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Commem 2022 Ms Hannah Daniels speech
Friday, 10 June 2022
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Ms Daniels shared the following 'Staff Reflections on Queen's' at the Commemoration Service in May 2022. It is an absolute pleasure and delight to be here today to share with you the commemoration of The Queen’s School. The 14 years I taught at Queen’s are but a drop in the ocean of the 144 years of Queen’s history, but I treasure each one with great fondness. I didn’t quite manage the holy grail of being a pupil, teacher, and parent but Queen’s was on the shortlist of potential schools when I was 11. In the end my mother sent me to a rival school…no not that one (it was all boys then) but one nearer home. When I got the job at Queen’s I had spent 10 years living and teaching in London but wanted to move back up North to my roots. I think there were four other candidates at my interview, and one was an ex Queen’s pupil who was beautifully turned out with her hair in a sophisticated up do and wearing a highly tailored expensive looking suit. I rocked up having been on maternity leave sporting a crumpled dress, wild hair, and baby brain. I think many on the staff thought the Prada model would get the job but instead The Queen’s School got a short, slightly bonkers northerner who could pass for Dawn French’s sister but not quite as funny or rich. Queen’s is a special place, and I am not surprised that the in the recent inspection the school was awarded the top rating of ‘Excellent’ in all areas. This is not easily achieved, and the support staff, teachers, and senior leadership team work continually hard to ensure that Queen’s pupils receive an outstanding educational experience. I say this both as a teacher and a Queen’s parent and looking back on my time at Queen’s it’s been incredibly hard to pick a few moments to share with you what makes Queen’s so unique. I loved almost every minute of my 14 years at Queen’s and right from the start I got involved in the wider life of the school. Overseeing charity fundraising was hard work but also a joy. Thank you to all the staff over the years who agreed to join in when I have badgered them to sing in a karaoke show, perform in a talent show, have wet sponges thrown at them or did Just Dance for charity. Without the generosity of pupils, teachers, and parents we would not have raised what I estimate to be just under £100,000 for charity in my time at Queen’s. Appreciation to the chaps who joined in with Movember one year and faced a month of looking like rejects from the Village People whilst their tashes grew, and heartfelt apologies to those teachers who endured the ‘male teacher leg waxing’; I still feel guilt at making you do that more than 10 years on. If there was a fancy dress occasion to be celebrated you can guarantee I was at the centre of it. I now work for the Church in Wales in the St Asaph Diocese and sadly the options for dressing up in my new job are sadly lacking, although if I see the Bishop’s robes hanging around in the office I have been known to sneakily try them on, getting ever nearer to my goal of being the Vicar of Dibley. The educational experiences that Queen’s run are exceptional and thank you to everyone who let me accompany them on a school trip. I’ve had the pleasure of visiting Dublin on a number of occasions, Iceland, a couple of London musicals trips, Salamanca and Barcelona. These are truly special times as you get to know the staff well and it’s lovely to see the pupils away from the stress of school and see them in a different light. School residential trips are extremely hard work and I salute those of you who arrange them year after year alongside your teaching job and giving up your holidays to accompany the pupils. Believe me, you haven’t experienced airport stress until you have shepherded sixty pupils through security and got them safely on a plane and then returned with the correct 60 a week later. Whilst at Queen’s I loved being an honorary member of the music and drama departments. Music was my life when I was at school and so to have the chance of participating in these activities at Queen’s was always a pleasure. The performing arts are incredibly valuable to a school and the well-being of pupils, and I am so pleased that music groups and ensembles are now able to ring out once more from the music tower. It’s always a treat to hear the chamber choir and when I came to watch ‘Matilda’ last term I thought it was absolutely fantabulous. Once again, the teachers produce plays, musicals, and concerts alongside their main job of teaching, marking, and preparing pupils for exams without any extra time to do this – a remarkable achievement. My daughter Melody loved her involvement with the drama department and is now the culture editor of Cambridge student magazine ‘The Tab’. The pastoral staff do a truly amazing job at Queen’s. Nurturing a teenager to fulfil their potential in the 21st century is not an easy task. The demands of safely guiding them through social media, anxiety due to school pressures, and expectations from home and society mean that the pastoral staff are often helping pupils who are in crisis and have nowhere else to turn to ask for help. These teachers give way more hours to the pupils in their care than the job allocates and I am in awe of the tireless work they do to improve the lives of the pupils. The recent inspection report stated that ‘pupils are carefully nurtured by staff who are committed to supporting their welfare and development.’ Of course, my main passion whilst at Queen’s was teaching religious studies. It is such an important subject for the development of young minds because of its interdisciplinary nature which includes analytical and reasoning skills, social insight, theoretical knowledge, ethics, and philosophical thinking. When I first joined Queen’s there was only one pupil in my A level class and her other subjects were maths, further maths, and physics. These couldn’t be further away from my own skill set but we were drawn together in our interest in all things philosophical. She is now at Bath university and teaching: Uncertainty Quantification of Composite Structures with Defects using Multilevel Monte Carlo Simulations I have no idea what this means but I’m so proud to have had some input into Stef’s academic journey. I have to thank Dr Scherer for putting up with my sometimes mad RS schemes and plans for open mornings and school festivals. He accepted them all with good grace and was an amazing colleague for the 14 years I was at Queen’s. He is genuine, kind, intellectual, hard working and writes the most beautiful school reports you could ever hope to read. He works tirelessly for the pupils in his care and it was an absolute pleasure to work alongside him. There are things I don’t miss about teaching - the early mornings for one, but there are things l definitely miss - my Chester parking permit which is worth its weight in gold, the school lunches - I hate making a packed lunch, but most of all the wonderful pupils and the buzz of being around young people. I’ve just started a new job with the Diocese of St Asaph as the Children’s and Youth Officer having realised I miss working with young people too much, and I’m excited about all this will offer. I’m also relishing the opportunity of being a learner as Dw i'n dysgu siarad Cymraeg (I’m learning to speak Welsh) at Coleg Cambria. It’s so interesting being a pupil and sitting on the other side of the desk and I empathise with all of the pupils taking exams this summer as I am sitting a Welsh exam including speaking, reading, listening and writing. It’s fair to say I’m quite nervous and I need to do more revision! I want to thank my wonderful colleagues for making Queen’s what it is. Your professionalism and dedication in helping young people achieve their best is inspirational. The philosopher Aristotle talked about a concept of ‘eudaimonia’ – perfect human flourishing in accordance with the living out virtues such as courage, honesty, friendliness and this is what all the teachers and staff at Queen’s are working towards achieving with the pupils. The motto of the Diocese of St Asaph is Grow Faith, Bring Hope, Demonstrate Love, and this is based on a very famous passage in the Book of Corinthians in the New Testament. Despite being from a 2,000 year old text I think these values are as relevant today as they were when they were written. In all that you do strive to grow faith in yourself, bring hope to those around you and demonstrate love in your actions towards one another. I would hope that in turn I have worked with kindness and compassion, empathy and equity, honesty and integrity in all my dealings with pupils, parents and staff during my time at Queen’s. |