Featured Teacher
I
t is not very often that you come
across a school principal who has
stayed in his or her role for more
than two decades, it is even more
rare, to find one who has been the
head of an international school for over
twenty years. Ed Goodwin OBE, is such
a ‘one’. He has been the principal of
St Christopher’s School Bahrain since
1995, and is set to retire at the end
of the current academic year (2017-
2018). Teach Middle East was fortunate
enough to catch up with him before he
heads off on his retirement.
Ed who is originally from New Castle
in Northeast England, is married to
Wendy (The other featured teacher
in this issue). He is the father of one
daughter, Vickie and the proud
grandfather of one grandson, Brodie.
In 1984 after several years of teaching,
Ed moved to Bahrain to work at
Bahrain School, which was a school
run by the US armed forces. He recalls
his days at the Bahrain school, as being
full of adventure, as he happened to
have been teaching there during the
time of the first Gulf war in 1991. Ed,
remembers he and his students having
to seek shelter in a gas proof area and
wearing gas masks when the air raid
sirens sounded in the early hours of
the mornings. You would think this
would be reason enough for Ed to
leave the gulf region the first chance
he got, instead he turned down job
offers in other countries to remain in
the region.
The early days
St Christopher’s School is now a world
renowned British school, but it was
not always this way. In the spring of
1995 when Ed returned to Bahrain,
to be principal of St Christopher’s,
the school was in dire need of a
revamping of the culture and change
and growth in every area. The school
was underperforming and had gone
through a very difficult time, leading to
the abrupt departure of the previous
principal, after only a few months
in the position. A proposed A-level
programme had been scrapped,
morale was low, so too were students’
expectations, the Board was under
attack from all quarters and, clearly,
a culture change was needed. Ed and
his team worked long and hard on
turning the school from an introverted,
low-expectation position to where it
stands now. The school is now known
and respected around the world, for
its ethos and culture, as well as for the
quality of its students. Ed’s 23 years
at St Christopher’s Bahrain have seen
a doubling of student numbers to the
current strength of 2300. The culture
of the school is n