Message from the Governors

Discussion of the children's schools in the UK.
CBetts
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Message from the Governors

Postby CBetts » Mon Apr 10, 2006 10:49 am

The Governors have asked me to post the following message:

"A message from the Governors

At the request of ET & JC, we are posting this apology on this message board. Early last week two former pupils wrote a private and confidential letter to the two named governors who are managing the reconciliation process. In an attempt to establish more information, one of the receiving governors showed the letter to a former governor asking how these things could have taken place. This was a breach of the confidentiality requested and led to distress within the complainants? families. The Governors apologise profusely for this error and have reviewed their procedures. In future, only the two named Governors and the Governor overseeing the reconciliation procedure will be privy to correspondence. The two complainants have received a personal apology from the Governor concerned and this message is being posted at their request. "

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a different guest
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Postby a different guest » Mon Apr 10, 2006 11:53 am

distress


"distress" ? well that is one way of putting it. :|

In future, only the two named Governors and the Governor overseeing the reconciliation procedure will be privy to correspondence.


How novel, ONLY the addressees of corresponence marked 'Private and confidential' will read aforesaid correspondence. (insert scarcasm smilie)


The Governors apologise profusely for this error


"error" ??? *taps foot*

OK, I will stop stirring, the letter writers harmed have accepted your apologies.

Still, I cannot help but say the conduct of the Govenors was appalling and inexcusable.

They should be sacked.
Relatives with long-term involvement in the SES / SOP/ SoEP

Matthew
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PR & proffesionalism...or lack of it

Postby Matthew » Mon Apr 10, 2006 12:12 pm

CBetts wrote:In future, only the two named Governors and the Governor overseeing the reconciliation procedure will be privy to correspondence.

Who is this other ?Governor overseeing the reconciliation procedure?? That?s the first mention of this.
Why are they only announcing this now, as a part of this statement?
Why are Mary Pickering and John Story named, but this other mysterious Governor is not?
Perhaps this should also be included in their ?review of procedures?? :?

Whilst this apology is welcome, they have yet again succeeded in creating further mystery and confusion. Talk about PR!

Alban
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Postby Alban » Mon Apr 10, 2006 5:07 pm

I agree - who is the Third Gov and why isn't his / her name mentioned. How do they expect us to write to them if we don't know who we're writting to.

Anyway, I'm glad that they have posted the appology for two reasons. Firstly because it is the right thing to do and an admission that they screwed up, and secondly because they are slowly coming around to realising that if they want to say anything, this is the best place to say it. Communicate directly with your audience and it is amazing what can be achieved.

Having said that, I do wonder if they would have posted up here if JC and ET hadn't forced them to do it. Well done guys.

Alban

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ET
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Postby ET » Mon Apr 10, 2006 6:17 pm

Alban wrote:Having said that, I do wonder if they would have posted up here if JC and ET hadn't forced them to do it. Well done guys.


There was no force involved. In the reply to the initial e-mail apology we received, we suggested that a post on here might be a good idea - there was no pressure put on them to do so. It is worth mentioning that we were sent a copy of the message before it was posted, and when we asked for a very small thing to be changed (simply to protect our anonymity) it was done without question.

I have not changed my opinion about the way the governors are handling this post-inquiry time, and I still think that they need to take note of what we said in our letters about accountability and acknowledgement of past abuse, and also take action. I have made sure to say this in a second e-mail to them today. The breach of confidentiality still remains unacceptable, but I believe that it will not happen again.

The positive consequences of the e-mail correspondence that has sprung up from this unacceptable event are that we have seen a more personal and human side to one member of the governing body, and, vice versa, they have seen a more human side to us, the "hardened activists". This can only be a good thing.
Pupil at St James Girl's School from 1979-1989, from age 4-14. Parents ex-members of SES.

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ET
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Postby ET » Mon Apr 10, 2006 6:19 pm

Having said all that, we have also been confused by the need to keep this third overseeing governor's name a secret.

It seems odd.
Pupil at St James Girl's School from 1979-1989, from age 4-14. Parents ex-members of SES.

Matthew
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Further breaches of confidentiality

Postby Matthew » Mon Apr 10, 2006 6:48 pm

ET wrote:Having said all that, we have also been confused by the need to keep this third overseeing governor's name a secret.

It seems odd.

So not only is this third governor unnamed, but he/she also has access to all our replies. On top of this, governors Story & Pickering make no mention of any of this in their original letter, which reads ?Please mark any correspondence as private and confidential and address it to either (or both) of us.?

I?ll leave it to everyone else to judge how they feel this whole matter is being handled.

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bonsai
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Re: Further breaches of confidentiality

Postby bonsai » Mon Apr 10, 2006 8:22 pm

Matthew wrote:I?ll leave it to everyone else to judge how they feel this whole matter is being handled.


It's stating the obvious but the governors seem to be struggling with it: Transparency would be an improvement and something that could begin to establish a little bit of trust.

That and a few less mistakes.

Bonsai

BoeingDriver
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Postby BoeingDriver » Mon Apr 10, 2006 10:35 pm

Bonsai;

You are right, it is obvious.

But what is becoming more and more apparent is that despite the protestations of a few that the governors, SEoS et all are becoming more transparent, they in fact appear to have absolutely no intentions of becoming so.

The 'mystery 3rd governor' is no more than a shabby attempt to put off people with valid grounds for comment and/or complaint from doing so.

The same old, same old "very few people responded, most of those who did were the 'hardened activists' (and as such their credibility is in doubt so they have been discounted) therefore the perception is that there is no need for any further action on our part as there is no perceivable problem" head in the sand attitude.

