It feels strange writing in March about leaving school after 7 years of BVGS. It hadn’t really crossed my mind that we would be leaving this year let alone finding out on the Wednesday we would not be coming back the following Monday.
 

During these last 7 years, we’ve seen plenty of change at school, with new students, new teachers, new buildings yet there were some constants that were taken as guaranteed. We all expected to be leaving school on May 5^th, with a big celebration of our whole year in fancy dress, ready to go on study leave. We all expected to be sitting down to do our first exam in mid-May after months of preparation and revision. We all expected to relax and enjoy our summer where we went on holidays together and composed ourselves before the next stage of our lives. However, we had a short assembly which was, in the situation, fantastically well put together and presented by members of the officer team overnight to a diminished year. We had 20 minutes to say our goodbyes to students and staff who have all enriched our lives insurmountably. I know there are people, both staff and students, who we would have loved to say thank you to in person but didn’t get chance to. We may get chance to thank our teachers in isolation, but the cleaners, the canteen and office staff, the music teachers, the sports coaches, the career advisers, pastoral care team and I’m sure many many more have made our 7 years memorable to say the least.
 

I, personally, have tried to take the cancellation of our exams as calmly as possible. It’s still not confirmed how they will grade us, and what will happen to our university places. Ultimately, we’re only going to be able to prepare for the next stage after we get our results in July. I can’t help but feel sorry for us as we can’t show off the work we have done over the past 18 months, but when we joined Vesey I remember them saying about a “Vesey Experience”. It has taken me until now to actually realise what that means. Whilst at the moment, we don’t know what grades we will come out with, during our time at BVGS, we’ve all played new sports, learnt new instruments, seen different countries, raised money for charity and much more. Somehow, I feel like I’ve already received above and beyond what I expected from my time at Vesey even before getting my A Levels so whilst I’m disappointed that my time was cut short, I can’t say I wasn’t given every opportunity. Until you leave all those things and people behind, you don’t realise Vesey is so much more than a place to get qualifications, but a place to learn lessons both in academia and in life.