Kingswood residential – an epilogue

It was a great privilege to be able to accompany the current year 6 children on their residential to Kingswood last week. I have known most of these children since they first entered Foundation and some for longer than that!

My greatest enjoyment has always been the time that I have been able to spend with children and not surprisingly they were full of questions about what I was now doing with my time, was I coming back, and would there be any more assemblies!

It was also an opportunity to spend time with some of the school staff, without the pressure for me, of what might be happening back at school and what the next budget prediction might look like! They continue to seek to provide the best for all the children in their care. We had fun, laughs and great banter with the children. I am very grateful to them for letting me come along.

I hope that I will continue to have opportunities to be involved in the life of the school again in the future. It remains a very special place to me, it was extremely strange not coming back after the holidays!

Over the time spent at Kingswood I tried to share a glimpse of what we were up to through this blog, but also through two other social media applications.

These exist under the name of Lighthouse synergy and can be found on both Twitter
 (@lighthousesyne1) and Instagram (lighthousesynergy). I will also be launching a Lighthouse synergy website in the next few weeks that will seek to promote and support my belief that education needs to be fully holistic. Balancing the demands of the academic with the essential focus on enabling individuals to discover their personal identity that is defined by their relationship with God.

The Lighthouse continues to be a very visible image of this essential aspect of personal development. But my belief that this can not be achieved by a school in isolation. The African saying that it takes a whole village to educate a child is so true. For me the relationship between the local church and the school has always been a significant aspect of this work. Partnerships are essential, hence the use of the word synergy, and there are so many opportunities for this style of true community working that can established.

What I sought to instil at St Johns, is the concept that knowledge without identity is not effective in enabling individuals to discover the potential that each of them has. My hope is that through Lighthouse Synergy, I will be able to work with others to facilitates distinctively Christian partnerships that can serve local schools and their communities to achieve this potential for all that our schools serve. 

Its early days in my exploration of this calling but as Martin Luther King said:

You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just to take the first step.

It’s time to share the concept of Lighthouse synergy and see if it can bring its light elsewhere.

Many thanks for all your encouragement and support over the years in enabling me to discover and develop this concept of Lighthouse Synergy.

St John’s was most certainly its birth place and I thoroughly enjoyed journeying with you all.

Mr Marshall