Or am I just being overly cynical?

What they fail to realise is that whilst it may (and I for one hope it doesn't) take the heat off them in the short term, it will ultimately come back and bite them on their collective arses big time at some time in the not to distant future.

What was a relatively small scrub fire that could have easily been put out is still smouldering and has the potential to erupt in to a major and potentially uncontrollable forest fire sweeping through all that gets in its way with devastating effect.

When this happens, the governors and the unrepentant 'former abusers' (those named on this BB and those who have escaped naming) will have no one to blame but themselves.

As has been said on this BB on numerous occassions, very few, if any, of the people who suffered during their time at St. Vedast or St. James want to see the present day schools harmed. They just want to be sure that all vestages of the dark past are gone from the schools, that they are indeed the 'happy and loving' places they are purported to be, and not the "happy and loving' places they were 10 or 20 or 30 years ago.

They want justice to be seen to be done, and a few heart-felt apologies from a few people who must surely know full well who they are might just be what is called for.

That, to me, does not seem to be at all unreasonable.

It is a reasonable expectation from a group of mostly extremely reasonable people!!!!!!

It is well past time for the 'establishment' to stop hiding behind their cloak of secrecy and their smoke and mirrors and to front up honestly and fully to their responsibilities.

sugarloaf
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Postby sugarloaf » Mon Apr 10, 2006 11:45 pm

boeing driver wrote
It is well past time for the 'establishment' to stop hiding behind their cloak of secrecy and their smoke and mirrors and to front up honestly and fully to their responsibilities.

Absolutely.

And for me that includes the SES as well as St james. Any talk of acknowledgement, apology or reform coming from the SES is utterly meaningless while Debenham remains the chair of trustees of the (SES run) Education Rennaissance Trust - the man fully responsible for overseeing well over a decade of abuse in his school.... and still running an educational charity whose aim is to spread the St james model of education worldwide.....? :crazyeyes:

His silence speaks volumes in terms of the SES' attitude and current position. The findings of the Townend inquiry would surely result in his instant removal - if they were living in the real world. Just yet more proof - as if any one needs it - that they really havent changed.

Perhaps the SES and St james should peek out from under their cloak and have a look at how the rest of us do it. As a start it wouldnt do any harm to have a look at the accepted principles that paid public officials are expected to work to:

Selflessness
Integrity
Objectivity
Openness
Honesty
Leadership

Or perhaps these come into conflict with the teachings of the SES?

<sigh> sooner or later they'll wake up to that fact that the mess theyve created over the past 30 years just isnt going to go away unless they actually DO something about it....

sugarloaf
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Postby sugarloaf » Tue Apr 11, 2006 12:00 am

I can see why its dificult for them - Ultimately it means facing up to the realisation that Leon Maclarens beliefs, teachings and actions were the root cause of the systematic mistreatment of children - and adults - and destroyed scores if not hundreds of families and relationships.

They really have their own reconcilliation process to go through.

If I can help with this process in any way - just PM me (and mark your email "private and confidential")

(Apologies to Pickering and Story - cheap gag - but you really do deserve it)

And perhaps its about the right time to appoint some governors that can actually do their job.... go on St james - rise to the challenge - do what's best for the school, not the SES hierarchy.

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bonsai
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Postby bonsai » Tue Apr 11, 2006 8:41 am

sugarloaf wrote:They really have their own reconcilliation process to go through.


All the more reason for outside independent "proffesionals" to lead the reconciliation process.

Bonsai

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Ben W
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Message to CBetts

Postby Ben W » Tue Apr 11, 2006 10:19 am

To Christine Betts

I understand you are a lawyer at VW, and assume you are acting for the current governors in some capacity.

Please can you pass on the following message to Mary Pickering and John Story.

Kind regards,
Ben


Dear Mary and John,

I do not envy your current predicament. Thank you for posting an apology here - I believe it is a step in the right direction.

I have no personal knowledge of either of you nor of the process you are following. Therefore the following may miss the mark.

I suspect that you have not had any governorship experiences to prepare you for what you are currently facing.

I would like to make an open and friendly suggestion that you take immediate steps to find people outside SES who have in depth governance experience and engage them directly and independently (i.e. without any SES input) to support you in terms of understanding your personal responsibilities, rights, obligations etc.

I also echo the requests on this bulletin board that you name the third governor who is overseeing the reconciliation process.

Best wishes,
Ben
Child member of SES from around 1967 to around 1977; Strongly involved in Sunday Schools ; Five brothers and sisters went to ST V and St J in the worst years

Free
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Postby Free » Tue Apr 11, 2006 2:28 pm

<delete>
Last edited by Free on Wed Oct 05, 2011 10:19 pm, edited 2 times in total.

Alban
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Postby Alban » Tue Apr 11, 2006 9:44 pm

There was an interesting story on the beeb website today:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4879160.stm

Basically, it is saying that the internet has come of age in that it now has the power to challenge big businesses that have traditionally hid behind a blanket of PR.

This is exactly the predicament that the current SES leaders are facing. Unlike in 1983 when a number of Evening Standard articles and The Secret Cult were published, they are now being forced to become acountable to the general public....

....good

...it's about time!

It is obvious from their language that they don't like it when they use expressions like "faceless" and "anonymous" and "hardened activists". They're too used to sitting in the tutor's chair and being extended a certain amount of authority, but on here they would just be another voice. What's more they would need to believe that their philosophy could stand up to public scrutiny...maybe that's why they (or their friends and family) disappear almost as soon as they've arrived.

Maybe the govs could read the article and take note. They will get a lot further if they embrace this board rather than fight it.

Alban


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