At Ficino School, we completed the academic year in traditional fashion with our annual carol service and Prize Giving. It was delightful to have former pupil and current Board member, Rowan Ashton, as our guest speaker. In both Rowan’s and my addresses, two important facets of a Ficino education stood out – the Pause and the teaching of philosophy. Why are these so important?

The pace of change in this age of digital technology is faster than ever before in human history. The progress of artificial intelligence is such a rapidly developing field that it has become like an arms race to be the first to master General AI.

The ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus famously said, “the only constant is change”. At Ficino School we take a different view, because Heraclitus’ idea is limited in its scope; limited only to consideration of the physical world, the world of the senses, the visible world. In this realm Heraclitus is utterly correct and profoundly insightful considering that he lived over 2000 years ago. However, for human beings to thrive, and surmount the vicissitudes of the current age, they need to seek and discover constancy.

At Ficino, the opportunity to do this is most easily found in our daily Pause, and more profoundly in meditation which the students are offered when they reach Year 6. The ability to fall still and simply be oneself for a few moments at regular intervals provides this constancy. If it can’t be found in the outside world as Heraclitus tells us, where else can it be found, but within?

The Sufi poet Rumi speaks of this constancy in a poem that was recited by the winner of this year’s speech competition; it’s called The Source.

Everything you see has its roots
in the unseen world.
The forms may change,
yet the essence remains the same.

He goes on to write:

Why do you weep?
That Source is within you,
and this whole world
is springing up from it.

What Rumi is speaking of is the brilliance, beauty and creativity that we believe resides in each and every one of our students, and a key purpose of education which is the process of peeling back the ‘outer layer’ to find the Source which Rumi describes as full, ever-flowing and endless.

Philosophy is at the heart of a Ficino education. In this day and age, with the onset of AI as mentioned earlier, the skills learned through philosophical enquiry are going to be most valuable both to our students themselves, and to their employers. A recent guest, Jeffrey Robertson, who is an expert in Māori spirituality, recently met with our Year 8 students and was most impressed by their deep thinking and penetrating questions. This ability was made possible through their study of philosophy. The reason this is so important is that it encourages students to question what others take as self-evident truth.

An exciting new project in the development of philosophy studies begins next year at Ficino. We have appointed a philosopher in residence to synthesise all the material we have gathered over the years and work with our sister schools in Sydney and Melbourne, to produce a structured philosophy curriculum. This initiative has been generously funded by the Education Renaissance Trust – a UK-based charity that supports our family of schools around the world. We are excited to see the results of this work and its impact on our students and staff.

Finally, I’d like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a peaceful and prosperous New Year.