Forces of nature
Proper boarding, gleaming pastoral care and the kind of leadership admired in a gentleman officer are top of the agenda for many prospective military families.
WHEN a Russian oligarch ‘choppered’ into Shrewsbury School to have an introductory lunch with his son’s housemaster, he was alarmed to discover that he was a retired army officer. ‘He politely asked what on earth a soldier was doing as a housemaster,’ remembers Charles Bonas of Bonas Macfarlane, which places children into leading schools and universities. ‘After all, the Russian communists had any remaining gentleman soldiers shot or sent to Siberia long ago and the Red Army was not celebrated for gently nurturing teenagers.
Whether soldiers or pupils, the more time you invest in them, the more you get back
‘We spent the rest of lunch discussing the civility of being commissioned into the British army, disabusing the father of any notion that he had delegated parental authority to a battle-hardened thug.’ For parents in the British Armed Forces, of course, a former military man in charge is a reassuring credential; an understanding of military life is often deemed more valuable than the most generous of financial assistance offered to serving parents who opt for the boarding route. After 10 years as an officer with the Queen’s Royal Hussars, Richard Penny switched to education and is now a housemaster at Cheltenham College. ‘I went from a cavalry regiment and deployment in Afghanistan to teaching in an all-girls school, so to my military friends that was out of the frying pan and into the fire,’ he laughs. Mr Penny swiftly realised that coaxing teenagers through their education and leading soldiers in the heat of battle drew on some similar reserves. ‘In both, I think getting to know people is really important, as is having a sense of humour,’ he says. ‘And whether they’re soldiers or pupils, the more time you invest in them, the more you get back.’ He is among half a dozen members of staff at Cheltenham College to have served in Armed Forces. The pupils are regularly reminded of the school’s rich military heritage, with memorials and archive material celebrating the 6,000 Old Cheltonians who served in times of war, including the 14 who were awarded the Victoria Cross. ‘It’s useful for those [forces] parents to know that there are people who speak their language,’ says Mr Penny. ‘I suppose they know that we’re calm under fire— they trust us to look after their kids.’
Forces parents know we’re calm under fire –they trust us to look after their kids
The first question prospective parents in the forces ask is ‘what does full boarding look like here?’, says Cheltenham College headmistress Nicola Huggett of those anxious that their children will be left rattling around on a Saturday night. ‘We’re still in the traditional mould of having Saturday-morning school, with activities and sport in the afternoon and a lot of social events. We aren’t an emptyingout-at-the-weekend kind of place.’ By the final two years at Sandroyd prep school in Wiltshire, all children are expected to be full boarders, which, says headmaster Alastair Speers, is attractive to those based further afield. ‘If families are based in Scotland, London or overseas, they want to be able to leave their child here on a Sunday and for a significant number of their friends to be here, too. But, also, if they’re posted to [nearby] Bovington Camp, they want to be able to pick them up on Sundays, so we have a flexible model that allows for that,’ he explains. ‘I’m quite clear with parents that we try to re-create what happens at home at the weekends,’ adds Mr Speers, steering clear of endless paintballing and Laser Quest trips. With 500 acres of Wiltshire countryside to hand, den building, cycling and riding are more likely to be on the agenda, before refuelling with a Sunday roast. As a military child himself, Mr Speers remembers school as his one consistent home, his parents having moved house four or five times when he was between the ages of seven and 18. ‘The fact that I’ve gone through the process —as have two of our house parents—is a bonus. We can understand the issues and help resolve them,’ he points out. Small class sizes and tutor groups are the secret to the long tradition of nurturing military children at St Lawrence College in Kent, particularly those of Gurkhas, with its proximity to the regiment’s Folkestone barracks. ‘Everybody knows each other here and I think that makes a huge difference for a service family if you’ve been bobbing around from place to place and you want that sense of structure and continuity,’ notes the headmaster, Barney Durrant. ‘There have certainly been individuals in my care [during my career] who have looked as if the world is on their shoulders when their parents have been overseas in Iraq or Afghanistan.’ He elaborates: ‘I think one of the key elements of a really good boarding school is that every individual is well known, so even
small changes within their demeanour can be picked up on really quickly.’ For anyone, finding the right school can be like solving a logistical Rubik’s cube; being near family is important, as are road and rail connections, which is when somewhere such as Clifton College, neatly positioned near the M4/M5 intersection and Bristol airport, has pulling power. As Nick Gregory, headmaster at Wycliffe College in Gloucester says, a co-educational school such as his—where parents on active service pay only 10% of the full fees and which takes children aged three to 18—works for families hoping to have all their children in one place, to save having to tour the country when they’re back on home turf. Such schools are much sought after—33% of Mr Gregory’s boarders are from military families. It is, however, a school’s carefully crafted character—which is often well reflected in its Combined Cadet Force (CCF) programme where leadership, self-reliance, endurance and perseverance reign supreme—that can clinch the choice of school for military parents. At Cheltenham College, where the motto is Labor omnia vincit (‘Work conquers all’), ‘servant leadership’ are the buzz words, mirroring Sandhurst’s motto ‘Serve to Lead’. ‘Our parents and pupils are rounded and grounded,’ says Mr Penny. ‘I have as many Passats as Range Rovers in the car park—we’re not a flash school. Service, effort and manners are all the currencies that are important here.’