Pippa Hull
Well, congratulations to you Trudy and all the staff (especially Sue, Kate and Deborah) on your forthcoming 10 year celebration!
As a member of staff myself, the past few years has been exciting, stimulating, sometimes hard work but most of all extremely re-warding. Stagecoach is unlike any organization I have worked for before. For a start you teach a huge age range, from tiny tots right up to adults. As a teacher you are really given the time to nurture the students and allow them to experiment creatively (believe me this is not always the case in other establishments).
Although you always want pupils to achieve as much as they possibly can within a lesson or term, this is accomplished without too many targets and tests being set for the pupils themselves. A great emphasis is put on confidence building (something that is so important nowadays) and teaching young students to communicate with each other and work within a team.
Trudy allows a teacher to use his or her own teaching ‘style’ and is always there for support - not only for the students but for her staff as well and for this I must thank her!
I loved being allowed to be creative myself, I know other teachers feel the same way.
I have had the opportunity to work with many amazing and wonderful students and some extremely talented members of staff.
The job itself is so versatile and has opened up many opportunities for me. I have thoroughly enjoyed every minute of every rehearsal for ‘Joseph’. I learned so much from ‘Singing Sue’ and it was such a giggle. Training 80 students isn’t straight forward but each and every one of them was so dedicated and talented that it made our job seem easy. Seeing the choir on the actual set for Joseph for the first time was simply an ‘amazing technicolour’ experience - oooh! sorry!
I’ve also had the opportunity to work with some very talented students on other fab and diverse projects. For example the rock concert The Pink Floyd Tribute, ‘Think Floyd’ to a couple of opera’s, La Bohème and Tosca. Students as young as 9 years old trained to be in these operas and learned to sing in Italian and Latin - what an achievement! I loved it! I was so proud of them!
To be given the opportunity to work on these wonderful and exciting professional shows is something I can take with me and keep in my heart forever but there’s still a couple of memories that stand out for me - one in particular; the day a young student, who in stage 2 couldn’t even tell me her name because she was so shy, had the confidence to stand tall and sing a solo in front of the whole class - it’s when these small little miracles happen that no one else really witnesses that you realize - you as a teacher have really made a difference, I found it so hard to hold back the tears.
Well, for many happy memories I must just say a massive thank you for every thing Here’s to another ten years!
Lots of love Pippa xxx