The Head's Address at the End of Michaelmas Term 2023

December 19, 2023

The Cathedral was a riot of colour with the school community embracing Christmas jumper day, as the Head delivered his end of term address before pupils and staff alike departed for the festive break…

“The multilingual reading in this service from the start of St John’s gospel is one of my favourite Norwich School traditions. 'In the beginning was the Word' is a reading which is familiar to so many of us, but this simple twist allows it to seem fresh each year, while also reminding us of the multi-culturalism of our community. WoLLoW, the sector-leading languages programme pioneered here, is based on equal celebration of all languages and cultures, so it makes this annual reading an even better fit for us.


Advent and the build-up to Christmas itself is a time full of fun traditions, of course, and this strand of thinking brought to mind others for Norwich School:

  • the festive lighting of our amazing buildings from early December;
  • the presence in the Prefects nativity story of some reality-stretching detail, this year a world-weary 21st century Joseph and a simply massive baby Jesus. From Max Nicholls’ portrayal of the sleeping Christ-child, it was not immediately clear if there had just been a birth or a death. And that would have been a rather radical retelling;
  • the assistance by senior staff in the serving of Christmas lunch. This taps into other festivals where the established hierarchy is challenged: this stretched all the way back to the Roman festival of Saturnalia, but the sentiments are shared in later celebrations such as Twelfth Night and the Boy Bishop. Whenever I serve, I am always reminded of how hot and uncomfortable the conditions are; I do a token stint once a year and it makes me even more grateful to the staff who serve us so impeccably for hours each day throughout the year. If this is a time of year to give thanks, we should certainly give thanks to our amazing catering staff.
  • And to this list of traditions, the Chaplain might just have given us a new addition; the Christmas limerick. I have not often been referred to as a creature (at least not to my face), but I can see that it fits if you want to make rhymes around head teacher. Some have commented over the years that my dancing is indeed a feature. But not in a good way. Let us see whether the limerick tradition catches on…

So a blend of traditions and innovations, a chance to be creative and an opportunity to show gratitude. I am sure that you and your family will have your own Christmas traditions, but I encourage you to think about how you might give them a fresh twist this year, how you might interpret them in a fun and innovative way. And if not this, think about how else you might be creative and original this holiday.


Why? Well, I am long on record for saying that creativity is one of the key 21st century skills, particularly for your generation. As AI and automation become more prominent, this will be even more the case; many of these to be successful will be those who work out, probably in collaboration with others, how to deploy such technologies fruitfully. We will all need to be creative problem solvers.

I am no petrolhead but let’s explore this further through Formula 1’s high standards and embedded practice of innovation. For example, I know that Mr White uses pit stops as an exemplar of breaking down a process into constituent parts in order to maximise efficiency. The time taken by the best teams to change a full set of tyres is ridiculous, especially as it includes the need to fit the wheel nuts which allow the cars to travel of speeds up to 300km/h. They have up to 20 mechanics per car. The record for this season, held by McLaren for Lando Norris, was 1.8 seconds; just count 2 seconds in your head (1 Mississippi, 2 Mississippi) and think about car stopping, car up on jack, wheel guns on, 4 wheels off, wheel guns again, 4 wheels on, car down from jack. I think it is definitely taking more than 2 seconds for me even to describe it. And in a sport where hundredths and thousandths of a second matter, they are constantly being creative about how to improve it, make it faster, more reliable, use different equipment, and so on.


And then you consider design. If you follow F1, you will know that Max Verstappen won 18 out of 21 races for Red Bull in the most one-sided season ever. For me, the real star of the show is Adrian Newey, who designed the car. In a post-season interview, he described his influences, talking about an early interest in making his sketches into 3D models, gaining experience in a blend of theory and practice. Further, he described the importance of interdisciplinarity: his father was a vet who 'had a great interest in maths and engineering', while his mother's side of the family was 'very artistic'. For Newey, 'that's ultimately what you need - that combination of the creative, artistic side, measured with an engineering discipline and analytical side'. I like the way Newey joins science with artistic creativity here, exposing the false distinction that is sometimes cited between these two areas of activity.


