The Older I Get The Better I Was Update and Tribute

I started teaching in 1976 and spent four years and two terms at my first school, a High School in Rowley Regis. Someone very recently posted a teaching staff photo on Facebook and it stirred some powerful emotions: I wasn't on it; I’d only just left when it was taken and in spite of my absence it’s a good photo! The colour quality is good and it captures the essence of the memory I have for my former colleagues. As is the way of things on Facebook, someone posted another photo, a black and white one of the Staff Football team: we were playing the 5^th Year (Year 11’s now) in a match that celebrated their final year in school and the restorative (albeit temporary) power of the male ego: you know, “The older I get, the better I was,” sort of thing. No one took it dreadfully seriously a light-hearted piece of “pupil engagement”.

1976 marked a time when challenges to the assumed comfort of education as a key player in developing a productive and employable workforce were raised; notably from the political left. Jim Callaghan and Shirley Williams each voiced concerns about the worth, value and relevance of what was taking place in our classrooms. In doing so they added fresh fuel to a debate that eventually led to changes that have in so many ways “wiped the smiles off the face of education.”

And there is the starkest of differences: fun. Things like this happened regularly and often:

·          Teachers running lunchtime activities (Formal)

·          Teachers running lunchtime activities (Informal)

·          “Catch Up Classes”

·          Teachers having time to socialise and build up productive relationships with the kids

·          Teachers having time to socialise and build up productive relationships with each other.

·          Whole staff social events

·          Spontaneous “stuff”

As I reflect on the journey we’ve been forced to take, it feels that we have lost some of the essence of purpose that made a job a calling. It’s hard to look at the “progress” we are alleged to have made without concluding that it has been successful largely in an unintended outcome: it has made a calling a job.

The above reflections gained an additional poignancy this week as I read (again on Facebook  about the death of a former valued colleague, Bob Ashwood. Bob was a talented teacher, a great colleague and one of the rare people whose character becomes part of “what goes on around here”: they effortlessly shape culture. The warmth and esteem in which Bob was held is clear from the response to his untimely death from the people he taught. Bob helped keep the smile on the face of education and his passing creates a reflective space that is occupied in no small measure by talent, integrity and a lightness of touch that is often only the property of professional heavyweights. His work outside of teaching is captured in this link. http://www.athleticsweekly.com/news/athletics-community-pays-tribute-to-bob-ashwood/

It feels that Bob’s life was about “a calling,” one that touched countless numbers of people from many walks of life.  

The Older I Get, The Better I Was!

I started teaching in 1976 and spent four years and two terms at my first school, a High School in Rowley Regis. Someone very recently posted a teaching staff photo on Facebook and it stirred some powerful recollections: I wasn’t on it; I’d only just left when it was taken and in spite of my absence it’s an acceptable photo! The colour quality is good and it captures the essence of the memory I have for my former colleagues. As is the way of things on Facebook, someone posted another photo, a black and white one of the Staff Football team: we were playing the 5^th Year (Year 11’s now) in a match that celebrated their final year in school and the restorative (albeit temporary) power of the male ego: you know, “The older I get, the better I was,” sort of thing. No one took it dreadfully seriously: a light-hearted piece of “pupil engagement”.

1976 marked a time when challenges to the assumed comfort of education as a key player in developing a productive and employable workforce were raised; notably from the political left. Jim Callaghan and Shirley Williams each voiced concerns about the worth, value and relevance of what was taking place in our classrooms. In doing so they added fresh fuel to a debate that eventually led to changes that have in so many ways “wiped the smiles off the face of education.”

And there is the starkest of differences: fun. Things like this happened regularly and often:

·          Teachers running lunchtime activities (Formal)

·          Teachers running lunchtime activities (Informal)

·          “Catch Up Classes”

·          Teachers having time to socialise and build up productive relationships with the kids

·          Teachers having time to socialise and build up productive relationships with each other.

·          Whole staff social events

·          Spontaneous “stuff”

As I reflect on the journey we've been forced to take, it feels that we have lost some of the essence of purpose that made a job a calling. It’s hard to look at the “progress” we are alleged to have made without concluding that it has been successful largely in an unintended outcome: it has made a calling a job.

Exclusion From School-Inclusion In Prison.

