If you attended Hillcrest High School at any point over the past four decades, there is a good chance you know Brett “Chibby” Chibnall.
Perhaps he taught you. Perhaps he was your Dean. Perhaps you went on a camp or school trip with him, sat through an assembly he was involved in, had a conversation with him when things weren’t going particularly well, or simply remember him as one of those familiar faces that was always part of Hillcrest.
For the Season 2 finale of our Beyond the Bell podcast, we sit down with Chibby to reflect on an extraordinary association with our school that stretches back nearly 40 years.
Chibby first walked through the gates of Hillcrest as a student teacher in 1988, before joining the teaching staff in 1989. He became a Dean in 1997 and is currently seeing out his sixth cohort of students.
Those numbers tell part of the story.
But a lifetime in a school can’t really be measured in years.
It’s measured in people.
It’s the thousands of students who have passed through classrooms and corridors. The colleagues who became friends. The camps, sports trips, assemblies and school events. The difficult conversations and the celebrations. The students who needed someone in their corner. And the former students who, years later, still stop to say hello.
Schools change enormously over four decades. Buildings are added and removed. Uniforms change. Technology transforms classrooms. Traditions come and go. Generations of students graduate and make way for the next.
But ultimately, a school is much more than its buildings.
A school is its people.
And there are some people who become so woven into the story of a place that it is difficult to imagine one without the other.
For generations of Hillcrest students, Chibby is one of those people.
In Chibby – A Lifetime at Hillcrest, we take Chibby back to where it all began. There are stories from the Hillcrest of the late 1980s and 1990s, plenty of memories and laughs, reflections on how students and education have changed, and a look at what has kept him returning to Hillcrest year after year.
But beneath the stories is something much more important: a conversation about relationships, service, belonging and the privilege of working alongside generations of young people.
For our alumni in particular, we hope this episode provides an opportunity to reconnect with a person, and perhaps a version of Hillcrest — that formed part of your own story.
🎙️ Chibby – A Lifetime at Hillcrest is the Season 2 finale of Beyond the Bell, the official podcast of Hillcrest High School.
🎧 Listen now on Spotify:
https://open.spotify.com/episode/7auG9jp6Z1yqfKfYGUeZQO?si=lkPubL01QG6TgS_FapLGPg
And if Chibby was your teacher, Dean, coach, colleague — or simply someone who made an impact during your time at Hillcrest — we’d love to hear your memories.
Once Hillcrest, always Hillcrest. 💙
