Letter to Horsforth School

Dear Sarah

Thank you very much for inviting Friends of the Earth to give the assemblies this week.  Its been a very enjoyable and interesting experience for me and I hope the students have learned a lot.  They certainly seemed to be interested and concerned about the issues we touched on.  One boy in yr 9  thanked me afterwards and said he was very interested and asked if a 13 yr old could really write to the council or MP (I had emphasised that it’s all our responsibility to DO something to stop the rot).  Of course I said yes.  Another girl (poss yr 8) very sweetly came to say sorry she had had to leave the room for health reasons – and she didn’t want me to think it was for any other reason.  Another boy asked where the nearest FOE group is  (Leeds – but no reason why students shouldn’t start their own local one)

It would be great if more schools invited FOE speakers  since it was worrying to discover that the  students seemed unaware of this well established organisation and most of these crucial issues, and I guess this will be the case with most young people at the moment.  I spoke briefly with Ms W and offered to come back to discuss things in more depth with your school council or any other group.  I also suggested the school might want to set up a hustings before the election in early May so that students can see and hear at first hand what each political party has to say about these issues.  Possibly parents and  the public could be invited too.   I did emphasise to the 6^th form that all these issues ARE political and they should get informed.  As you probably know, FOE is not aligned to any political party, but their policies are virtually identical to Green Party policy. You will see that I am a Green Party candidate for May’s election – but I didn’t mention this to the students since I was giving the talks on behalf of FOE.   I was, however,  in two minds about mentioning this, since I feel it’s important that young people  (particularly girls) know that politics is a route they might be interested to follow as a response to their concerns.

On a practical note – I wonder if the school might want to reimburse my travel expenses which amounted to about 30 pounds for the 5 days (train and bus).  I have tickets if that would help.

I left a poster with reception showing bee-friendly flowers and wonder if the school might consider making a wild flower meadow!   The Woodland Trust is offering free trees to schools at the moment.  Last but not least, regarding solar panels – please see FOE’s current project to encourage solar on school roofs: I know you have some – but maybe there is room for more?!

Please convey my thanks to Phil the techno wizard for his help and to everyone else who made my visits so pleasant.   Thank you again, Sarah,  for making the effort to invite us: having been a teacher myself, I know it’s a big effort to go beyond the excessive day to day workload to make external arrangements!

Very best wishes

Shan Oakes

For Friends of the Earth

School cancels Christmas

Bah Humbug!

The cancellation of Christmas by the Oasis Academy at Nunsthorpe, near Grimsby (in N-E Yorks according to today's Metro!)  says it all about the madness of the current approach to education.   The primary school says  they have to 'raise standards'  before reintroducing music and drama productions because they came bottom of a league table for  English and Maths.  An angry parent renamed the school  'the Scrooge Academy' .

A head teacher who had turned round a London school through music and the arts was outraged. The fact that schools have now reached the stage of  bizarre decisions like this is an indication of the depth of the crisis in education. School governors and heads have bought in to the myths of Gradgrind methods because they are lacking wise leadership from government.  Dickens' ‘Hard Times’ has morphed from being a satire to becoming a text book.  Talking of Dickens, the  UK government should be put through Scrooge’s nightmare experience in ‘A Christmas Carol’…..they need a dose of those ghosts warning against a preoccupation with cash boxes, ledgers and exploiting the workers.  Then they might – just possibly – realise the error of their ways.

The North East Lincs 'academy' may be an oasis from Christmas, but the UK government's approach to education (and society) is now an oasis from humanity and good sense.
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State schools 'not providing group worship'

'Many state schools in England are not providing group worship, despite legislation making it a requirement, a survey suggests. The Comres survey for BBC local radio found 64% of the 500 parents questioned said their child did not attend daily acts of collective worship. 60% of the 1,743 adults asked said the legislation should not be enforced.'

I agree with them and have felt this for a long time. To me, enforcing ‘worship’ is appalling and this aspect should be separated from the activities it is linked with. The activities such as getting together and story telling (as long as the stories come from all over the world), and singing are great, but not enforced ‘worship’! If we got rid of this ludicrous element in schools, there would be no need to start all the various faith schools.

Here’s my secular version of that well known hymn (my favourite when I was small), All things bright and beautiful:

All things bright and beautiful, all creatures great and small, all things wise and wonderful, we must care for them all….

Young people and political debate

I spent a very interesting afternoon last week observing an East Riding Youth Assembly meeting in Beverley where young people were putting themselves forward as potential members of the Youth Parliament for the UK. 30 secondary school students spoke about what mattered to them - and it was all about justice. Issues included lowering the voting age, divorce and its effect on kids, bullying, the need to listen to young people’s views and to talk about disability in schools, unfair attitudes towards young people, and lack of things for young people to do. It was very impressive – and all these issues are championed by the Green Party whose slogan is ‘Fair is worth fighting for’.

The afternoon proved how caring young people can be, so it’s worrying that, in my experience, many young people don’t vote at all, often saying they know nothing about it. This allows the ‘grey’ parties (and the far right parties) to win seats because many older people seem to vote out of habit - or protest. It’s often younger people who want sensible fair Green politics, but who don’t vote…so its easy to see why we don’t get the positive change we so desperately need.

So, I’m inviting colleges and schools to please hold hustings (a meeting with questions to a panel of politicians) in the run-up to the general election. There was a Green landslide vote at Wolfreton School hustings (see below) : when people hear Green policies they like them. If you know a school or college (or, for that matter, any group at all) which is looking for a Green speaker, or a Green panellist for a hustings, do please get in touch with us.

'Supersizing' schools and community

In response to John Roberts’ article about ‘supersize’ schools (Dec, Yorkshire Post), I should like to make one or two observations.

I do not think children’s experience of school is dependent on the size of the school per se, although I agree that children respond well to ‘being known’ - which is usually easier to achieve in a smaller institution . Whether a school is successful is dependent, in my experience (as a former teacher, parent and former officer in local education authorities), on the quality of relationships both within the school and between the school and the community.

I have just spent a morning as a guest at Kingswood, a secondary school in Hull, with Year seven. The children couldn’t have been better behaved or more engaged and thoughtful. I was very impressed. What I noticed was the mutual respect and good humour which was evident between staff and students, and the politeness and good listening skills of the students. In addition to a high respect factor, I understand that Year 7 is organised in such a way that students do more discussion and project work than is usual in secondary schools, and I suspect that this allows for a more relaxed and student-led approach to learning than the usual dominance of ‘subjects’.

When students (of any age) are allowed to learn about things which interest them, and at their own pace, they learn faster and more effectively. This is why we need to remove from our schools the frenetic drive for pressure to ‘perform.’ The well-known struggle to reach state-imposed subject ‘targets’ often becomes a barrier preventing staff and students from acknowledging and respecting each other as people. The school scenario becomes dominated by stress and competition with many falling behind in the race and feeling disaffected and disgruntled.

Many children come to school with huge personal issues which are rarely addressed due to the time pressure created by ‘state’ obligations. A Green education, on the other hand, would be child-centred, firmly based in the community but also looking outwards to the rest of the world, and founded on respect for each individual and his or her unique contribution.

Shan Oakes
Shan@voice-international.net