Edinburgh University has carried out research that suggests that excluded pupils are more likely to go to prison as adults. I'm pretty certain that many of its readers will have reacted with mock (Oh really!!!) shock: did we need another report to tell us this? Well, yes and here's why. Looking through the TES summary http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6318854 there are some success stories and maybe we should be focussing on what appears to work.

I was brought up in Birmingham and we are blessed with the "Number 11 Outer Circle 'Bus Route. 

The route takes you around 26 miles of Birmingham and when we were kids....yes you get it, this is how we spent our sad gaming platform free existences. It prepared me well for my work in Education generally and working with challenging young people particularly: mainly because if you wait long enough, the Number 11 will, unfailingly turn up again and do the same thing as it did the last time. Only the drivers (and heck the dates me) and  the conductors were different.

The Education Workforce has been driven around the place by a plethora of Drivers and monitored by a head scratchingly diverse range of conductors some of which should not have been allowed anywhere near the Education Bus. Others have skipped along a continuum of bus driving techniques

• Break neck and destabilising-inducing panic and vomiting amongst the passengers
• Ponderous to the point that everyone thinks we've stopped
• Indifferent to the needs and understanding of the passengers-about their journey requirements, arrival times and so on.

Amongst all of this uncertainty, one fact remained the Number 11 would always be there.

And here we have it. Schools, academies and other providers are subject to regular changes in the manner in which they are expected to deal with challenging young people. The report "Vexed Questions over Exclusion" raises an interesting success story: that Schools with behavioural values based tend to do better in addressing challenges and that punitive approaches work less well.

Teaching values is tough: particularly when we consider how we (the adults) manage the gap between our Espoused (what we stand for) Values and our Lived (What we really do) Values. Kids can spot the gap from miles away and the bigger the gap is, the less credibility we have, proving to them that Monkey Say and Monkey Do are two very different monkeys that pretend to be the same one.

We can take a punitive approach-a "Short, Sharp Shock" that has more to do with organisational revenge than moving processes and people forward in a meaningful manner. It will gain populist applause and eventually serve no one as thresholds slip, consistency vanishes and appropriate responses to challenge converge into a Number 11 Bus route of sanctions.

Where we have have strong values, where what and who we are is informed by what we do and say and vice-versa, we stand at least a chance to deliver a strong message based on how we deliver the values we espouse. And yes, there need to be sanctions, sanctions that go hand-in-hand with well measured support and access to a range of options that engage with the person, not just the behaviour. This might give us a better chance of keeping the important link between the provider and the child.

I'm off to relive my childhood on the Number 11!

Self Esteem-The Four Rooms

Introduction

Our work with people takes us to some interesting places and over the last couple of days I've been checking out some ideas and observations in the context of Transactional Analysis. As is often the case, some tangential work sprang to mind and here it is-an easily digestible metaphor for how we stay in touch with (or otherwise) those feelings and beliefs that nurture or attack our self-esteem.

Self Esteem might be described as “the way we think about ourselves” and there can be a number of pulls on our self-esteem, sometimes in opposing directions. The human capacity for listening to negative messages is truly alarming and too often these are the ones we hear, think about and use as evidence to justify a low self opinion. They also give “permission” for others to adapt a negative view of us, thereby reinforcing our poor self-appraisal.  It may be useful to use the idea of The Four Rooms as a way of understanding the power of poor self-esteem. We can think of what we would accept other people knowing about us as a special house with four rooms. It's also worth considering what it is we are prepared to know about ourselves rather than what we are content to believe about ourselves.

Room One

Conditions of Entry:

We are happy to allow anyone into this room, there’s nothing here we would want to hide from public view there are no items or photographs on display that might embarrass us or lead to difficult questions being asked.

Room 2

Conditions of Entry

Some of our closer friends and family members are welcome here but there are things in this room that are private and by entering we agree to an understanding that nothing on display or discussed here will be talked about with others outside of our close circle. In this room we can be joyous or unhappy: it gives us permission to express our emotions and receive those of others

Room 3

Conditions of Entry

This is a very private room, one that only a few people have had any access to. There are things on display and lying around here that give us sometimes painful, complicated and difficult to understand messages abut ourselves, who we are, what we believe in, what we care about, what gives us joy and what hurts us. Most people are unaware that our house has a room like this.

