Becoming Deputy Head

A blog by Ms Tamara McKenna, Deputy Head of Secondary

I came into teaching relatively late and have felt blessed, ever since, to have found a profession that I love.  What drew me to teaching in the first place was my belief in the importance of language and literature and a desire to support young people in their understanding and appreciation of this area of knowledge and in their development of skills that will serve them well for the rest of their lives.  And this brings me to the aspect of the Deputy Head role that worries me the most: my time in the classroom will be much reduced.  One of the biggest challenges for me, will be to maintain contact with our lovely students and not to forget, in the busy whirl of school administration, why I joined the profession in the first place.

However, the great opportunity this role presents is the chance to support the development of academic success across all areas of the secondary school.  My areas of responsibility will be for curriculum and assessment: what are the students learning, why are they learning it and how do we know they are getting any better?  We already have great academic successes to celebrate, but part of my job will be to consider how we maintain and improve these over the coming years.  Looking at how we communicate details of the curriculum and the progress your child is making, and to make sure we are doing this in a clear and informative way, is another important aspect of the role.

As well as helping students achieve academic success, I really enjoy being involved in the various opportunities that life in our busy school presents: from playing in music ensembles, running the Regents Race to visiting our community partners like Ban Mae Lid and the Bamboo School.  Each time I have taken on a new role at Regents, it has always been because I have felt ready to try something new and I am looking forward to playing my part in helping to make sure Regents continues to be the special place that it is.