APS Reunion 2014.

Friday 3rd & Saturday 4th October.

Holiday Inn Hotel, Liverpool.

There is always something nostalgic about returning to Liverpool for our Annual Reunion. If we could not be at the I M Marsh Campus then the next best thing was to be right in the heart of the city and the Holiday Inn is exactly that. Across the road is Lime Street Station and just down the road is St George’s Hall. Many of the past students who attended the reunion travelled by rail though many of them were surely recalling that, in their College days, the trains were steam engines!

Eighty past students were expected to attend the reunion and many of those had already arrived by Friday evening. The bar was buzzing as everyone enjoyed pre-dinner drinks and caught up with the lives of people they had not seen, sometimes for as much as 50 years. The excitement continued into dinner and beyond.

By Saturday morning the remaining attendees had arrived and we all gathered in the conference room to be welcomed by our President, Barbara Graham (Holmes). Linda Bond (Ward) weaved her magic again with her ‘getting to know you’ activity to make sure that everyone had a chance to integrate. The ‘Fruit Salad’ game was enjoyed by all – even if some of those, still sporting their competitive character, ran between chairs as if it were an elimination game! The resultant groups were then given a set of topics to discuss which prompted a lively discussion of how their lives had developed since their training at I M Marsh.

After the mid morning coffee break Meg Maunder gave a presentation entitled ‘Pride, Prejudice, Candour and ……….?’. Meg is co-founder of an organisation called WiSH (Women into School Headships) and she delivered a fascinating insight into the qualities needed for leadership in relation to school headships. ‘Confidence’, the deliberate omission in the wording, is something which it appears that women lack – unlike their male counterparts, when it comes to applying for Headships The aim of WiSH is to help women to understand that many of them they do have the qualities to be heads and they should have the confidence to recognise this.

After a break for lunch we reconvened for the AGM of the Association. Before the start of the AGM Barbara introduced Emily Saunders, the LJMU archivist who gave the members an insight into what is held in the IMM Archives. The archives are accessible and all the details are available on the LJMU website. Click Here for the Website

If anyone has material they would like to donate to the Archive please contact Emily via our History and Archives page

Barbara opened the AGM by welcoming everybody ‘home’, especially those who had travelled huge distances; Frankie Pelgrave (Readman) and Terry Crockett from Australia, and Bev Ainscow (Moore) from California. 1964 had gathered no fewer than 35 past students to mark their 50th Anniversary since leaving College and credit must go to Sylvia Ellis (Phillips), their Set Rep who had worked so hard to achieve this record attendance.

The business of the AGM was conducted quickly and efficiently, something which is becoming a trade mark of Barbara’s Presidency. An amendment to the Constitution which increased the term of office for co-opted committee members from 1 year to 2 years was passed unanimously. June Nash was re-elected as Reunion Organiser, Kath Simpson was elected as Membership Secretary, Prof Sheila Wigmore was re-elected as Archives Coordinator and Meg Maunder, Trish Wootton, and Jackie Wright were re-elected as Co-opted Members.

The venue for our next Reunion will be the Old Swan Hotel in Harrogate on the 2nd/3rd October 2015. Details and booking forms will be in next year’s Journal, normally published late March/early April and will be on our website shortly thereafter.

Barbara presented everyone with a wine glass displaying the College name as a memento of the occasion before bringing the meeting to a close.

Many of those attending stayed on at the Holiday Inn and enjoyed a privately served Reunion Dinner on the Saturday evening.

Members of the Committee were delighted that everyone seemed to have an enjoyable day and they hope that members will join us next year in Harrogate. If you would like to become a member of the Association you can apply through the ‘How to Join’ section of the website.

You can view photographs of the reunion by clicking on the ‘Gallery’.