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Do we need to write this down? A question that echoes through classrooms and schools. This podcast starts there, unpacking what school asks us to remember, what we leave behind, and how our education shapes us long after the lessons end. Because education touches everyone’s lives: your experience could be positive, negative or a mixture of the two, but it’s one of the few things that everyone has an opinion on.
This podcast discusses all elements of the education system in the UK and beyond, hosted by the Outreach team at New College, Oxford. Each week, Dan and Shelby are joined by industry experts, chatting about a wide range of topics including bullying, home-schooling, the importance of early years and much more. Tune in for a fresh and relevant deep dive into the theme of education.
Hello, and welcome to the first ever episode of. Do we need to write this down? A new podcast based on the theme of education, brought to you by, the team at New College, which is part of the University of Oxford. My name is Daniel Powell. I'm the head of outreach and communications here at the college, and I am joined by my wonderful colleague and friend, Shelby.
Hello. Lovely to be described as a friend and colleague. I'm Shelby, I'm the senior outreach officer here at New College. I've been here since 2021, so. Yeah. Gosh, about four years now. And I've been torturing Dan for about 4 years.
And the reason why we decided to start this podcast and hopefully why it's going to be an interesting podcast to add to your list of things to listen to is because we wanted to champion the cause, and the theme of education, as it's something that touches everybody's everyday lives. And that experience could be wholly positive. It could be negative, it could be a mixture of the two. But it's one of the few things in life that everybody has an opinion on. Everybody has an opinion on schools and what they should or shouldn't be doing. Evidence and opinion on what makes a good teacher, because it is something that we've all had this contact with. So throughout the series, we'll be talking to each other about our own experiences and our own history, and our own education. But we'll also be interspersing that with having some experts, on certain topics that all relate to this overarching theme of education. So we hope you're going to enjoy listening to us. We hope, we're going to be approaching things, in a fair and light hearted way, light hearted. We will not profess to be experts on lots of things. But we hope that we can, give you something that you perhaps will want to write down, in future, because that is a question, certainly, that I know plagues teachers up and down the country. Do we need to write this down? Well, let's find out.
So today's first episode is going to be talking about school, in general and what the point of school activity is and what we think the point of school is. And we'll also be talking about our own experiences as well. So that's a good place to start. We should probably say how old we are. I am 41 years old, nearly 42. So left secondary education in 1999. And then I studied A-levels until 2001 before coming to this university, to study geography, when I graduated in 2004.
Shelby, you’re younger than me.
That means I have to reveal my age. How dare you? Yes, I'm 31. I'm going to 32 this October. Oh my goodness.
That's young. Yes.
The problem is, you don't feel like it's young when it's your birthday. And then five years later, you look back and think, gosh, I'm so young. But yes, I did GCSE, I originally from North Wales, but yes, I did GCSE, I originally from North Wales, so I did GCSE, I did my A-levels, finished in 2012, applied to Oxford, did English in Oxford for three years. Absolutely loved it. I mean, I had a really good experience of school, actually. Surprisingly good because I had a very disrupted education. I'm originally from the Fairground community, so my parents, did not attend school for very long. My mom left school aged nine. My dad with school aged 14. They had a negative relationship with school, had a lot of problems. There was a lot of discrimination back then. So they had a real tough time with it. Whereas my experience for me and my sister was just a bit more positive.
But when you say you had a disrupted education. What do you mean?
Yeah. So, so, like I said, kids were from the Fairground community, so we would, put on fairs across the UK. And my both my parents families had been doing that for the last 200 years. So it's very much a family business. So when we were younger, we, we lived in a, you know, normal house, bricks and mortar house. But then when we were sort of 11, 12, my parents felt you know, they wanted to remind us of our community and our culture and our heritage. Not that we didn't know, but we weren't living that lifestyle. So, they, with great joy, bought a 12ft hobby caravan on the fairground ride and they're like, right off we go. So that's what we did. So we would be away from school for like 2 or 3 weeks. We do like Nottingham Goose Fair, Hull Fair those kinds of stuff with our fairground equipment. And then we would come back. Then me and my sister would go to school for like another 2 or 3 weeks and then we go again. So yeah, my attendance was all over the shop. I think the highest attendance I got was in my second year of school, and I got to the lofty heights of 68%. Which I thought was really good, but yeah, at the time the teachers were pulling their hair out, but but I was really good at school, so it was a tough situation for the teachers because they're always trying to push the, the attendance thing, which I very much get. But for me, I was I was always that smart kid. I was always able to do it and I could keep up with the work. The teachers used to do work packs for us when we would leave, and I would zoom through my work pack because I really liked my school work. And then I come back into school after being away, and everyone else was only like halfway through the work that I'd covered in two weeks. So, so it was a bit of a tight corner for the teachers to try and push you know the fact that I had to have higher attendance, but also the fact that I was getting in know some of the best grades in the school. So, so yeah, it was very disrupted. It's very disrupted. And I think I had a much more, you know, in inverted commas, normal school experience.
But I think the thing that probably unites our two education experiences is that we both love reading. Oh yeah. Absolutely. So that was certainly something that got me interested in in school, but also got me interested in the subjects that I went on to study at A-level and so on, with things like facts and figures and flags and capital cities such.
