Share:
8 September 2023
Marina Gardiner Legge has been named as President of the Girls’ Schools Association and plans to highlight the transformative power of girls’ schools and girls’ education to build a fairer world for all, in her Presidency year.
As President, Marina will work closely with GSA member schools, teachers, other stakeholders, and girls themselves to advocate for a unique education that offers inspiring spaces of freedom and fairness to young women today; she continues the vital work of the Association which champions and places the best interests of young women at the heart of everything it does.
A mother of three girls herself, Marina believes that girls-only schools are uniquely able to equip young women for life in the modern world, honouring who they are, as they are, and empowering them to choose the lives they want to live.
Girls’ Schools Association President, and Head at Oxford High School GDST, Marina says: “GSA schools celebrate and support every young woman; I plan to ‘sing the joy’ of girls’ education and the way it changes lives for the better this year and I’m delighted to drive GSA’s mission with our growing membership in both the state and independent sector. No girl should feel as though she should have to apologize or minimise herself, or that she cannot study for or choose the life she wishes to live. In our schools girls are liberated to define their own parameters.”
Marina will centre on the importance of supportive educational state and independent school relationships, adding: “Having worked in both state and independent schools myself, I know how hard everyone is working to give every young person the best education and opportunity in life, we care deeply about each pupil – it’s seared into our bones as teachers, it’s why we teach. I’m a firm believer that through working together we learn from each other and can benefit every child.”
A keen advocate of dialogue and oracy, she champions every student’s ability and opportunity to hone these skills so that they can positively contribute to society and feel fully equipped to engage with contrary points of view and opinions, critically, analytically, and respectfully. Marina brings welcome focus to the value of diverse thinking and its potential to transform and enrich organisations, and the lives of people working in them, to create a fairer and more inclusive world for everyone.
Donna Stevens, Girls’ Schools Association CEO, adds: “I’m thrilled to welcome Marina as new President in the year we celebrate GSA’s 150 years of empowering young women to live the lives of their choosing. It’s imperative that all young women today are afforded the opportunity to learn in schools built for them and that bring out the best in them. We walk alongside our Heads and school communities to champion every girl’s right to a fairer world through the finest education. We can never underestimate the significant role girls’ schools play in shaping a fairer, and more brilliant, world. We have inspired bright, trailblazing, young women to be the difference in the world for hundreds of years, and long may that continue!”
