Thursday evening, I attended the Gordonstoun Nova Scotia Information Forum put on by Friends of Gordonstoun Nova Scotia (FOGNS) at Cornwallis Park. The moderator was Linda Hume Leahy. FOGNS is a citizen support group, numbering over 600 members.
The one and a half hour presentation was made by Richard Thorne and Kate Cornell on behalf of Gordonstoun NS. The event was under strict COVID social distancing and face mask rules. There were between 60-80 citizens in the audience. Thorne is Acting Principal. Cornell is Development Officer. Consultant, Edward Ferren was in the audience. Because of COVID there was no opportunity to ask questions from the floor.
Richard and Kate provided an in-depth background to the Gordonstoun philosophy, the role of Kurt Hahn and the establishment of Gordonstoun School in Moray, Scotland. Gordonstoun education for life includes teamwork, responsibility, resilience, achievement and compassion. The experience includes Outward Bound, the Duke of Edinburgh awards, and the Round Square movement. In the words of Hahn, it responds to the six declines of modern youth: fitness, initiative and enterprise, memory and imagination, skill and care, self-discipline and compassion.
The timeline for Gordonstoun Nova Scotia: they will be breaking the ground in late Spring 2021, hiring VP Academic and VP Finance by September 2021. First intake will be September 2022. There will be six hundred students, fifty-plus staff. The students will be Grade 9-12. The curriculum will be part of the International Baccalaureate (IB) program. The school will be not for profit and will offer full scholarships (two for Nova Scotia students and two for non- Nova Scotia students) valued at $78k for each of four years.
There will opportunity for the community to be involved through maintenance of the site, local provisioning and collaboration. The question posed : How are you going to be involved with us? And vice versa?
Overall, there was a lot of good background information. Via the Gordonstoun UK web site there are a range of videos on teamwork, responsibility, resilience, achievement, compassion. From a geographic perspective, there are many similarities between the Annapolis Basin and Moray, Scotland
Overall, there was a lot of good background information. Via the Gordonstoun UK web site there are a range of videos on teamwork, responsibility, resilience, achievement, compassion. From a geographic perspective, there are many similarities between the Annapolis Basin and Moray, Scotland
between mountain and the water
— Kurt Hahn
Acknowledgements
Thanks to Friends of Gordonstoun Nova Scotia for organizing the forum.
References
go to gordonstoun.org.uk to find the link to the videos
check Google for more on Kurt Hahn and his educational philosophy.
Ashley Thompson, SaltWire, 23 October 2020, “Citizen Group Formed in Support of Gordonstoun School”
Ernest Blair Experiment 
Although the primary economic benefits of establishing Gordostoun here will be providing goods and services, there is an opportunity to share the cultural, social and environmental values of our region with the graduating students for perhaps hundreds of years. If the community is successful in making each student’s experience of Nova Scotia a warm and welcoming remembrance, we will have launched thousands of unofficial ambassadors worldwide.
Bill Crossman, Centrelea
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Bill:
I agree. This is an opportunity for global exposure of our geography: the people and the place. This is well understood by the residents.
Bob
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