Congratulations Miss Dodd!

Good Morning Everyone.

On Tuesday this week you received a letter from Tim Machin our Chair of Governors outlining school leadership arrangements from September 2024.

I am sure you will appreciate that professionally and personally I had nothing to do with the recruitment process. It would not have been appropriate. The process and decision making was entirely that of our Governing Body and representatives from the Trust.

I do however want to comment about the outcome…

I am absolutely DELIGHTED that Miss Dodd is going to be the new Heptonstall Head of School.

It was my pleasure back in 2013 to offer Miss Dodd her first ever teaching position. I remember that there was a particularly strong applicant pool for the job and we interviewed a number of quality candidates.

However once the panel had interviewed Miss Dodd it became clear that here was a young teacher full of spark and promise and it was decided to give her the teaching position–it was a decision that over the years has paid off in spades.

If I say so myself, one of my very best appointments in 25 years as a Head!

Thinking back to how young she seemed when she first started here it has been truly wonderful (in a professional but also in kind of a “paternal-like” way – we are a family after all!) to see how Miss Dodd has developed and grown personally and professionally over the years I have known her and she absolutely deserves this “step-up”.

I know she will be supported by all the staff here (just as I have been for the last 16 years) and will take Heptonstall School from strength to strength.

I have only known the new Executive head, Mrs Pether, since I began working with my colleagues across the Family of Learning Trust last July. On my visits since then to her school, Dean Field, I have been very impressed with the atmosphere and the behavior and manners of the children and the exciting learning that I have witnessed going on.

I am sure she will be a good fit for our school and also work very well with Miss Dodd.

When the time comes it is going very hard for me to leave all of this behind – after so many years it really becomes so personal. I am however really thrilled that I am leaving school in such capable and “Heptonstall” hands.

Congratulations Miss Dodd. I am so very proud of you.

Have a good weekend everyone.

Best wishes,

David Perrin