Room 4

Conditions of Entry

No-one is allowed in here-often we deny ourselves permission to enter because we know that beyond the doors there are powerfully felt examples and memories of those events and feelings that have made us the person we think we are

Which do we keep open?

Which can't we close?

Which do we not dare enter?

Where do we become stuck?

131496 Hours Ago And The Future!

We've been engaged by a valued client to support a complicated change process that involves relocation, reorganisation and realignment, Apart from that, it’s pretty straight forward. 

When we looked for an approach that was developmental and sustainable we agreed that the processes and philosophy of Appreciative Inquiry would be a strong candidate to engage the management team and to enable them to deliver the process to their teams. I wouldn't want to add to the volumes, production numbers, quotes and conferences that have been conceived, born and flourished around the concept of change: I’d just like to state the obvious, that no matter how we wrap it up-you know “challenging,” “exciting opportunities,”-and so on, change is for a number of people both threatening and tough. It’s also inevitable as a number of organisations are required to make sense of and adapt to a rapidly shifting context in which one of the certainties is that there is likely to be more uncertainty.

An important component of Appreciative Inquiry is the capacity to understand and celebrate who we were, what we did and what happens on are “best days” and as a coach/facilitator I guess I need to be pretty attentive to conversational pearls that help me to help the client recognises their “best days”

.

Something turned up in a conversation exploring those occasions where we feel lifted and encouraged by an event or interaction. My client referred to an occasion where his help had been requested by a student (Service User). Unsure of how to approach the challenge my client and the student worked through it together, arrived at the solution and had each learned a lot from the other as they were required to get to grips with the technology and its application from two  very different perspectives.

My client talked about this with real pride and stated that it sets out what he values most: to teach and to learn as a transactional rather than an instructional process. Where was this energy accessed from? It was an event that took place

15 Years ago

Or 180 months ago

Or 780 weeks ago

Or 5479 Days ago

Or 131496  Hours ago.

And it steers the future.

131496 Hours ago And The Future

We've been engaged by a valued client to support a complicated change process that involves relocation, reorganisation and realignment, Apart from that, it's pretty straight forward.

When we looked for an approach that was developmental and sustainable we agreed that the processes and philosophy of Appreciative Inquiry would be a strong candidate to engage the management team and to enable them to deliver the process to their teams. I wouldn't want to add to the volumes, production numbers, quotes and conferences that have been conceived, born and flourished around the concept of change: I'd just like to state the obvious, that no matter how we wrap it up-you know "challenging," "exciting opportunities,"-and so on, change is for a number of people both threatening and tough. It's also inevitable as a number of organisations are required to make sense of and adapt to a rapidly shifting context in which one of the certainties is that there is likely to be more uncertainty.

An important component of Appreciative Inquiry is the capacity to understand and celebrate who we were, what we did and what happens on are "best days" and as a coach/facilitator I guess I need to be pretty attentive to conversational pearls that help me to help the client recognises their "best days".

Something turned up in a conversation exploring those occasions where we feel lifted and encouraged by an event or interaction. My client referred to an occasion where his help had been requested by a student (Service User). Unsure of how to approach the challenge my client and the student worked through it together, arrived at the solution and had each learned a lot from the other as they were required to get to grips with the technology and its application from two  very different perspectives.

My client talked about this with real pride and stated that it sets out what he values most: to teach and to learn as a transactional rather than an instructional process. Where was this energy accessed from? It was an event that took place

• 15 Years ago
• Or 180 months ago
• Or 780 weeks ago
• Or 5479 Days ago
• Or 131496  Hours ago.

And it steers the future.

Teacher Bashing Dips as Weather Warms!

This week I am pleased for my colleagues and friends who are employed in the Education Workforce because  they might now be able to go about their business without any more than the usual level of comment and interference from Tabloids, Talk Shows and Tirade Mongers.

Last Thursday's edition of Question Time morphed into a pastiche of the "Four Yorkshire Men Sketch"  (Python. M. Drury Lane 1974 http://tinyurl.com/bb6ubeo ) as the Q T panel members vied with each other acquiring as they did the skill of opposites, talking hot air about cold weather.  The snow, or more accurately the response of schools to it being there has given countless opportunities for pundits around the country to "talk snow balls." Opportunities that say more about how small-minded and vindictive we have become than they enlighten or provide a basis for sensible and informed discussion.

