Chronicle Summer 2023

9 ST EDWARD’S CHRONICLE

St Edward’s, Oxford is on fire – academic ambitions are at an all time high, but none of the school’s characteristic warmth and roundedness has been sacrificed in the pursuit.’ TALK EDUCATION

the Houses. Pupil voice is a really important part of our work in this area, because pupils know Teddies today better than anyone else. From September, we will have new committees for pupils to share their ideas about greater equality and more inclusion, and we’ll have a new equality plan with three new objectives published every year. We’re also working hard to increase the number of women on the teaching staff – it’s currently 38% – and in management positions. The management team is almost exactly 50:50, which is good, but we need that balance in the Departments and in the Houses too. I think those soft cues are really important for pupils’ attitudes – they probably make more triple this year. It is 150 years since the School moved to what were then turnip fields in Summertown from dilapidated buildings in central Oxford. How does Teddies connect with its North Oxford community today, and with the wider Oxford community? of a difference than anything we say. As we’ve said, it is an anniversary

In lots of ways! We don’t want any sense of separateness, because we want pupils to grow up here connected to the world beyond Teddies. That’s partly about opening up the School – whether that’s for a concert in the Olivier or a play in The North Wall, to host the Oxford Ceramics Fair or to allow sports clubs like the Oxfordshire Bulls to use our facilities, or to provide a venue for conferences like the Youth In Mind event with Oxfordshire Youth. We’re also going to reconfigure the Lodge, so that the gates are open more of the time – it’s a small thing, but it will make the School feel more open. There are also visits to Teddies from pupils in local state schools all the time – for science workshops, Maths challenges, sports tournaments like the hockey event which we run every year together with Oxford Hawks. Just as important is getting pupils literally beyond Teddies – Teddies Collaborates sends all 180 of the Lower Sixth out into Oxford for 90 minutes every week for partnership work in local primary schools, care homes, food banks and charity

Head of Art Adam Hahn at work on the portrait of Felicia Skene