Head Master's Weekly Notes - 15th January 2016

This week’s assembly focussed on the remarkable career of the most influential musician of his era, David Bowie who passed away at 69 having lost his battle with cancer (and that of the wickedly versatile British actor, Alan Rickman who also passed away this week aged 69 from cancer). It was a celebratory occasion where we took time to reflect on how he influenced generation after generation with his music and style and was constantly changing, looking forward and moving forward. His career was defined by his relentless evolution and possibly revolution as he continued to challenge and change attitudes, both socially and culturally. The outpouring over the past few days is testimony of the impact Bowie has had on our lives – he will forever remain a part of British culture and form a part of our national identity. His music formed the soundtrack of many of our lives and we can all draw inspiration from many of them, in particular ‘Changes’, something we can all do to better ourselves and the lives of others and ‘Heroes’, we can all be heroes even if it is just for one day. Making a positive difference to a community and society can only be viewed as a good thing. It was interesting speaking to staff and students after the assembly on how Bowie had affected them and I was impressed at how the students articulated their responses and it was encouraging to see young people developing their own opinions – something I am very keen for them to do here at Sexey’s. Do discuss with your sons and/or daughters what’s going on in the world around them - encourage them to read the newspaper, watch the news, listen to the radio (Radio 4 is a family favourite), take an interest in current affairs and the political debate – those conversations around the dining table are vital in developing their intellectual curiosity and capital and will help them to engage with what is going on beyond the safety of our school gates. We also talked about how we should be keeping those New Year resolutions that we made with all the best intentions at the start of the year. Making resolutions is easy, but keeping them is the challenge.  I’m glad to say that I haven’t broken any of my resolutions (yet!) and if we all endeavour to keep them, then actually we have a chance of creating change.