Such a geography nerd!
All these geography, sort of nerdy things that I like doing, but also reading fiction as well.
Do you remember where that comes from? Do you think there's a particular source?
I think my mum always read, but she always sort of says that by the time it got to books like, you know, Roald Dahl and the sorts of books that by that point we were, we were reading by ourselves. So it was always just something that I enjoyed doing before bed in particular. Yeah.
Did you have a torch by your bed?
I didn’t have a torch. I sort of never had to secretly read or anything like.
My mum was always telling me off. You still reading?
There’s worse things to be told off for isn't there? B
ut then I do remember, I remember in secondary school I picked the wrong subjects at GCSE, basically, and should have picked the sort of arts humanities ones. Instead got into the sciences. And I do remember my dad saying to me when I came to pick my A-levels and I said, I want to do English, literature at A-level. I do remember him saying, well, that's good, because you're the only 16 year old boy I know who goes to bed with a dictionary by the side of his bed. And you. Still, because. Of course. Yeah. Now you just use your phone, don’t you but I, you know, I had that interest in language, I suppose. And and in words. And that's something that I still love doing. And, and it's something that I want to instill in my children is a, is a love for reading. So I think that's one thing that even though our education experiences are very different, even though we, you know, both grew up in the same country, albeit in different parts at different times, I think the thing that we can definitely say we have in common is this once you once you learn to love reading, yes, everything else falls into place a lot easier. I think so, yeah. And maybe this is something that we can look at in later episodes. So then you had a disrupted education, but then you came to Oxford University and then what did you do after that? Well, did your education stop or did you then carry on?
I did all sorts of bits and pieces. I went to Oxford and I assumed, that because I was going to Oxford, everyone would want to employ me. And apparently that was not the case. And my mom and dad, you know, those outside of the fairground community, they could think of maybe like a handful of jobs, you know, you could be a nurse. You could be a doctor lawyer you could be a police officer. I still think that that's the only jobs you can have. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. So. So there wasn't any guidance from home? There was lots of support from home, which I think was very brave for them, considering that the fact that, you know, no one they know had gone to university, they had only, you know, had a very limited schooling. So it was very brave to sort of support me in this very new adventure for they and my sister absolutely hated school. But yeah, I didn't know what kind of jobs you could go for. So, so I found it quite difficult, particularly the early career stuff and I ended up doing two more degrees. I did a master's in business management at Bangor University because it was close to home. It was convenient.
Why did you do that? That sounds quite a jump, I think going from English literature.
Yeah, I was a bit lost. And the Welsh Government had a, there was a scheme on where it was quite cheap to do a master's at the time. I think it's finished now. So yeah, I was a bit lost. I'd just done, I'd just done a year and a half of my first real job, which was PA to the Marchioness of Linlithgow, which was sounds really fancy, but was very strange job. And I basically lived in this country estate in the middle of Wales and it just, yeah, it was a very, very strange job. And I was looking for a reason to come out of that. And then. Yeah, the Welsh Government had this thing on and I thought, oh, an MBA makes it sound like I would be much more employable. It did not help with my employability at all, but it kept me busy for a year. And then I did that and I worked a bit more, did a few different jobs. I was a bit. I was very lost, actually very lost in my early career. And my mum said, you know, you can do whatever you want. If you want to work a job and be miserable, you might as well stay at home and do the same thing that we've done. But you've got an opportunity to go and do some it where you get some money for doing something that you like, and that's, you know, for her, that was the dream for me to go and get to do something that, you know, I didn't absolutely hate. I suppose it's this idea that education can give you opportunities. Absolutely. Absolutely. Because I'd seen the experience of what my mum and dad had done. You know, it's very manual labour. It's very hard on your body as well as your mind. It's tough. It was tough the kind of jobs that they had to do. And so being exposed from that for young age and being expected to help with the family business, it gave me a very clear incentive to do something else because I was like, I've seen how hard this is. I don't want to be working in the wind, in the rain, like mum and dad still. Yeah. So I wanted to do something else. I just wasn't sure what it was that you could do. So yeah. Then I went to London to do a graduate diploma with the Courtauld Institute. That was in the history of art. Really loved that. I worked at the Imperial War Museum for time. Worked in a couple of different museums, in London. Enjoyed that. And then the pandemic happened, and then, yeah, I thought, why not give outreach a go? Maybe someone, somewhere will give me a job in outreach. And and, Dan, Dan was silly enough to.
And that someone was me.
Yeah, exactly. So I’ve got three degrees which is far too many for any reasonable person.
That is quite a lot, yeah, so. You must really love school then. You must really love learning. To, to, sort of, do three degrees.
I love it, and as a hobby I’ll do like online courses. I did a paleoanthropology one a couple of years ago. And I just love it. I just want to be able to sit down in lectures and just make notes. Don’t ask me anything about it but I just want to make the notes. So if we think then, about school and about education.
So as somebody who's had a lot of education. Too much. What what do you think the point of school, what do you think the point of education actually is?
