Another Big Event in Jacks life.....

Yesterday was a big day for Baby. Yesterday she started at secondary school for the first time. This is a massively exciting and nervous time for any child. The closest thing to this for me will be starting my new role in a couple of weeks, but lets face it…I’m 45 and more than experienced enough to brush this off. But for Baby, a little girl of 11, who still sees the world through bright un-cynical innocent eyes, it’s a very big adventure.

Nowadays they open the school for the new entrants a day early in order to allow them to acclimatize to the new environment, to get used to where everything is, to meet old and new friends. Frankly this is a marvellous idea because I remember my first day at secondary school and the traumatic event it was back in …..fucking hell…… 1973. It seemed that back in those days no concession was given to the new intake, nor to be fair was any sought by us or our parents. In these days it was always about just growing up and coping. When I turned up at my new school in Hayes End certain things struck me as being very different. Playtime had become a “break”. The Hall was used for assemblies only instead of doubling up as a gym. There were separate changing rooms as opposed to just getting your kit off in the hall, or in the toilets. PE was done in proper kit as opposed to being done in just your underwear (they were very innocent times back then!). Some of the boys were very tall, some had the voices of men. The girls were different too….some were mousey, some swotty and some were basically women. The classrooms were much bigger, there were mysterious classrooms called “science labs” with all sorts of important looking equipment in them. There were woodworking and metalworking huts when those were still viable career options. There was a motor mechanic workshop when cars still ran on mechanical engine parts and not on electronics and software. I can still remember the smell of baking wafting through the corridor outside the Home Education classrooms.

Going from Junior School to Secondary was a very big change of environment, but the first day or so was usually pretty hellish for boys. There were two main forms of “induction” pretty much encouraged by teachers, or at the very least overlooked by those more in tune with the changing sensitivities of the profession from be-suited ex-forces disciplinarians to jean wearing long haired socialists. That was the style and attitude division of the male staff. The comb-flicking was the first and most prevailing induction rite. This consisted of being flicked on various exposed parts of the body, ears being the favourite, with stainless steel combs. Resistance usually met with a bit of a hiding, as did any sort of crying at the pain. The second and thoroughly most unpleasant was the dunking of the head into the toilet whilst it was flushed. Sometimes it had just been used. Again, any resistance was futile as the subsequent beating was even worse. If you got that then there was no point in complaining because you were told either to get on with it, to not be a grass or that no-one had seen it. At times, and for some of the kids, it must have been an experience similar to that seen later in the film Scum.

The female staff style and attitude went from Mrs Hole (60 plus, dowager, dressed in twin-set and pearls, very serious and never laughed) to Miss Wild (early 20’s, mini-skirted, leather booted, long dark gorgeous hair, flirty, smiley, fancied by all the male and no doubt some of the female teachers). These extremes in the attitudes and styles of the teachers seemed very different from Junior School. Suddenly young female teachers became “interesting”, young male hippy teachers were seen almost as friends rather than adversaries. The older suited and booted guard were seen as figures of fear to start with until you were in the 3^rd year (as we called it back then) and then they became sad figures of fun, there to be ridiculed, ignored and humiliated whenever possible. I think they knew their day had come and gone in teaching. Roger Waters depiction of the teacher in The Wall was very close to the truth for the older guard, and I often imagined them going home at night to a huge, domineering beast of a wife who would make them eat their dinner and refuse to allow them to watch any TV.

Girls thought I was cute because I was (and am) short. This gave me immediate in-roads to girls from all years…I’m no mug when it comes to using any physical or mental advantage to gain female affections! Combined with the sudden awakening provided by the likes of Miss Wild, Miss Mackie and Mrs French gave school a whole new aura for me. Women and girls had suddenly become interesting.

It was a rough old school as well. It was often closed during the miners strikes as it was heated by coal, but also because the old heating system was notoriously unreliable, combined with being easy to sabotage by unruly 5^th formers. Days off because of the cold seemed quite frequent. I remember the second week being in awe of the 5^th formers rougher element that refused to acknowledge the end of break bell. When the teachers came out to remonstrate with them and order them back in, they simply stubbed out their fags and started chucking coal at them. The teachers were stunned, not least of all when the 5^th formers finally decided to go back in by “steaming” the teachers, and assembled younger hordes. I got hammered by some lanky ginger prick in the cricket nets that day because I stupidly thought I could watch the ensuing chaos from the sidelines. I had to tell my mum the bruises happened whilst playing football. Weeks later, that beating was seen as a badge of honour and boosted the respect I had, such was the warped value system in place at the school. As time went by, I learnt the way to avoid being bullied or beaten up was to be the clown. I had (and maybe still have) the knack of making people laugh and this became a very powerful weapon for defence. I reckon that still works today, but more so in disarming pomposity, snobbery or hesitancy.

I remember so much about that first day and those first few weeks I could probably write TV series based on them alone, let alone the subsequent years to the 6^th Form. At the time they seemed so stressful and steeped in obligatory respect and fear. Of course now, after 28 years in the working environment, they also seem like the most carefree days I ever had. I trust the new way devised for Baby and her generation is better and judging by Teenager’s apparent enjoyment of school it seems that today at secondary school is very different and far more positive and enjoyable than in my day.

And long may it continue that way, despite the naysayers harping on about falling standards and easier exams. Looking back I think I’m where I am in spite of the education system I grew up under and not because of it. Yes, I can read, write, add, multiply, subtract etc……but the social education of such an environment could not, looking back, have been a positive influence on my development.