Why "SPIRE"?

Two years ago today I stepped off a plane in Melbourne confronted with temperatures of 4 degrees having spent the past two weeks in the summer temperatures of Spain and France. The purpose of my trip was to attend the 17th International Conference on Thinking (ICOT) in Bilbao, Spain. Along with colleagues from the ONWZ of the Melbourne Archdiocese I spent 4 days listening to some of the pre-eminent speakers on education and the importance of developing a thinking curriculum. It was a fantastic way to spend the winter holidays, was incredibly thought provoking and allowed me to bring my family with me on our first overseas trip.

When the conference finished we headed to France and if you believe my son, we visited too many churches. One of these was Chartres Cathedral, 90 km from Paris. I remember when I first saw it I thought it was a village church because we could see no town around it and the satnav stated we were still 25 km away. However as we got closer the enormity of the building came into view and I realised why we had seen it from so far away. Apart from the building itself being massive, the spires on it reach 105 and 110 metres into the air. A massive feat for a building that was built 900 years ago!

Jumping to another time a presenter at another conference talked about the need to make use of the research of others to improve our practice - to stand on the shoulders of giants. This made more sense to me then the idea of trying to reinvent the wheel. Now this quote is commonly attributed to Sir Isaac Newton but in researching I found that it came from John of Salisbury who was quoting Bernard of Chartres. Bernard was a philosopher and Bishop of Chartres.

So long story short, a spire that reaches 100+ metres into the air would provide a view long into the distance, in the same way that using the research of others can assist our educational vision. Having been taken by the awesome spires of Chartres Cathedral and learning that a favourite quote of mine was associated with Chartres, the link was simple.

Spire Educational Consulting - and the catch phrase - "See Beyond The Crowd."