Dear Friends and Colleagues,

As is always the case, Christmas arrives all too soon. Even more so this year as I mark a significant change to working life – one that I promised in my letter last year. As I tried to create a sustainable future for the great partnership of schools I work with, the world changes around you in ways that you little expect. But in the words of Marvin Gaye, ‘A Change is Gonna Come’.

It’s not been a quiet year. Travel has been extensive and varied and not just about work. For the first time I think I’ve felt a bit weary now and again.

In 2001 I started my Kunskapsskolan journey when my good friend Lars Jonsson was appointed to one of the early schools in Kunskapsskolan at Enkoping. We had twinned our previous schools and it was natural that I moved Rivington and Blackrod as a twin school to Enkoping. In these early days we worked closely with the growing KED network through the International Networked Learning Community we built. We learned much about how coaching can improve performance and they took our log book. It was so good this week to go back to those roots and still find Lars and Lena Oden there – Lena being on the first exchange visit we ever did. I shall be eternally grateful to Lars for his global thinking and ambition.

As I travel this week and I retrace some of those steps, I get to 2007 when I was privileged to establish the Science Centre in Saltjobaden and then spend three years there as head of both the grundskola and gymnasiet. Thanks to Facebook, I can still see the fine young people they have become choosing every type of career you can imagine. With Anton and later Helena we assembled a team of great colleagues to create the highest achieving school in Sweden. But this was such a special and unique place that will live in my heart. Apart from the astronomy and use of the telescope, the amazing views over the archipelago, the trip we made with 20+ students to South Africa was a special memory.

So in 2010 I travelled back to the UK to help lead the development of Kunskapsskolan schools in the UK. We now have over 20 inspired schools and they have continued to excite my late professional life with their innovation and commitment to young people. Never has our school system been so restrictive and the environment so challenging, but fortunately there are exceptional professionals out there working to make things special for their students. Being able to play a small part in orchestrating this is a joy and privilege. Thank you all of you.

I can’t give you a full commentary but just to say innovation, curiosity, collaboration and challenge are alive and well in our partnership of schools.

This work has not only brought me a whole group of exceptional professionals to work with, many have become friends as well as colleagues sharing a common vision and mission for what they want this world to be. And thanks to the rich tapestry of Kunskapsskolan, this extends across the globe. The differences across this world bring a real cultural diversity that is to be celebrated, but when you do a job like mine you realise that young people are pretty much the same the world over. They have the same ambitions and the same anxieties. Just the context is different. And that’s one of the special things we are bringing to our schools. There is no more important time to enable students to understand the importance and joy and thinking internationally.

I could go on at length here but that would be to divert the purpose of this message at Christmas. I got my P45 today from KED; I’m a BREXIT casualty.  From January the 1^st I will be working with Prof. David Hopkins as co-director of the International Centre for Educational Leadership and School Improvement at the University of Bolton. I will remain an arm’s length Director of Education for KED UK and the partnership of schools will work alongside the centre. Although this may mean more time working from a home base, I hope to be continuing my strong relationship with schools in India, South Africa and the USA. That’s the international element of the new job. You may ask as I enter my 70^th year why? Well there is still the passion to make that difference for young people wherever they are.

But I can only sustain this with having such an amazing circle of friends and a tolerant and forgiving family. And this is time of the year, and for me the time of life to celebrate that and be thankful. Some of you have been with me for as long as I can remember. We often don’t see one another for months and in some cases years but I we know that when we are in need of anything – a call, a visit or post – we can depend on one another. You don’t need a list. You know who you are. And know I depend on you.

I intend that my 70th year will be full and any ‘bucket list’ well dented. I don’t intend to act my age. Not that this year has been uneventful. Everyone was delighted that I didn’t get my tickets to Glastonbury as their 50^th coinciding with my 70^th would have been epic. So after three weeks in Costa Rica in February, I’m planning some concerts and gigs to replace Glastonbury, some sort of European road trip, to walk the Hebridean Way  and perhaps a special week in Tuscany with friends and of course South Africa in October. I’m working on it.

So thank you everyone for this year, and if your photo isn’t above, then it’s not because you are any less special. Let’s make next year a chance to spend more time together be it work or pleasure.

Finally I’m sitting here waiting for the family to arrive for Christmas. The dynasty will grow by one more this January and we are all excited to meet Rachel’s new arrival. But the next few days will be full on with children, grandchildren, siblings and mother. And that’s how it should be. The noise and politics of life recede to be replaced by what holds me together, although I know how much I take it for granted.

There has been so much darkness, so little honesty and such acrimony over this year. It is so easy to despair at leadership in many places and from many directions. I don’t need to replay any of it. But on a day to day basis I meet such love and respect, such hope and ambition. So in this spirit of Christmas, let’s all work for more of that and hold those who fail to meet these standards to task. Right will always win through …eventually.

Lord Alfred Tennyson sums it up I think

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die…

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.

Merry Christmas and all my love  and best wishes.

John