Issue 13

20
feature
TEACHER FEATURE
ANNE MCPHERSON
ENGLISH
A serendipitous thing happened to me this weekend when I
bumped into a new acquaintance. ‘Did you go to Iona, class
of 1989?’ she asked, having recognised my face 27 years
after we last met.
For numerous reasons that aren’t relevant to this article,
I haven’t attended a single reunion or performed an Iona
‘Google search’ since I left school in 1989. But strangely
enough, over the past few years I had been reflecting quite
a lot on how fortunate I had been to attend Iona for five
years, during a period of my life that was experiencing
major personal upheaval. I received a solid grounding
in my education, as well as an inner strength that has
helped me weather quite a few storms.
I believe things often happen for a reason. My ‘new’ Iona
connection mentioned that the school was seeking stories
relating to how teachers had influenced Past Pupils. I feel an
immense sense of gratitude at being given an opportunity to
say thank you to my past English teacher, Anne McPherson
(Miss A Mathews), for instilling in me a love of reading and
writing that has not only grown stronger with time, but is
something that I am striving to cultivate in my own children.
I didn’t continue my studies at university, but my working
life has relied heavily on the English skills that I gained at
Iona. Over the past few years, my writing has taken more of
a creative form. It’s the creative side that has triggered such
fond memories of English lessons with Mrs McPherson. I
smile when I think of how I used to look forward to English
exams, when I could test my creativity under pressure.
I really appreciate this opportunity to say thank you.
Marie McLean (née Wood)
Class of 1989
esprit de corps • IONA PRESENTATION COLLEGE MAGAZINE • ISSUE 12 • AUTUMN 2016