“If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.”
Martin Luther King, Jr.
GCSE results day began with somewhat of a shock today.
Not because of the results for our students – we received and processed those yesterday – and we’re very pleased with the efforts of all of them.
The surprise was that our first student to collect their results was Ilyas. As the time ticked to 8.30am precisely, he was ready and waiting. This was a student for whom punctuality has been elusive since the day he joined us.
Why the surprise?
Perpetually late to his first lesson of the day because of traffic or oversleeping or whatever excuse he could muster, this slipshod approach spilled into the formal exam period, often far too close to the exam cut-off time for comfort.
So to see the precocious young man striding in expectantly as promptly as he did this morning was a pleasant surprise.
To observe the bashful sense of glee on his face was another pleasant revelation from someone usually so cagey.
I can only imagine the position he was in last year.
Having attended a large secondary academy, he emerged with middling to poor grades:
English Language English Literature Mathematics Biology Chemistry Physics Geography Religious Studies Design & Technology
3 2 5 4 5 5 1 3 5
For a student who possesses a great deal of potential, such results would have been extremely difficult to deal with for his parents, the staff who had supported him and, of course, for himself. I know it would have been accompanied by a profound sense of hopelessness. The trauma which punctuated the following days and weeks would have been palpable
I know this because when the student came to us at the start of September, head bowed and demeanour abashed, he required a great deal of picking up. All students who have encountered such setbacks do.
But this is a particular speciality of the College
Grasping firmly to an attitude that no situation is irredeemable, we seek to turn pessimism to optimism, and do so quickly.