Sir – Speaking as a Headington Prep’ parent, I am appalled by Miss Bartlett’s exit (Report, August 29) following what the school governors described enigmatically as a ‘strategic review’ in their press release to parents and local media received this week.
Andrea Bartlett is a sincere, dedicated and inspirational person. It is a huge failure of the school governors to have mismanaged the situation in this way, leaving the junior school rudderless for a full year.
It was unwise of the governors to use the words ‘strategic review’ in their external communications without indicating what the content of this is, since numerous wild rumours now circulate including whether the school will take boys in the junior school, whether the school is planning to change from Christian to secular in order to attract people from other faiths from abroad or, more likely, whether the plan is to demote the status of the Junior school head as part of some internal decision to end the current separate character of the junior and senior schools.
Whatever the reason, I would like to thank Miss Bartlett for her skills as a leader and teacher. I was just as in awe of her, as my daughter was. Her successor, whoever and whenever that person appears, has a tough act to follow.
Alison Eden, Oxford
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