Pastoral
Pastoral care can be either reactive, or proactive. If a boy is in trouble, or distressed, or just bewildered, reactive pastoral care is essential. Ironically, such care can only really be given if certain proactive steps had already been put in place. During this period of the history, significant steps were taken to strengthen the capacity of the school to deal with, and to pre-empt, the crises and catastrophes that adolescent boys are subject to, and these steps were taken to produce at the end balanced and empathetic good men.
The key component and strength of the pastoral arrangements at Bishops is the House system, one which had been in place in its current form for over a century in both College and Prep. It is ironic that despite this, at the start of this quarter century, bullying of juniors by seniors (a pattern of many generations’ standing) still persisted, even though Clive Watson, in his newsletters to parents, had been insistent in his determination to eradicate it. Policies had been drawn up, and were implemented, but these policies were not enough to change the attitudes and expectations of the boys – “it happened to me and now it’s my turn”. The institutionalized system of fagging (junior boys allocated to prefects and/or senior boys as ‘servants’ ) which had the capacity to create good relationships between senior and junior, did not always do so, usually because of the misuse of the system by seniors.
In 1999, there were three boarding houses each with its own Housemaster and an Assistant Housemaster. There were four dayboy houses, each of which had its own self-contained building, housemaster and two assistant housemasters, and recreational and locker spaces for the boys. The housemasters were senior staff members, and the Housemaster Committee probably the most powerful committee within the school.
All houses had tutor groups supervised by members of staff, and usually consisting of boys from the same grade. The effect of having these tutor groups was that the large unit of the school (650+ boys) was broken down into houses (80-100 boys) and houses were broken down into small units (15 boys), which meant that there was a much greater chance for each boy to be known well by a member of the teaching staff. In pursuit of that situation, the eighth house, Mallett House, was opened in 2003.
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The boys’ academic progress was checked on by the housemaster and tutor, and discipline was enforced by the housemaster. Sport was administered on a school-wide basis, except for the fiercely contested house matches in some sporting codes. Parents were required to deal with Housemasters in the first instance if they had issues that needed to have dealt with. Each house had a Head boy (called a School Prefect) and a number of House prefects drawn from the matric group, to lead and control the boys. At the Prep school in 1999, there were four Houses – Bramley, Brooke, Charlton for dayboys, and Van der Bijl for boarders on the same lines as the College Houses.
There were some green shoots. In 1999, the prefects as a body agreed that the system of fagging should be abolished. However, this did not stop the belief among many senior boys that they could still order juniors to run errands for them. At the start of 2001, a School Counsellor was appointed in Jason Bantjes, whose focus was going to be on the psychological, emotional, and developmental needs of the boys, rather than on academic remedial attention. He was deliberately excluded from any disciplinary involvement.
The 2010 Conference held in September 2001 was followed by eight Action groups which dealt with the main focuses of attention that emerged from the Conference. The Pastoral Action group came up with a number of recommendations which the executive acted on with immediate effect. First, a Vice-principal Pastoral was appointed in the person of Stuart West, formerly Housemaster of School House. A fifth dayboy House, Mallett House, was set up, with David Ledwidge as the first Housemaster, and its rationale was to allow a reduction in the size of the existing dayboy houses.
This would make it easier for the Housemasters to fulfil their role. The position of Catering Matron in the boarding houses had ended and, in their place, Housemothers were appointed in each of the boarding houses, with the emphasis more on interacting with the boys, rather than dealing solely with housekeeping.
In 1999, there were three boarding houses each with its own Housemaster and an Assistant Housemaster. There were four dayboy houses, each of which had its own self-contained building, housemaster and two assistant housemasters, and recreational and locker spaces for the boys. The housemasters were senior staff members, and the Housemaster Committee probably the most powerful committee within the school. All houses had tutor groups supervised by members of staff, and usually consisting of boys from the same grade. The effect of having these tutor groups was that the large unit of the school (650+ boys) was broken down into houses (80-100 boys) and houses were broken down into small units (15 boys), which meant that there was a much greater chance for each boy to be known well by a member of the teaching staff. In pursuit of that situation, the eighth house, Mallett House, was opened in 2003.
The boys’ academic progress was checked on by the housemaster and tutor, and discipline was enforced by the housemaster. Sport was administered on a school-wide basis, except for the fiercely contested house matches in some sporting codes. Parents were required to deal with Housemasters in the first instance if they had issues that needed to have dealt with. Each house had a Head boy (called a School Prefect) and a number of House prefects drawn from the matric group, to lead and control the boys. At the Prep school in 1999, there were four Houses – Bramley, Brooke, Charlton for dayboys, and Van der Bijl for boarders on the same lines as the College Houses.
A new tutor system was introduced in 2003 with the following modifications. First, the groups were to become vertical groups of about 15 boys, 3 or 4 drawn from each of the five grades. Second, these groups would stay with the same tutor for the whole Bishops career. Third, each tutor group would have three time-tabled meetings a week with the tutor. And fourth, each boy was given a Bishops Homework Diary, which allowed the boys to organise their work programmes, and allow tutor and housemasters to monitor the boys’ progress, as well as giving the parents assistance in following their sons’ progress.