Yeah, it's a really good question. My understanding of school was always that school is there to teach you stuff that your mum and dad can't teach you. so my mum and dad, they taught me a lot of stuff and a lot of it was practical. This is how you balance the books. This is how you, you know, apply for a bank account. This is how you clean your windows properly. All these, like, life things. So it's everything that your mum and dad can't give you. So my mum and dad can't teach me how to do algebra. They can't teach me how to analyze a text. They can't teach me what an oxbow lake is. So for me, that was how I
The classic geography question. Everyone always stems back to.
Exactly, exactly. So when people start saying things like, oh, in school they should. Ten years ago it was in school, they should teach you how to write a cheque. Who's going to write a cheque anymore? No one but some people say, oh, well, the school should do these more practical things. I was like, oh, that's your mom and dad's job, you know, teaches of us. I've got loads of wonderful academic things that they can instill in young people. The practical stuff, you know, your mum and dad have to do something, surely. So that's what I think school is about: teaching you stuff that you mum and dad can’t.
Yeah, that's quite a good way to think about it. Unless your mum and dad are a maths teacher. And then. Yeah, in which case you would hope that they can teach you.
No geography lessons for you because both your parents are geography teachers.
They were. Well, one was a Geography teacher. Yeah. One was just a yeah, had a geography degree. But if we think about schools then, and we think about sort of the schools that we went to and, you know, the buildings in particular, and I can sort of really close my eyes and think about what my school looked like. Yeah. what was your school actually like? yeah. It was built in 1939. I think it was a nunnery before that. It was a weird building This is your secondary school? Yes. My home, my primary, my secondary school were one school. And then they had There are two mobiles. You remember mobiles, those mobile buildings? Yes, these were called Different things. Yeah. See now what did you call them?
We called them. Mobiles. Mobiles.
See, I call them Demountables. Demountables. Yeah, temporary building innit. Other people call them terrapins. Terrapins.
What a tremendously bad name. Yeah. so you called them mobiles? Yeah. Okay, so we have these beautiful red brick buildings, which is like where the assembly hall was in the main reception. And then everything else was all of these temporary buildings that were only supposed to be there for like, 2 or 3 years. And they were there the whole time. It was at that, that school. So it was very parts of it all, very modular and modern, and other parts of it were sort of wood panelling and, and red brick, very strange conglomeration. What was yours like?
So my primary school is very old. I can't remember exactly when it was built. I think it was built sort of 19th century ish. it was very small. classrooms were very, very old. sort of very high ceilings, that sort of thing. and there was about 200 children in it. So it was small, for a village primary school. And then I went to a secondary school that was built in the 1970s. So it was it was very much reflective of the time, I think. Yeah. so, yeah, the buildings themselves weren't exactly inspiring places to be, but then that doesn't really matter. I don't think, because, you know, it sounds a cliche, but it's what goes on inside the classrooms that are important and usually what dictates what goes on in that classroom are the teachers that you have. so if you think about teachers that have had an impact upon you, who who are those names that sort of spring into your mind about people who you think, yeah, without them, I don't think I'd be where I am now.
Yeah. I remember Mr. Maddock, in Year 4. This is mad, he used to read out Swallows and Amazons, remember Swallows and Amazons books? And do they do that in schools now? I don't know. But he used to read So yeah. He used to read a chapter of Swallows and Amazons and like this is idyllic British childhood. Then, you know, we weren’t going to go and get in a coracle and row across a lake, but apparently that was the dream so I remember reading those that that was used for my English teachers in secondary school. I had two: Ms Harmsworth and Ms Parry-Hughes, and they were, I think, instrumental. So I liked reading. I definitely liked reading and I always would have considered English literature, but because those two teachers in particular were so charismatic and so good at what they did, I think that cemented my degree choice for me, and I think I would have enjoyed lots of things. I think I would have enjoyed History of Art, I would’ve enjoyed there's a wonderful course at Oxford called Archaeology and Anthropology. I think I really would have enjoyed that. But because those two teachers were so particularly good at what they did, I think that really, really swayed me. Yeah. You had a family tradition of doing geography.
I did have a family tradition. So both my mum and my dad did Geography in university, my sister, three and a half years older than me, was the black sheep. She didn't even do Geography A-level.
God. How dare she?!
and but, I mean, she was very different to me academically, which I think actually made life easier in some ways. So she was much more scientific. and she went to UCL to do medicine and is now a GP, whereas by the time I was 16, I knew that that wasn't something that I wanted to go down because I wasn't good enough for science, basically. Yeah, so in some ways, I think in terms of sibling sort of pressure, because we were so different, I didn't necessarily feel any form of competition or anything like that.
That's quite helpful.
My sister sat three of her GCSE exams. So that was there was always never going to be competition between the two of us. But it's good that the two of you were very good at different things. Yeah.
And then I think in terms of teachers, for me, if I think about the different stages of your education. So I think if that's the best way to think about it. I had two teachers in primary school in top of juniors, which we call J4 just the fourth year of juniors or year six, as they call it now. so I had Mrs.. Vahyden and Mr. Withy, and they were very forward thinking.
When you think about think back and look at education at the moment. What made them forward-thinking?
so 1. they taught to their strengths. So we had we had Mr. Withy who did the math side of things and sciences, and then we had Mrs Vahyden, who did English and all of the arts and humanities sorts of things.
