PUPILS and staff have waved goodbye to a much loved head teacher who is retiring after 40 years service to Glasgow schools.

It will be a huge adjustment for Merrylee Primary head Liz Mahindru as she steps down from her post.

But the 61-year-old says she is privileged to have had a career she has loved and, she says, was "meant to be".

Liz said: "It's a bit surreal to be honest. I feel really privileged to be leaving a job I love.

"I have been so lucky because I have been able to follow my dreams and teach in this very special school and turn it into the kind of place I would have wanted for my own children's education.

"But this is very much the right time for me to be leaving and I know the school is in a place where it will continue to thrive."

As a teenager, Liz looked up to her neighbour, Sheila Thompson, who was a teacher at Knockburn Primary in Roboyston.

Liz would help her out with the school football team and assist with marking jotters.

It was this experience that inspired Liz to go in to teaching and she trained at Jordanhill College, qualifying at the age of 20.

Just a handful of her classmates gained teaching jobs... and Liz was one of them.

Sheila had been diagnosed with cancer and Liz was offered a teaching post at Knockburn.

She said: "Sheila had treatment but she died. I ultimately went on to take on her primary seven class and I took on her football team.

"She was an inspiration to me and I like to think I helped continue her legacy.

"I loved Knockburn, I have to say."

Liz became involved in the Glasgow Schools Football League and helped with the school team and the Glasgow team.

After five years at Knockburn she left and went to Wellhouse Primary where she stayed for three years before leaving to have her first son.

A seven year career break- and a second son - followed before Liz came back to teaching, taking up a post at Langside Primary School for two years.

A stint at Arden Primary followed before Liz became depute head of Castleton Primary for two years.

Finally Liz arrived at Merrylee Primary to be head teacher and has stayed there for the past two decades.

Under Liz's care, the school has developed a state-of-the-art playground - Liz describes herself as loving the outdoors and the playground as "second to none."

We told in the Evening Times in 2009 how Merrylee was home to Britain's first school urban play area.

It was modelled on similar school play zones in Switzerland and Germany and took nearly two years to design, fundraise and build.

Liz added: "It will be very difficult to leave the school and everything we have achieved but I'm so delighted that my depute is taking over because she fully buys into the ethos of the school and I know it will continue to get bigger and better under her stewardship."

Now she's a free woman, Liz's plan to is to travel on an adventure around the north of India.

She grew up reading stories about that area of the country and is also a huge fan of tigers.

Liz said: "I have visited India before but have always wanted to see the north and there has never been enough time to do it properly, even with all the holidays we get.

"So this is it. I'm going to the Himalayas and to see my tigers."

And on her return, Liz will be returning to Merrylee to tell the children all about her trip.

The head teacher thinks it will be January before it really kicks in that she has retired and knows the adjustment will be hard.

But she plans to stay involved in learning in some way.

Missing the pupils, parents and teachers, she says, will be the hardest part of retirement.

At a special assembly on Thursday former pupils and staff turned out to wave her goodbye, which Liz said left her feeling hugely touched.

She said: "We have a great staff and the parents have been amazing.

"We have a very diverse community at Merrylee with wealth at one end and deprivation at the other but the school community works so well to help one another.

"I will really miss the people because it's the people who really stay in your heart.

"I will always thik of the impact they have had on me and I have had on them.

"They have touched my life and I have touched theirs.

"I have worked with fantastic staff over the years doing the best job in the world."

Councillor Chris Cunningham, City Convener for Education, Skills and Early Years said: “We would all like to wish Mrs Mahindru a very happy retirement and thank her for her commitment and dedication to her many years of teaching in Glasgow.”