Funds were set aside to upgrade the boarding house living quarters for boys and domestic staff, as well as the recreational and bathroom spaces, which happened during 2003.
The school took the next step by creating the Bishops Support Unit at the College. The Unit was set up with its own building (The old squash court had been converted into the school museum, which was then converted into the BSU.) and Jason Bantjes and James Fraser were able to meet with boys who approached them in appropriate surroundings. Grant Nupen, on more than one occasion, had to address questions of drug and alcohol abuse, appealing to the parents to work with the school on these issues. Mrs Ann Macdonald was appointed in 2004 at the Prep as the school Councillor.
Stuart West left Bishops in 2006 to go to Dainfern College in Gauteng as Headmaster. Peter Westwood, Housemaster of School House, was appointed Vice-principal Pastoral.
Attention was given to the prefect system but there was a growing perception that the system carried within itself the seeds of its own weaknesses. Prefects are necessarily an elite group, and there was a definite sense of insider and outsider status, particularly when the prefect selections were announced. To address this, discussions were held to devise a leadership system which would not be divisive in this way. Peter Westwood steered this system into place at the start of 2009. Each House would have a Head boy and Deputy Head boy, but all the matrics would form the leadership group, each boy having a specific portfolio to lead and develop. A new badge was drawn up with help from the SA College of Heralds, and while there was some resistance to the ending of the old prefects’ badge, the new system and its visible signs were quickly accepted and became settled. This is not to say that the system worked perfectly – there were instances in which the boys did not live up to the expectations and requirements they took on at the start.
This continued the process of changing the relationship between the senior and junior boys, as now all seniors were included in the management of the houses. However, although by 2012, some progress was made in achieving a better relationship between senior and junior, obstacles still remained. The key perception that senior boys had in terms of the relationship was one that was tainted by domination and subjugation. Accordingly, the school imposed the following restrictions which had to come into effect immediately in the College.
- No initiation allowed (Education act)
- Boys may not punish boys (Education act)
- Seniors may not use juniors as servants for personal gain
- No military-style line-up and marching
- No juniors allowed into matric rooms or studies
The intention was that with the House staff and boys in their Houses, a new and improved era of leadership and relationship could be ushered in – one more in line with the understanding of service leadership and respectful “followship”.
The potential of the BSU had been quickly recognised and it benefited from a number of extensions and improvements. An administrator was appointed to assist the running of the unit, allowing more time for the psychologist to see boys. In 2005, Jason Bantjes took a two-year leave of absence to go to Rhodes University to study for a Master’s Degree in Psychology. Sid Cooper ran the unit for those two years, and then stayed on part-time on the return of Jason Bantjes, now a qualified Counselling Psychologist. The BSU became a training unit for intern Master’s students, and was accredited by the HPCSA. Each year there were two interns, mostly from Stellenbosch, who administered academic tests and offered some therapy. The interns went on to qualify as Educational Psychologists and two of them were in turn later employed by the BSU. A part-time remedial teacher was added to the complement.
A significant growth area developed when boys undertook various academic psychometric tests to determine whether they would quality for exam concessions, and this became a major part of the BSU’s activities. Concussion testing was also administered through the BSU.
The BSU also undertook a number of courses for parents – Jason and Megan de Beyer ran a very popular “Strong mothers, strong sons” course for a number of years. Jason also produced booklets dealing with issues such as the effects of alcohol and drugs on teenage development. He also spoke to the academic staff on aspects of intellectual and emotional development. The College BSU assisted the Pre-Prep when asked, and a BSU was established at the Prep in 2004 with Anne Macdonald running the programme. Marileen Harrod, an Educational Psychologist, was appointed at the Prep in 2009.
Jason resigned at the end of 2011 and went to a lecturing post at Stellenbosch University. He was replaced by Peter Farlam OD, a clinical psychologist. Marileen Harrod moved up to the College in 2018 and one of the BSU interns, Juandre di Trapari was appointed at the Pre-Prep. In 2022, the Prep BSU was able to move into new premises in the restructured Rossall campus, and this enabled the unit to expand its reaching out to boys who needed assistance.
Over the last few years, specific attention has been directed towards support for boys with scholarships and bursaries, to ensure that they can gain the most from their experiences at Bishops.
The Housemasters’ group remained at the centre of the pastoral concerns. While this group had been exclusively male up until 1998, many people approved strongly of the appointment of Shirley Lamb as the first female Assistant Housemaster in 1999, and then was appointed Housemaster of Kidd in 2005. She had previously been Assistant Housemaster in Founders, showing that a female staff member could fulfil a boarding house position with ease. At the end of 2012, four new housemasters were appointed, including Marion Bradley to Mallett House, and this occasioned the need to change the name from Housemaster to the more gender-neutral House Director.
The House Directors remain key personnel in pastoral matters. Regular events are held in the Houses to engender a spirit of unity and belonging. Some of these raise money for charities, others for House improvements. Parents are regularly included in such events, especially at the start of the year.
When Peter Westwood retired at the end of 2023, Joc Wrensch was appointed as Deputy Head Pastoral & Discipline, as the portfolio of Discipline was moved from Warren Wallace and was attached to that of Pastoral, on the belief that Pastoral and Discipline were two sides of the same coin.