So I remember in year six, I had one teacher for everything. But you had two teachers.
So we had two teachers, so we'd have a morning with one and then we'd swap over and we had that for the entire week. It seems like such a good way of doing it yeah. So my primary school, we didn't wear uniform, which again, was quite sort of liberal. in some ways. and then we did things like speechwriting. In Year 6? Yeah, we’d have to prepare a speech every week and bring it in in a folder, and we'd be picked on at random and asked to sort of speak aloud about a certain topic.
Were you terrified?
No, I don't I mean, I think because everybody knew everybody so. Well. Yeah. it didn't feel scary in any way in terms of talking in front of those people. but I think then what was difficult is that, like anybody finds the move from primary school to secondary school difficult. Yeah. I think it becomes more difficult when you come from a smaller primary school and all of a sudden you're in a big secondary school. Yeah. which is what I experienced. And, I do remember sort of being, there's a photograph of me on my first day in secondary school where I do not look happy. and I was lucky there in terms of my secondary school, I would say the teacher that I always think back to is my form teacher, who is a, you know, she was a girls PE teacher, so never taught me for anything. but she was just a really good form teacher and sort of looked after us, really well. And I remember her saying to us in Year 7, by the time you leave, I'm going to know everything about all of you. I'm going to know you all inside out.
Did she? A
nd she did. Yeah. And and it was mad then it's probably about ten years ago. I was watching the Swans, Swansea City play in the Liberty Stadium in Swansea as as it was then. And I was at the bar, I was getting a drink, and this voice next, she was like, I know that voice and it was Mrs. Moys my former teacher and she like, straight away. She just remembered, like everybody who was in our form. She was like, how so-and-so? How so-and-so? How's so-and-so? I said, my sister, who was not an athlete, would not have been on the radar of a girls’ PE teacher at all. She was like, “oh, how’s Hannah? How's she doing?” And it was just like, wow. From that side of things, you know, the pastoral element of teaching, I think sort of came through in secondary education. And then sixth form was definitely my geography teacher who inspired me to, apply to Oxford, so she was called Nicky King, and I think then I was just impressed that she knew so much stuff. Yeah and you just felt like you could go to her with any question, and she’d know what the answer was. and she was instrumental in getting me to apply to to this university.
Did you feel like you wanted to be that person that had all the answers?
Not necessarily. No, it wasn't that I wanted all of that knowledge, but it was just something quite impressive and, quite cool that you think. Yeah, she she knows this stuff. And I think that when I was a teacher, that's why I loved teaching geography, is because I felt confident that I. I really knew my subject. Yeah. you know, whatever age group you're teaching, you want to know that if an A-level student comes to you with a question that you know what the answer to that question is and I was so comfortable in my ability to do that.
And then I think the forgotten sort of cohort of teachers in some ways, and the teachers you have in university, because we didn't think of them as teachers as such, but they are. They are ultimately. you know, we call them tutors here at Oxford for a reason.
We’ve had some legendary tutors over the years as well, some quite famous names. Yeah. Did you have a favourite tutor?
So I probably I did have a favourite tutor. So in Jesus College, we had Colin Clarke, who is Professor of Human Geography, and I just remember he, when we finished, gave us a piece of advice that I always have remembered. wherever you are in the world. let me get this right now. Wherever you are in the world, you just need three things. You need a good map (being a geographer). Yeah, you need a good newspaper. to make sure that you're getting the right information. Yeah, and you need a good beer. And if you get those three things, wherever you are in the world, you won't go far wrong. And the other thing he said was the thing that Oxford University will teach you, that you won't appreciate, until in ten years time you're in a meeting, and you turn up and you just have one page of notes, and everybody else there will have pages and pages and pages of information that they're trying to get through. And you will just have picked out the important information. And I think that's something that I only appreciated, really, since leaving. And I think he was absolutely right. Yeah. yeah. I suppose it's different, you know, when you get to university level, obviously they know a lot of stuff that's. Yes, very few people know more than them. But when it comes to Oxford tutors, yeah, yeah. Now they are very interesting people. so I suppose then what we're sort of basically saying is that school and education should give you, opportunities. but it should also give you knowledge. You shouldn't be frightened to give you knowledge. Like you said, it should be things that your mum and dad can't necessarily teach you. That's right. By its very definitions. That's right. It should be different knowledge than the knowledge that you're accustomed to. And in order to acquire that knowledge, it's got to be given to you by somebody who knows more than you do. That's right. And who loves the subject.
I think it's got to be a big old nerd that teaches you.
So then if we think about some of the history of schools.
Here we go, very Socratic method. very Oxford Tutorial.
What is a school? So, you know, we're in a 14th century college here in Oxford now. Yeah. we're not in the building that was built in the 14th century. We're in a very modern place. but certainly, you know, there are there are schools in this country that were built hundreds and hundreds of years ago. I think the oldest school in the country is King School in Canterbury, which is 597 AD was when that was built. And at that time, of course, you then had the main purpose of schools was to teach people Latin.
Gosh. not my forte.
