Damn Craig Robinson

Damn Craig Robinson. It's not enough that he's off in South America searching for inspiration via Ayahuasca, Boca Juniors and Brasilian cuisine, he is so busy gloating at the apparent success of Liverpool FC that I have been driven to start a counter thread to set the account straight.

But how, you may well ask, has that driven me to write a blog? Well in order to leave a comment on his beknighted blog I had to register with google and here I am with my own blog and the responsibility of creating content!

Actually I am secretly delighted with him if not for him. I have been intending on finding an outlet for my rantings about the British education system within which I am currently embroiled and employed and rather than simply transferring my angst to my nearest and dearest, with all the associated implications and consequences, carping into cyberspace seems the ideal outlet. So here goes...

'Education, education, education' was I believe the argot of the now departed Prime Minister, the slightly less than honourable Tony Bliar. Yes, he of the 'real and present danger' and 'weapons of mass destruction'. So why did we, and are we still pursuing his educational policies with abandon and teaching our kids from the National Curriculum? Because we're bloody stupid, stupid!

Now, before I respond to my own rhetoric perhaps I should establish my credentials and purpose. I am what is known as a Newly Qualified Teacher (NQT) having recently graduated with a BA (Hons) in English Literature and a Post Graduate Certificate in Education (English with Drama) at the age of 49. I have taught before, both as a private music tutor and in Further Education at a music college for post-16 students, and my previous varied and chequered career has certainly been educational. My own experience of education, as a Grammar school scholarship student, left me with a rather poor opinion of Head Teachers, Boards of Governors, and most - but by no means all - secondary schoolteachers. So I guess it is my personal crusade that has led me back through the school gates and into a comprehensive school.

Nothing, however, had prepared me for this the most gruelling year of my life! So here I sit, about to embark on a record of my perceptions and experiences, tales and anecdotes, stories and opinions about the good, the bad and the downright ugly of life in a secondary modern. I will begin at the beginning, so far as I remember it, and change only those details necessary to protect me from litigation and a premature end to a career that in spite of my desire to conclude, will end, somehow, on my terms.

So, damn Craig Robinson, I must now continue this to the bitter end, which is rather appropriate as he is currently writing his blog from Tierra del Fuego, which according to him is bitterly cold and certainly at the end of the world he is currently inhabiting. Damn him to Tierra del Fuego, and back of course.