THE hunt is on for someone new to take the helm at a top York school after its current head is set to retire.

The head of Bootham School has announced his retirement in a letter to parents today.

Chris Jeffery told of his “very mixed feelings” at sharing the news that he would be retiring from teaching at the end of the 2022-23 academic year, which is also the school’s bicentenary year.

He said: “It has been a genuine privilege to have been trusted to lead Bootham since 2016 and to have seen it safely and successfully through some unforeseeable and particularly testing times.”

Chairman of Governors, David Stanton said: “Chris has been an outstanding head of Bootham.

"It is fitting that his leadership should be acknowledged in our very latest inspection report with a rating of excellent for both pupils’ achievement and personal development.

"The whole Bootham community wish him all the very best for long and fruitful further endeavours when retirement from teaching eventually comes in August next year.”

 

York Press:

 

Mr Jeffery, who is a graduate of the University of York and worked as a singer and songwriter based at St Michael-le-Belfry Church in the city before going into teaching, will have been a head teacher for more than 18½ years by the time he retires, having led The Grange School in Northwich, Cheshire before returning to York.

In his letter he acknowledged that he was aware that, while a change of school leadership “has the possibility to be unsettling, I cannot think of another school where the embedded values are as strong, as well understood and as enduring; and thus where the continuity of all that really matters most about the education is more assured, whatever might change in the short term.”

He concluded by thanking the parents “for all the support that I and the Bootham Community have received from so very many of you in my tenure here, and I look forward to the rest of my time at this wonderful school.”

The governors have now embarked on their preparations for the search for a new head.

As The Press reported on Tuesday (March 8), the school is celebrating after being awarded the highest rating in their latest inspection.

Bootham School was found to be fully compliant with all aspects of the Independent Schools’ Regulations and the National Minimum Standards for boarding.

It received an ‘excellent’ rating for both of the qualitative categories: "Academic and other achievements of pupils’ and ‘Personal Development of pupils’; that is the highest judgement available to independent schools.