Not necessarily something that is on the school curriculum now, rightly or wrongly. but maybe we should, maybe we should test each other's Latin, see how see how we would fare.
I did start doing Latin on Duolingo. Did you?
I did, I didn't last. I I'm a obsessed with Duolingo as a as a learning device.
Do they do a soft G or a hard G? That's a real question. The Latin. The Latin, I don't know, I feel like this is the only thing I know about Latin. There's often, academic debate about whether it's a soft G or a hard G.
So can you give an example. Like, cogito ergo sum. So I think therefore I am. Is it called ‘cogito’ or is it ‘cogito’? I could be talking nonsense, I don't know anything about Latin or Classics.
I think I would say cogito, but that might just be me. I don't know, I dunno.
We'll have to ask.
We'll get a real Roman in next week. Yeah, here he is. Maximus, through the door.
So what was the phrase you said then called Cogito ergo sum, I think. therefore I am, I think, therefore I am.
What other Latin are you gonna test me on?
What about um quid pro quo. That's Latin. Quid pro quo.
I only know that they say that in one of the Austin Powers films. I don't know what it is. Is it Austin Powers? Different form of classical education. Yes. still a stone cold classic. Quid pro quo. Quid pro. Quo.
I feel like we should lean on Florie who is hidden behind the camera here. Producer Florie. quid pro quo. Quid pro quo, what’s that mean?
Means this for that. This for that.
I tell you, because you have tradesmen who do jobs. Quid pro quo Quid pro quo. They do it in Silence of the Lambs, don't they? At the end of Silence of the Lambs, the like sharing information do they. Yeah, yeah. Anthony Hopkins. okay. They share information. Because that’s when she says why is it called silence of the lambs? It's a quid. Pro. Quo. So spoiler alert.
Yeah for an old film. this for that. This for that. Quid pro quo.
Okay. what other classic, classic Latin phrases?
So I want to test on you because I had this inscribed in my university ring because I got one of those when I graduated. In fact, my dad insisted because we we are not a family of signet ring wearers. But, when I graduate, he's like, oh, you could wear a signet ring, I am now, I am now. So I had this inscribed. I had my, initials of my name. So SMH inscribed and underneath it, it said Carpe Diem.
Carpe Diem is seize the day. Seize the day? So ‘Diem’ presumably ‘day’, ‘Carpe’ ‘seize’.
That's right.
Okay, so that's a motto you now live by every day.
Every day, Dan. That signet ring. Every day I look at my outlook inbox and I think. I’m going to carpe the diem out of this day.
That's right, that's right.
Okay. I don't know any others. well then I suppose if we think Latin and we think about New College in particular, what makes New College very interesting is that it was founded by William of Wykeham back in the 14th century, when Latin was all the rage, absolute legend. yeah, yeah. He decided with the college motto that he wasn't gonna have Latin. No English. It's in English, and I believe I might in saying we're the only Oxford College to have an English motto.
I think it's the only Oxford or Cambridge College that's in English, which is pretty impressive given that some of them were built much more recently and still have Latin.
That's right. mottos. So what's the what's the motto of New College?
Motto is manners makyth man.
Manners Makyth Man. So if you ever watch Kingsman, They stole it. Yes. From William of Wykeham. Exactly, exactly.
And it's wonderful because it's, you know, how you treat other people. It's the mark of who you are. I think that's a wonderful message. So how does that then relate to William of Wykeham? We can clearly talk about education because, you know, he didn't just set up New College. He also founded, Winchester School as well, who have the same motto. So what's he meaning then when he says Manners makyth man, in terms of education, what is he trying to say?
I think certainly, and William's time, there's definitely an element of education as a form of refinement and a form of social mobility. So if you do well enough in your education, you can really climb the ranks. And that's what William did. Right? Because it wasn't he from like a very humble background. And he got, you know, pretty high up in the church. And he made his money. And I think that's his big message with with Manners makyth man. You you can improve yourself and that can, you know, be the stairway to a lot of success. So education is a way of empowering yourself in order to lead to success. Yeah. And social mobility. And social mobility okay. So education is a way of improving your lot in some ways. Yeah. Yeah. If you're given the chance to because that's the other thing, isn't it. Not everybody historically was given the chance to go to school. No, no, I mean, when William is founding places like New College, places like Winchester, it's really for boys. Yeah, there isn't really a lot that women can do, unless you want to go and join a nunnery, which isn't for everyone. yeah.
And and if you think about women in general, I mean, Jesus College let women in in 1970 something. Something like that. New College wasn't that far behind. But it's it's pretty late. Yeah. Certainly. Yeah. The last 50 years.
Yeah. I mean, when I was a student here, there was still a female only college. Yeah. I mean, that isn't the case now. Everywhere is mixed.
Yeah. Here in Oxford.
But if we think about people who get to go to school now, then, Basically it's a legal requirement of everybody. I think the term after they turn five has got to go to school, and then you're in school until, normally you set your GCSEs when you're 16 years old, and then it's up to you, what you go into in terms of, of A-levels and things like that. But then the confusing thing in this country is there are so many different types of school.
Yes, it's very confusing.
