesh, I knew that child marriage had been identified as a key issue in the country. According to UNICEF’s 2011 State of the World’s Children report, about a third of women in Bangladesh aged 20-24 are married by the age of 15, and 66% of girls will wed before their 18th …

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