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The Diocesan Education Service hosted the first overnight School Leaders’ Conference in many years on November 28-29. The two-day event with Bishop Richard was attended by more than 100 delegates, with a number of expert speakers exploring the principles of Catholic Social Teaching (CST) in the context of our school communities.

Keynote speaker Raymond Friel, CEO of the Caritas Social Action Network (CSAN), highlighted the importance of being formed as "agents of change" - outlining how we can facilitate this for our young people as we develop an approach to CST across diocesan schools. Delegates also heard from Lizzie Wakeling, diocesan Youth Adviser, about CYMFed's Faith in Action Award and from Mugeni Sumba, the Coordinator of the Oscar Romero Award, which supports schools to become evangelising centres, with both award programmes offering important opportunities to embed CST principles at an individual and a school-wide level.

There were a number of opportunities for prayer and reflection during the conference, including the Sacrament of Reconciliation, the celebration of Mass, and time in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament. At the end of the conference, the Heads were recommissioned as school leaders with accompanying prayers echoing the words used at their Induction Masses.

Speaking after the event, one attendee said:

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“I valued listening to the inspirational speakers, understanding more about many of the things we already do in school, but leaving with more knowledge and a greater sense of my ability to change what is happening in the world - and inspire others to do the same.”

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You can see pictures from the conference on the diocesan Flickr feed here.