And you talk to the school children and they're all so confused about what it means to go to a grammar or what it means to go to a public school. You went to a you went to then a school that it's again, it's quite forward thinking. So yes, it's the same school from 3 to 18. Yes. Which they now call. All the way through schools. Yeah. And it used to be all girls. But when I started my A-levels, that was the first year, they let boys do the A-levels alongside those. So you can have schools according to gender. Yeah. So you can have girls and boys schools. Yeah. You can then have a school which you go to from 3 to 18. Yeah. But then there's everything in between. So let's try and see if we can oh gosh. Figure out the different types of schools that are in this country because it is highly confusing. Okay. So I suppose the simplest way to think about it is who funds the school first of all okay. Okay. So we have state schools. Yeah. Funded by the government. Yeah. And then you have independent schools funded by the fees largely paid by the parents of the children who attend those schools. Yeah. Those independent schools though are called public schools, but they're sometimes also referred to as private schools. Yeah. Very confusing. So there are already three possible labels there. And then we have grammar schools which can be state school or private state. So you have state grammar schools. So let's talk about that then first of all. So if we're thinking back in time grammar schools, the sort of my parents generation in particular would have had to sit an exam.
Is that the 11 plus?
Called the 11 plus, which you still have to sit in some parts of the country now in order to either access a grammar school. And it was called a grammar school because it links back to the teaching of Latin. Oh, that's why it's grammar. Is that where it comes from? There's they really love Latin, didn't they? They did love Latin. Oh my goodness.
So then you had okay, you go to a grammar school or you then go to a secondary modern school. What made it modern?
They didn't do they didn't do Latin I suppose.
No Latin. No. Very modern. Latin is off the cards.
So then you had those two types of schools there then since then. Well, and then also you've got schools connected to the church. Right. Okay you’ve also got Church of England schools.
I went to a Roman Catholic school.
So you went to a Roman Catholic school? Yeah. So you, you then have those schools that are connected to the church in some way. That's your Mass. Very boring. Right? Yeah. Can you still remember what you had to say?
I had to sing the mass because I was one of the few people that could sing in that school. So I sing the mass, and I did not. Please sing the Mass. No, we're not doing that, it’s been a long time. But but it was funny because when I got to my A levels and I stopped believing in God quite a while ago, but I still had to sing the Mass because no one else is going to do it. I remember you're plugging away on the Mass and thinking, oh my goodness, I can’t wait to not have to do this.
But that's again how high school has changed. Because, my daughters both go to our local village primary school that isn't a church affiliated school. but I went to school that wasn't church affiliated either or chapel affiliated in Wales, but we had to say a prayer every day before we had food. Yeah.
And I bet they taught you ‘All things bright and beautiful’.
We sang it in infants. Yeah, we sang it in infants. And then we said it in Juniors. Yeah. But now I don't think that happens unless you go to it. Absolutely. I don't. Know. I mean, I think quite a few schools do. So we have a mild Christian overlay. So we have that then we also have then. And this is where it starts to get really confusing. then we have academies. We have comprehensive schools. We have community schools. We have what other types of states. we have, multi-academy trusts, so that's one it's lots of academies in one big, lots of academies put together.
So what’s the difference between an academy and a comprehensive?
So an academy, is not affiliated to the local authority. It's not affiliated to the local authority. So essentially it's allowed to, particularly with its sort of finance and staffing and anything like that and management of the school. It can do it. It is there. It is very much so. It doesn't necessarily have to follow the national curriculum, although most of them will tend to. It seems easier. and then it can manage its budget in its own way. and it may well say rent the buildings from the local authority or something like that who will probably own the land on which the school is built. But the comprehensive is linked to the local authority. So what tends to happen then is comprehensive schools because there aren't, for example in Wales is a good example. Yeah. so the comprehensive school system has been retained there. So the academisation of schools is very much an English thing.
England, always doing weird stuff.
And that's the complication with that education in this country is that it's devolved to the different constituent nations of the country. Gosh, it seems like, so what happens in Wales doesn't necessarily happen to have in England, Scotland has got its own system. Northern Ireland has got his own system. So we have this highly confusing education system.
Which seems not considering that 93% of UK population have gone to a state school. So most people go to a school where the funding comes from the same source. Yeah. But then the manner in which that school exists.
Yes, is is very different. Yeah. The huge variety. And that's partly dictated by geography as well. So there will be some parts
Ah, you’re always shoehorning geography in there
There will be some parts of the country that have retained, for example, the grammar school system. Right. Just based upon where it is in the country. Yeah. so there will be a lot of grammar schools in some parts of the country, because that's just the way it is in that part of the country. where it's for example, in Oxfordshire, where we all know there aren't any grammar schools. So it's it's a very confusing system. that must be incredibly confusing if you come to live in this country from somewhere else. Yes. And you try and get your head around. First of all, it's this idea that some people pay to go to school and other people don't. Yeah. Then some people will go to to a school that they're going to be in from the age of three right the way through to when they’re 18. Some are going to be only there for a few years, and then they're going to go to a middle school. because that's the case in some parts of the country as well. You have a middle school before you go to high school. so we have this really confusing education system, that we try and say is the same. But it's not. But in reality, it's going to be very different in terms of how the schools are governed, how the schools are run. Free schools. That's another one that's come in fairly recently.
