New Year: new beginning

"So, it looks like GEMS will be the new owners of Bolitho School. The link to this blog has been removed from the Bolitho Forum site, presumably because of the negative articles quoted from, here.
In the end the place we send our children to, has to meet certain standards. We put our trust in a school and often only find out things have gone wrong when it is too late. We tend to believe in what the school's leaders say i.e. the Headmaster.

This 'believability' depends in part on the character, experience and integrity of the Head - as well as the board of Governors. I do not know Mark Shere very well, in fact, hardly at all. we both went to Keele, but at different times. He seems a fine man, an honest man - but he is new. To some extent he is a victim of circumstances and, unfortunately, things he has said in the past mean that his reassurances now may lack a certain reliability.


In September 09 he said:

"Being new has its advantages in that I can see things relatively clearly, and over the last few weeks have been working with a number of people to guarantee that the School will never again go through the uncertainties that it has suffered over the last year. Please be assured that I and a number of Governors are putting in place measures for the beginning of term that will not only halt such insecurities but will make the School continue to give such a quality of education to its pupils"

He also said:
"The School will be open as usual on Thursday, and will continue to do so as long as children want to be here. That is my personal guarantee."


That was so nearly not the case. The measures 'put in place' did nothing for the insecurities - but the introduction of GEMS will certainly provide the finances.
Whether that will make some staff and some parents less secure, only time will tell.



Throughout this blog I have shown you how GEMS have been doing at other schools and the effects being a partner with them can have. However they do have plenty of good results - otherwise they would not be the financial success they are now. I have made sure that all the quotations are sourced back to where I read them. I have urged people to read the quotations IN CONTEXT. I have published sections of Bolitho accounts, trawled through their website and checked numerous statements made to the press. It is somewhat disingenuous for the Head to say:

"doomster blogs which are very much misinformed"

when in fact THIS blog is well-informed and far more information has been given out here than Bolitho gave out to the paying parents. Think back to only a few days ago - parents had to read Facebook and other media to find out what was going on. What an organisation that lacked the wherewithal to contact the parents of the children that the school was supposed to be looking after!

Let us all hope they learn - as Mark Shere says they will - from their mistakes.

It is one thing to quote King George VI - but to actually live out (by lacking in communication) the poem the King quoted:

"So heart be still!
What need our human life to know
If God hath comprehension?

In all the dizzy strife of things
Both high and low,
God hideth his intention.""

(Minnie Louise Harkins 1875-1957)

GEM's success does not mean they have the 'soul' that Bolitho has, rightly, been proud of in these past years. Maybe there is no place in society for schools that offer that 'something special' that Bolitho offers UNLESS they also offer stunning examination results, financial efficiency, expert communication - all of which Bolitho plainly didn't.

Maybe 'caring', 'nurturing' and 'efficiency' are mutually exclusive. Looking at society as it has developed people have become less caring, less communicative (except behind anonymity) and less responsible.



Bolitho will survive - but not as the Bolitho I care about (and have cared about in previous times). I have done the very thorough research. I think I know what will happen to Bolitho and it is not for me. I can 'get' what Bolitho offers, elsewhere.


The 'specialness' of Bolitho will soon disappear.

I will not post here again unless something drastic happens. The information is here for all to see, to check and to carry out further research into.

Buy into Bolitho if you wish - but watch how it suddenly changes. Bolitho used to be about lighting a fire. Now, I fear, it will be about filling a bucket.




"Children require guidance and sympathy far more than instruction." - Annie Sullivan

Happy New Year - especially to the five people who emailed to 'thank me' for what I was doing here as, (their words) 'by showing us the other side we at least know that everything is not quite as rosy as we first thought'.

I leave you with:

So at the end of the day, it’s all about profits?

Sunny Varkey: “Surplus. Naturally. Everything else in the world is about profit. If you look at healthcare today, doctors will not come to you if you cannot pay them the money. So what is the big deal?”


Bolitho-Phoenix