Sometimes I dislike predictability: at its worst it can take me back to the wet Sunday afternoons of my childhood: oppressive, grey and unrelenting. But guess what, there are other occasions when our inbuilt need to conserve that which is dependable fills me with something like joy and so when I hear "It's 'elf and safety gone mad!" comments I find myself (a) punching the air  and (b) wanting to punch the person who's fallen into this lazy analysis of important and difficult decisions.

I wonder if anyone else has noticed that schools are large and complex organisations that require a lot of people to arrive at more or less the same time (remember how easy the school holiday time commute is in comparison)? Before opening their collective mouths with yet another salvo of asinine observations, commentators might want to think about where schools are. Generally they are where people are-you know, houses and stuff , often on busy and not always easy to reach urban environments. Here's something else, the workforce doesn't live on site and have to use the same roads and systems are all blessed with.

I'd like it fine if the tub-thumpers would just have a look about. They would see most schools are quite old and when planning permission was granted it was given (I'm guessing here) without too much consideration of how the workforce and learners would get there in challenging weather. The date(s) of the buildings (or yes, the sites) suggests that they were acquired at a time when there was much less commuter traffic and ruddy faced children could snowball their way to school and make ice-slides in the playground. A broken bone was as nothing providing it wasn't jutting out through the flesh. Even if it was, fathers could be relied upon (after work) to pick up their osteo-damaged offspring , throw them across the crossbar of their bike and whistle home where mother might apply a poultice.

Society has done a fantastic job in training schools to be risk averse and with that idea in mind I wonder what the view of pundits would be in the event of a loss of life or serious injury that occurred to someone when on a journey they didn't need to be making to a place that no reasonable person would consider should be open?

Well the snow has gone and we can expect a return to a more usual fare of "under-performance", "unemployable kids" and (Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a winner!), "the holidays.

Jeremy Forrest The Teacher Who Should Have...

A massive chunk of the news the week before last was devoted to the story of Jeremy Forrest and Megan Stammers; the 30 year old Maths Teacher who ran away to France with his 15 year old student. They've now been found safe and well in Bordeaux; Megan has  arrived home and will be talking to the police in the next few days, and Mr Forrest has now returned home to face questioning and charges of Abduction of a Child.
Clearly a child protection issue here, then.
Situations like this aren't exactly unknown, and certainly in the last 10-12 years there has been huge upheaval in the law relating to child protection, which is reflected in policies and procedures of positions where adults have conduct with children or vulnerable people. It almost beggars belief that, in this day and age, a situation like this is allowed to happen. And while the case hasn’t ended as tragically as some of the situations that marked the change in stringency, it is worth looking at some of the things that could have been handled differently.
1: Safeguarding Training