I thought all state schools were free schools.
So it's not that it's free to go to so a free school is a school that has been independently set up by somebody, with funding from the government.
So I could make my own school.
You could make a school.
The Shelby Homes school. You could make the Shelby Homes Academy. It wouldn’t be an academy. It'd be a free school. So you could set up your own school if you wanted to. And I think that there the government have to say yes, there is a demand or a need for this type of school.
Who wouldn't want to go to the Shelby Holmes school? Watch this space. You could have a Shelby school. The school where everybody listens to the Swallows and Amazons and reads. Dracula. Reads Dracula. And learns how to make candyfloss. You'll get my resignation in the morning, Dan and I'll be drafting up school timetables. Okay.
But then I suppose within that, there is this idea of every school should hopefully follow the national curriculum, right? Which basically means that you are going to learn similar sorts of things depending upon where we go to school. Okay.
So do you and I both know the same thing about motte and bailey castles? No.
Oh, no, not necessarily. Because then the other confusing thing is that there will be different exam boards. So by the time we come to do the exam. I remember this.
WJC in Wales, yeah.
So now in Wales there is, there is a sort of united exam board. But what I do in A-level geography in my school in Oxfordshire may well be different to somebody who's doing A-level geography in a school in Nottingham or a school in Liverpool, whatever it may be. So it's then confusing. It's confusing them for university lecturers because basically when people turn up, they don't really know who has done what.
Yes, of course.
So we do have a highly highly, confusing education system that we are going to try and unravel over the next few weeks. And months.
Yeah. as we delve into specific topics, we should do an episode on what our ideal scenario would be. That'd be great fun to hash that out. My dream school.
Yeah. Yes, yes. Yes, we both have opinions on that.
Yeah, yeah. so then if we think, we've learned all this stuff over the years in all these different types of schools, and we think back to what, what can I actually remember from school.
Not a lot and I liked school. I really loved school.
What can you remember from school? I can now only think about motte and bailey castles.
And what can you remember about?
I can't remember anything about them. Oh, yeah motte and bailey castles were great. So they’d dig a big ditch and they'd use the ditch the soils from the ditch to build this little hill in the middle. And then you stick a castle on top of the hill. Great stuff. What what more could you want? But this is depressing. I love school so much. I enjoyed so much of what I learned. The only thing I can think of is this motte and bailey castle. I remember building one. It was great.
I always just think my my knowledge of history. If somebody says to me, an historical event, I have no idea when that happened. Yeah, I have no idea when that is. Yeah. I have such gaping knowledge. Yeah in my history. That is quite depressing. One of the best things, one of my history teachers. But then obviously in history you know, is it important to know facts and figures like that? Yeah, are we saying that’s important? You can argue sort of one way or the other.
I remember my history teacher, Mr. Dicken. He he was about to propose to his partner, and he brought in this diamond ring. And it was his mother's or his grandmother's whatever to school, to school. It was important. It was important because he got this roll of loo paper and he rolled out.
What a romantic. Yeah, I know. Here’s some school toilet paper.
No, it was really clever. Because he was like, right, this is how long humans have been around. This is how long this ring ring has existed, because it was like a super old antique ring. And he, like, pointed it out, in this roll of toilet paper, like the ring had been around for, like, a lesson. Yeah. It was, it was good because you could see, like, humans had been around for so long. This ring has been around for like 200 years, which was like maybe like half one sheet of paper. And he was like, and we've been alive for this tiny bit. So it gave me that perspective of, you know, this is the the length of human history and how tiny an impact we have on it. It wasn't just him mucking around with toilet paper and a diamond ring. I promise.
I thought he was going to be like This is how long my love for you will last.
Oh, no, no, no, he did not propose to her in school. He's just showing us, you know. The length of history. Wow what a trusting teacher to tell you. He was. A legend. He, He once really impressed me because we were saying, like, oh, gosh. Yeah. You know so much. He was like, you're much harder to fool as A-level students, compared to the Year 8s, because the Year 8s will come up to you and say, Mr. Dicken, how many people died in the Peasants revolt? And he'll say, 3122 and they'll go, wow, you know, so much like that, I just made it up. I'm pretty sure you’re not supposed to do that, but but you get to the stage of of knowledge where you can kind of just, you know, it's a reasonable figure to come up with. Yeah, but he's very proud of us. But we weren't so easily fooled with his his facts. Yes.
But I'm always impressed when people do know extensive facts and figures. I do love a good fact or figure, but you know, to call on some big heavyweights now. You know, we've touched on what we think about education and why it's important. But, if you think about Martin Luther King, one of the greats, Martin Luther King, said the goal of true education was intelligence plus character. So I kind of feel that that's leaning into a bit of a William of Wykeham thing. Yeah. Definitely is Manners makyth man.
Definitely. I like that one. I like that one.
So what what do you think of that intelligence plus character?
I don't know if education can always build character. I don't know, I'm not sure about that. And then some more, some more modern, interpretations.
So we've got one person who you and I will be meeting later on in the year, a current head teacher who's called Sammy Wright.
