Above the security of the hull (built from the layers of ‘safety’, ‘connection’, ‘self-esteem’), rises the sail representing personal growth (stitched from the pieces ‘exploration’, ‘love’, and ‘purpose’). It was ‘purpose’, therefore, sitting at the pinnacle of the sail, that formed our final focal point, and it was one I had thought twice over. Afterall, how meaningfully can one expect a boy of this age to start feeling a sense of purpose to their life in the way we adults might talk of it? I fully subscribe to the notion of never underestimating what a child can connect to and begin to grapple with, but in this area I suspect many adults are still searching! And so we talked about downscaling; considering creating a purpose to a term, a week, or even a day; using goal-setting to motivate improvements in cricket technique, chess strategy, understanding a topic of work, memorising LAMDA lines, or whatever is motivating. This much, children of almost any age can start to do. 

Having said that many adults are likely still searching to connect with their sense of true purpose, those of us who interact with children regularly (and I include parents) have a fantastic advantage. We have the real privilege of being a present and active part of certain key moments in a child’s life, and there are few things more motivating and full of a sense of purpose. These moments take so many different forms in the Pilgrims’ age range, and they certainly stretch beyond the more obvious. In many ways, they can be moments created from a day-to-day situation by the way we adults respond to it: the mundane transformed to something memorable, elevating, reassuring or even inspiring... When you spend lots of time with children, there are so many chances for this alchemy.  

This week will have provided the backdrop for many such moments, largely unseen by the majority. However, it has also been a week of some very obvious examples of key moments. Those Year 8s who had prepared for Winchester Election and Winchester Entrance received their results on Tuesday and Thursday respectively. To be a part of that process is something I and other staff, I know, hold dear. It represents the end point of such a lot of effort, focus, stretch and good old hard work, and we congratulate and are so proud of all the boys who undertook these exams. And the same will be true of the Common Entrance boys who, it is crucial to acknowledge, continue their journey, nose to the grindstone, until after half-term.  

I have shared with a few parents and colleagues that when I was a Year 8 (then known as Senior A Block) at Pilgrims’, I didn’t properly connect with the fact I was leaving and moving on – with all that would make me feel – until, at the marquis tea after Prize Giving, I went to shake hands and say farewell to my housemaster and to the Deputy Head: and at that point, it hit me. They had, through hundreds and hundreds of moments over my time, been alchemists within my school journey. I’m sure I speak for them all when I say that, having the chance to nurture and guide our boys in the same way, and to know the impact it will have, is something that gives those of us who have the privilege of being with them that true sense of purpose. 

Tim Butcher
Headmaster