Let me now come to the same point via a different route: Camus wrote, “Fiction is the lie through which we tell the truth”… “Fiction is the lie through which we tell the truth”. ie that while fiction, by definition, is not true, it is able to make observations and offer insights into the human condition and the world around us which resonate and provide assistance in the lives we lead.


For my example this time, I turn to the world of contemporary music and Taylor Swift, recently voted Time magazine’s person of the year. I am sure this award has been given in part for the record-breaking commercial success of her Eras tour and the rejection of a patriarchal music industry through her re-recording of early material. However, none of it would be possible if people did not choose to listen to her songs, and in ever larger numbers, too. Catchy tunes only get you so far. Part of her appeal must be because her songs resonate with people. One such song is Anti-Hero.

It a song which captures many of the challenges faced by young people today and there is one section which seems particularly acute:

‘Sometimes I feel like everybody is a sexy baby
And I'm a monster on the hill
Too big to hang out, slowly lurching toward your favorite city
Pierced through the heart, but never killed’


In 4 lines, Swift captures the insecurity we experience in our appearance, body image and friendships because of ongoing feelings of inferiority, often fuelled by unhelpful social media comparisons. For many, that description resonates; it is the lie through which we tell the truth.



So, creativity matters in two ways. Following Adrian Newey, being creative ourselves helps us to come up with innovative solutions to the problems we encounter, using experience from different parts of our lives. Using the example from Taylor Swift’s song, consuming the creativity of others allows us fresh perspective and insight into our lives and the world around us. Both seeing creativity and being creative ourselves are also great for our own wellbeing, as the wonderful staff exhibition in the Crypt this week has shown.

So this Christmas, think how you can be interdisciplinary, how you can make connections, how you can watch, read, make or sing something new. You never know; it might just become a tradition!

 

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“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?” (Matthew 6:25-27) There’s a saying that you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover. Years ago I met someone who doesn’t like that saying very much. That’s because his job is to design book covers. I watched him lead a really interesting seminar where he showed us some of his designs. He explained how his artwork was trying to sum up – on just one piece of laminated, folded paper - the message and themes of all the other pages in the book. Just occasionally, some book covers do this by choosing a key phrase from the book and putting it in large letters on the front. A famous example is Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell, where some editions had a cover that read: ‘Big Brother is Watching You’. If you know the story then you’ll recognise that as the sinister propaganda message that no-one can get away from. Some copies of the Lord of the Rings had printed on the front ‘One ring to rule them all’. And The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams had just two words on the cover of some editions – ‘DON’T PANIC’. It begins to make sense when you discover that some of the characters in the story are using a space travel guide (the Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy) which is designed to help you through any difficult situation. And what makes the guide so successful and popular is that its first principle is on the front cover. Whatever happens – DON’T PANIC. Have a look at the cover of your hymn book for a moment. What do you think? We’ve gone for a pretty classic look. The name of our school in gold embossed lettering, and the school crest complete with a motto in Latin for a classy finish. Sometimes I wonder – entirely hypothetically – how we might redesign the cover. If you were going to put a few words on the front, one essential message that everyone in the school was going to see at the beginning of every day, what would it be? Here are a few suggestions I got from people around the school, some more serious than others: · “Show Love” · “Shine Bright!” · “Treat others as you would like to be treated” · “Do some work in your study periods” · “Wake Up!” Actually, I think the words ‘DON’T PANIC’ might work here too. I hope you’re realising, now that we’re a few weeks into term, that panicking is never worth it – and if you’re tempted to panic then sharing your problem and talking to someone almost always helps. Maybe that would be good to remember at the start of the school day. This also reminds me of one of my favourite passages from the Bible, the words of Jesus we heard just now: “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? … Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?”  I’ve had times myself where those words from the Sermon on the Mount have given me some perspective. Perhaps part of that passage would work well on the front of our hymn books – that wouldn’t be a bad thing to keep remembering. We’re not about to reissue the school hymn books with a new cover any time soon. But there’s nothing stopping you imagining a message on the front of the hymn book – whatever you need that message to be. “Don’t panic.” “Do not worry.” “Show love.” Why not have a few helpful words in your mind’s eye every time you pick up these blue books in the morning?
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