Oh, yes. who’s written an excellent book called Exam Nation. I love it.
So he said school exists to prepare people to become functioning members of society. Functioning members. So that kind of goes against what you were saying in terms of, you know, schools should teach you what your mum and dad can’t.
Can’t wait to duke it out with Sammy because.
You could argue, well, how much of that role is is the parent to make sure that you become a functioning member of society? Is it fair to ask a teacher to create a functioning member of society? I don't know.
I suppose what school gives people and children that not all children are fortunate to have is some kind of structure? Yeah, and some kind of routine and some kind of discipline. that sadly not everybody has access to. So I suppose what he's saying there is that it is this leveller school, isn't it? Everybody, everybody does go to school whether or not people take the opportunity to come out of it as better people at the end of it, it's kind of down to them. Yeah. But you do learn a lot of what's right and wrong in school. I will say. Yeah. And there are social elements to going to school aren’t there. Yeah. You know, you learn so many of your social skills in school. It's this idea of, you know, how do I become the person who I want to be, but at the same time, how do I also make friends and how do I also fit in, and how do I behave at lunchtime? Yeah. And how do I say, actually I don't want to do that or I do want to do this. You know, there are navigating problems. Challenges. Yeah, there are all sorts of things that you have to navigate through, particularly a secondary school life, that aren't easy to do at an age where everything is so confusing.
Yeah, it's just the worst possible time to have to go through those sorts of things. You couldn't pay me to go through 13 to 16 again.
No, I don't think I would want to, particularly in the current climate. Oh, no. and I think this is, again, something that we'll explore in future episodes with some experts is. Social media and mobile phones. The pressures of of things like that. And also how, you know, AI’s rapidly changing the world in which we live in. but then there's another author, a historian, called David Kynaston, and he said, education is fundamental to creating who we are. And it's a sign of who you are as a society, what kind of education you have decided is standard for everyone.
Yeah, I think I yeah, I think that's a really good point.
And I think it also sets out the story of what a government thinks, you know. So it is. Absolutely. Blair’s famous education education education.
Yeah. it's what's important. What's important to Maggie Thatcher taking away the milk. Of what's what's important to, to the country. What's important to the people within it. and I, I quite like that as a statement. Education is fundamental to creating who we are.
Would you pick that one? Would that be one of those three?
I think I like David's the best. Yeah. Education is fundamental to creating who we are. because I think your your inner self is, in many ways a creation of what you've learned and how you experience the world.
Absolutely. and I think that's where our two subjects, even though they might appear different on the surface, you know, literature, literature and geography, they both in, in different ways teach us how to be a human being in the world of today. largely learning by the past.
Couldn't agree more. I couldn't agree more.
But on that wonderful note, I'm going to end, today's episode with something I can remember from school. Oh, excellent. Tell me, what can you remember from school? It'd be about geography. So I know it's not. It's about chemistry. Whoa. Okay. What I remember from chemistry. So I can I can name via and mnemonic. No. The first 20 elements of the periodic table. No, you can't, I can. Yeah. Go on, do it then. So I'll tell you the mnemonic. First of all. Camera. Evidence. So this is the mnemonic. So it was my GCSE chemistry teacher. the taught us this. So it was Harry, He likes BBC news on Friday. Nina Mgall sips chlorine and kills cats. Oh she's horrible. And that is the first 20 elements of the periodic table. Now, I must confess I have had to write these down. but he goes, Harry is Hydrogen. He is Helium. Likes is Lithium. B of the BBC is Berylium. The B Then for BBC is Boron and C is Carbon. So Harry likes BBC. News is Nitrogen. So the N for Nitrogen. On is Oxygen. And the Friday is Fluorine. I think that’s how you say that, Fluorine, Fluorine. Fluorine. The F is Fluorine. So that’s the first part. And then you got Nina Mgall. So that is Neon. Na is Sodium so N-A. Oh, yeah I remember that one. Mgall is just Magnesium and Aluminium. Then you’ve got. Sips which is Silicon, Phosphorus and Sulfur. Chlorine is Chlorine. I think he was running out of things to try and remember them. And then ‘and kills cats’. Is Argon, K is Potassium. And the C is CALCIUM. Wow. And they are the first 20 elements of the period table. I have no idea why I would every need to know the first 20 elements of the periodic table but I still do and I would’ve been taught that when I was in Year 10. So we’re talking years ago. It’s good to impress colleagues. It is good and it’s the sort of thing that one day will come up on a pub quiz. Absolutely, and it’ll be like. Got it. I know. Because of my potted education and the way my brain works. I think I’ve remembered the mnemonic but not the elements and that’s quite sad considering I did an AS level in Chemistry. So in our next episode it’s down to motte and bailey castles.
Oh gosh no I’ll have to think of something better for next time. But this was brilliant, I think it went very well.
Good.
Do you think they’ll let us do another one.
I hope so.
***
Thank you for listening to Do we need to write this down? with myself, Shelby Holmes and my colleague Daniel Powell. there will be future episodes on all sorts of things. Bullying, the importance of Early Years. AI in education, all sorts of stuff. so do tune in, keep listening. Do subscribe to the podcast. and we look forward to having you join us once again. Bye bye