100 Not Out

“It has genuinely never felt like work,” admits Senior Master Richard Kimber, when asked to reflect on completing one hundred terms at LWC.

 

“I remember saying to one of the girls in Haygate, when I was Houseparent there, “Find a job that doesn’t feel like work and you’ll never struggle to get out of bed in the morning.”

 

Wise advice and somewhat ironic bearing in mind that Mr Kimber very nearly didn’t become a teacher – originally choosing a career that would have seen him venturing nowhere near the landlocked 1200.

 

“I finished my engineering degree and wanted to join the Royal Navy,” he explains. “I spent a year preparing for the Interview Board and passed it. I thought I was all set for the Navy, until my medical, when I failed an eyesight test.”

 

It was advice from his mother (a teacher of business studies) which led Richard into education.

 

“She told me to do something with my time, whilst I was thinking about what else I might want to consider as a career. So I went to do a year’s teacher training at the University of Bristol.”

 

The next part of the story features some true serendipity.

 

“I came to LWC one day for a look around. I had been and played fixtures here before, but I’d seen a job advertised here and had missed the deadline for applications. My mother suggested that I contact them anyway, and then they would have my name on file if something else came up.

 

“When I arrived here, I saw a portrait of the headmaster and thought he looked familiar. When I walked into his office, we started talking about how I interviewed for the Royal Navy on the day we went to war in the Gulf. He revealed that he was on the Admiralty Interview Board that day and had interviewed me.”

 

A surprising story of déjà vu could well have ended there, but this was to herald the start of Richard’s time at LWC.

 

“The person who had taken the teaching job a month beforehand had actually dropped out, but I didn’t know this. I had a lovely look around and that evening, the headmaster rang me in Bristol to ask if I would like a job. It was amazing really.”

 

“When you become a parent, your view of teaching changes and of course you want your child treated as an individual, so why wouldn’t you treat other people’s children in this way?”

— Richard Kimber

 

Richard arrived in the 1200 as Teacher of Maths and Head of Tennis in September 1992. 33 years later, he’s performed a variety of different roles, including Head of Careers, Assistant Houseparent and Resident Tutor at School House for ten years, Houseparent of Haygate for 15 and Senior Master for nine. Added to that, 15 years of organising student cycle tours (raising £25,000 along the way), 20 CCF winter camps in Snowdonia and 54 week-long residential trips – it’s fair to say he’s sampled practically every aspect of life at LWC.

 

The constants, in three decades at the College, have been his responsibility for organising transport (no mean feat when you’re dealing with over 700 pupils and a myriad of commutes, fixtures and trips) and Richard’s enthusiasm for being part of a strong community.

 

“I’m not sure I would have stayed in teaching if I had lived off-site and been a commuter,” he admits. “But it’s the community that’s kept me here and the variety of what I do. If I meet someone and tell them that I’m a maths teacher, what they envisage I do and what I actually do are poles apart.”

 

Whilst no longer playing such a leading pastoral role as he once did as a Houseparent, Richard is still teaching and ensuring the smooth logistical running of LWC on a daily basis. From staffing to transport – safeguarding students is the aim of everything he does. This, in itself, is a much bigger job than it was thirty years ago, as the College has significantly grown in size.

 

“There’s a person here looking at every role on an almost daily basis now, trying to sharpen it up,” he reveals. “There’s a system for everything. We have changed from a cottage industry to a cutting-edge machine, to quote a previous Chief Operating Officer.”

 

In his time in education, Richard has also seen some huge developments in the classroom – for the better.

 

“A greater emphasis on the individual has been the big change,” he admits. “Everything we do now takes a group of children and breaks them down into 20 individuals, figuring out a plan for each of them. With that change has come more work, but when you become a parent, your view of teaching changes and of course you want your child treated as an individual, so why wouldn’t you treat other people’s children in this way?”

 

Mention of children encourages some brief reflection on how much of Richard’s life has evolved at LWC. The young, single man who first walked under the Blomfield Arch is now a married father of one, his 4^th Form daughter having had much of her life also shaped in the 1200. “She’s six months old in her first photo at Haygate. Having that many big sisters wanting to look after you was fabulous.”

   

But aside from transport responsibility and community spirit featuring throughout Richard’s time at LWC, so too has his humility.

 

When he was given a rousing reception by staff ahead of his 1000^th game of Friday Night Football back in November, he seemed surprised that everyone involved had gone to the effort of keeping it a secret. He made his way to the Astro Pitch wearing the same yellow and black striped shirt that he first donned over 30 years ago, the route lined by clapping staff and confetti cannons. “Coming down the hill that day and seeing them all, it was absolutely amazing.”

 

Likewise, when asked if he thinks he’s made a difference to the (likely) thousands he’s taught over the years, he pauses. “Running a boarding house for so many years, you would often get a parent thanking you and telling you that they would never have turned out like this, were it not for you. In the early years, this makes you feel great. But then you realise that the majority of these people are just great. They would have got there anyway. In some cases, the school has helped them to become what they are. But it’s just a privilege for us to have had that person coming through. We’re in a fantastic position to watch it happen.”

 

As are we, as we observe Richard embarking on his 101^st term at LWC…and still not out.