Gervase Phinn: Bog standards matter

When I first visited the comprehensive school which my sons attended, the headteacher, Tony Storey, who had the distinction of being the country's oldest serving secondary headteacher, asked me if there was anything I wished to ask or anywhere I would like to visit. "The boys' toilets," I told him.

"You are either a school inspector or a plumber," he replied smiling. I told him I was the latter. The toilets were clean, well-kept and free of graffiti and litter. There were locks on the cubicles, soap, paper towels and adequate toilet paper. I knew then that this was no "bog-standard comprehensive" and was proved to be right.

That same week I visited a primary school in Carlton-in-Snaith and found the amenities of the same high standard. It was bright, cheerful and welcoming building which I entered. The headteacher, Peter Holgate, who had spent 30 or more years in the profession, gestured to a veritable tower of folders and files in the corner of his room. "I get guidelines, recommendations, policy documents, circulars, questionnaires, reports, handbooks, strategies and I don't know what else, every week. I do wish people would not waste their time and money producing what has been said so many times before and allow teachers to provide the best environment for learning and get on with their teaching."

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He was right, of course. So much advice sent to schools has been given before. The Handbook of Suggestions for Teachers, produced by the Board of Education in 1936, is far more sensible, intelligible and interesting than many recently produced directives. For example, on the school itself, is the paragraph: "The school cannot perform its functions adequately unless the premises themselves are an example of what we naturally associate with a civilised life. The building should be dignified and pleasing as well as conducive to health. The internal decorations should be bright and attractive with specimens of good craft work and suitably chosen pictures placed to best advantage. The school, moreover, should give an impression of order and cleanliness, reflected for instance, in the care of books and apparatus, in the proper storing of clothes in well-kept cloakrooms, and in the tidy appearance of playgrounds and offices. The school should, in short, be a source of comfort and inspiration to the children while they are young, as a place where, for an important part of their

day, they can pursue their studies in a friendly, healthy and civilising atmosphere."

I was thinking of this paragraph when I visited one particular secondary school. It was a run-down, shabby-looking Colditz of a place enclosed within high red brick walls. The corridors were bare, save

for a few dog-eared posters on the walls, and the rain had seeped through the roof leaving dark brown

stains on the ceilings.

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In the boys' toilets, which were smelly and dark and bereft of soap and toilet paper, there was a long list of pupils' names stretching down the back of one cubicle door. The heading read: "Sign here if you think this place is a dump." I was very tempted to add my name.

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