Temuka principal in search of new challenges

After sitting in the bush alone for three days, office worker Grant Willocks decided to take up teaching. Now, after 17 years as principal of Temuka Primary School, he is leaving.

Willocks said it was time for a change, but he was unsure what that would be.

‘‘Life is about challenges. I’m not retiring, and I have no plan B. I want to leave on a high.’’

He will finish at the end of the school year and be replaced by Donna Hessell.

Willocks worked in a desk job when he finished high school after spending his childhood in Southland, then Timaru.

It was after his employer the Department of Social Welfare (now Work and Income) sent him on an Outward Bound course in the early 1980s that he realised teaching was a better fit for him.

‘‘I loved Outward Bound. [During] the three days solo sitting on a rock, I had time to contemplate and one of the tasks was to write a self-reflection letter.’’

The letter was given to the instructor at the end of the three days and was supposed to be returned to Willocks in three months, but it did not arrive until seven years later.

By then he had graduated from the Christchurch College of Education and had been working in his first job at Waimataitai School, in Timaru, for about a year.

‘‘When the letter arrived it reinforced what I was doing. I was fit and healthy and working with kids.’’

His next role was teaching at Waituna Creek School then a sole charge principal position at Ikawai School for about nine years before becoming principal of Milford School.

Education reforms in 2004 led to Milford School merging with Winchester on the Winchester site, so Willocks took up the principal role at Temuka.

‘‘The highlights have been all about relationships and connecting with students and families. I see former students in the most unlikely places.’’

The job was about problemsolving and finding solutions that best fitted the school community, he said.

During his time in charge there has been a flood and a major snowstorm, as well as Covid-19.

‘‘Over this [Covid] time we learnt a lot about distance teaching, communication, technology, resilience, patience and being kind.’’

Hessell is looking forward to stepping into Willocks’ shoes at the start of 2022.

She comes from Runanga School, eight kilometres north of Greymouth, where she has been principal for five years.

She spent her childhood between homes with her mother on the West Coast and father in Timaru, and is looking forward to moving.

‘‘Temuka Primary is a bigger school, and I’m looking forward to building connections.

‘‘I have a fresh set of eyes and will build on the successes.’’