Let’s not sugarcoat the pill. Before Gail Thomson arrived at St John’s College, the place was in a mess.

Why else would Te Kotahitanga have commissioned Sir Paul Reeves and Kathryn Beck to do a structural review of the College in 2009?

Why else would the 2010 General Synod have accepted their recommendations, holus bolus – which included doing away with three separate tikanga colleges?

And why else would they have recruited a commissioner to get the place functioning as a single college, ready to be led by a single principal?

Gail Thomson, who has just stepped down as that commissioner, says simply that there was “room for improvement” when she arrived in August 2010.

But now that she has handed over the baton to the college’s new Manukura, or Principal, Tony Gerritsen, people aren’t holding back their appreciation for what she achieved.

The big guns – Archbishop Philip Richardson, Bishop Kito Pikaahu, the chairman of Te Kotahitanga, and Bishop Api Qiliho among them – paid tribute to Gail at a dinner put on by the St John’s College Trust Board and Te Kotahitanga in early July.

Later that week, Tony Gerritsen, the deans, faculty and students thanked her at a separate Eucharist and farewell dinner.

Gail’s biggest challenge, she says, was getting the three tikanga to work together.

Getting each to paddle their waka in the same direction – and being able to tick off the requirements set out in Te Kotahitanga’s strategic plan for the College, was also the highlight of her three years here.

Gail could be tough. She’d challenge anybody, if she felt she had to. No beating about the bush.

But she also had a lightness of touch. One of Gail’s special attributes, according to Paula Jakeman, Te Kotahitanga’s Executive Officer, was that she was persistent, she would keep challenging people – and yet not break relationships with them.

“She treated people as she expected them to treat her,” says Paula. “It was a joy and a real privilege to work with someone who was that professional.”

Huia Swann, who paid tribute to Gail at the student’s farewell dinner, put her finger on one of the reasons why Gail could keep those relationships intact.

Huia could take hard decisions coming from Gail, she said – because she knew she was being treated fairly.

THE RIGHT CREDENTIALS

Gail Thomson had come to St John’s with credentials that suggested she could deliver.

For 11 years she’d been the head of Dio School for Girls in Auckland – which has 1550 students, and 210 staff – and she’d left there in 2003 to become an educational consultant and trouble-shooter.

Among her post Dio tasks, she’d been called in as the commissioner of three large Auckland secondary schools.

One of those schools, Sir Edmund Hillary Collegiate in Otara, was led by three principals. Gail had been wheeled in there after a damning ERO report and claims of abuse.

Since that low point, according to Wikipedia, the school and its new board of trustees have “moved on from strength to strength.”

Gail’s experience at that Otara school wasn’t bad preparation for what she faced at St John’s.

And what she achieved there.

The fact that Gail has finished her time at St John’s doesn’t mean she’s easing into her slippers.

Nor that she’s finished helping out with Anglican causes.

For a start, she’s now heading up a group of four (who include Hone Harawira) which has been commissioned by the Queen Victoria and St Stephen’s Schools Trust Board to examine the feasibility of re-opening those iconic schools.

She’s also twice been to Selwyn College in Honiara in the Solomon Islands – and she’s helping that school get on track, too.

Gail’s also the chairperson of the Hilary House Leadership Centre Trust. Back when she was the Commissioner of Sir Edmund Hillary Collegiate, the old Hilary home on Remuera Rd was under threat.

Gail arranged for the Hillary house to be carted to the Collegiate site in Otara – where it will soon be reopened, as a Leadership Training Centre.

And then, to prevent her from becoming entirely idle, Gail continues to accept invitations from school principals and senior school leadership teams to review their operations.

“I really enjoyed my time at St John’s College,” says Gail. “I found it very rewarding.”

“People warned me that this would be an incredibly difficult job.

“But in fact it hasn’t been.

“Nowhere near as difficult,” she says, “as some of the things I have encountered.”   

Lloyd Ashton is Media Officer for this church.