Safeguarding students is the first priority for teachers. For a long time now, it has been mandatory for teachers to receive intermediate-level safeguarding training as a part of their induction. While the training and CRB checks do not have to be repeated, it is nonetheless considered good practice by government guidelines to provide safeguarding training and repeat a CRB check once every three years. The training instructs teachers on what to do in the event that a child discloses something to a responsible adult, and also includes a section about what to do in the event of an infatuation.
Mr Forrest would have got the Child Protection training as a matter of course. If Bishop Bell School had failed to provide or at least arrange for the training it would be a serious case of poor management, and the issue is far too contentious for schools to allow that to happen. The man is 30; he will have seen the high-profile cases that relate to child protection that happened within at least the last 10 years, including those where pupils form a relationship with their teacher. The outcome of such cases is rarely good for anyone.
To this end it is hard to see how Mr Forrest could not have been given the training, the warnings, and every possible signal that forming a relationship with a student and running away to a different county with her is an extremely bad idea. More likely he chose to ignore it. Online sources suggest that “love,” a rather broad term that can bring out the very best in some people and the very worst in others, clouded his judgement. However, the fact remains that he had a choice, and he made it. He made the decision to form a relationship with the student. He arranged for them to leave the country. He was looking for work in Bordeaux to sustain their lives there. This sort of thing does not get planned on a whim; what happened was his decision. Whether Megan influenced some of the things that were decided is beside the point; Megan is a minor until she turns 18, and Mr Forrest is a so-called adult in a position of responsibility. Most will therefore regard Mr Forrest as the instigator of the eloping to France.
So if we ask ourselves if more could be done to promote awareness of the inherent dangers and issues amongst professionals, we may find ourselves thinking; ‘Not if some teachers throw all that training, guidelines and law back in our face.’
2: Did anybody else know?
For a story that ends with the couple eloping to Bordeaux, it is hard to see how the relationship could have gone unnoticed. Even though there had been some criticism of Bishop Bell School over how they handled concerns over the maths teacher, the matter certainly wasn't ignored. However, it is clear that a vital piece of action was left unattended, namely that the school should have immediately contacted the Local Authority's Designated Officer who would have instigated a series of actions preventing the further mismanagement of the case.
Megan’s parents were unaware of all of this until it happened. Hardly surprising, as this is not the sort of thing you tell your parents. However in a press conference during her absence,[1] they did state that it was completely out of character for her, and they had no indication that this was going to happen.
This is a stark contrast with the school, which was aware of concerns and were investigating them. In fact it directly contradicts a statement made by their headmaster Terry Boatwright: “The school, in conjunction with the local authority, Megan’s parents and the police, had been investigating the concerns when this happened.” So if they had been in contact with Megan’s parents about a concern, how is it that they knew nothing about it?
It is possible that some of Megan’s friends at school were aware she was planning on running away.[2] Should they have come forward to tell the school what was happening, perhaps putting a stop to it before it happened? Perhaps, and in some cases they said that they had,[3] but on the whole it appears unlikely that these rumours would have come to anything. Even if Megan had told her friends she was planning on running away, her friends may have disbelieved her simply because they do not want to believe she would do such a thing. Former pupil Shanice Dolan said that she knew some people who had crushes on teachers but nothing that would come to this.[4] So student infatuations with teachers weren't exactly unknown; what reason would they have had to believe it would go as far as this?
Mr Forrest’s parents have told the press that their son had been in a bad state for a number of months, and that they were disappointed that the school did not step in and do anything about it.[5] Whether these implicit mental health issues are true or not, and whether they gave rise to what happened, it should be remembered that a teacher’s work is largely unsupervised. It is unlikely that any of Mr Forrest’s colleagues would have noticed any problems, so unless Forrest himself went to his managers and said “I’ve got a problem, what help can you give me?” the chances of the school knowing about any mental health problems were slim. Given the nature of the problem and the fact that it involved a relationship with a student, it is hardly a surprise that Forrest did not turn to the management of a school for help.
3: The Police

Sussex Police have been doing everything in their power to bring Megan back safe and well, and Mr Forrest to justice. However, once it became knowledge that they had arrived in France the responsibility of tracking them down was shared with the French Police. They had a different approach to the investigation because of the different laws in their country: As the legal age for consent in France is 15, which Megan is, the French Police were treating it as a missing person enquiry rather than an investigation of child abduction. While no police force would take either matter lightly, it should come as no surprise that a missing person enquiry would not get the same level of attention as an investigation of child abduction – and by itself would not have been enough to arrest Mr Forrest, as it is not a criminal offence to go missing.
That being said, it was from CCTV footage and witnesses that Megan and Mr Forrest were eventually found. Mr Forrest would have known what kind of attention he would be given in the United Kingdom were he to run away with a fifteen-year-old girl, and that knowledge most likely contributed to his decision to go to France in the first place. Arguably, then, an investigation of child abduction would have forced them to make another move; it may have taken even longer to find them than it did. Ironically a less heavy-handed approach to the enquiry would probably have done more for the mutual benefit of all concerned.
Of course, all this becomes irrelevant once the European Arrest Warrant was issued, which means that Forrest could be arrested in France for a crime he committed in England. While the terms of the European Arrest Warrant means that he cannot be charged for any offence other than Child Abduction unless he voluntarily agrees to do so[6], it is nonetheless conducive to the fact that Forrest is now in custody and is awaiting extradition to England. It was a curious juxtaposition that on the same day Forrest was apprehended under the European Arrest Warrant, the Prime Minister of Great Britain and Northern Ireland declared that his government intends to pull out of many of the European Policing and Crime measures – including the European Arrest Warrant.[7]
Sussex police have been guarded on the subject of enquiries into concerns raised about Mr Forrest before their disappearance; concerns and suspicions had been raised as early as last February and even though the school refused to comment on the matter, it has been reported that Mr Forrest was due to be suspended on the day he and Megan went missing. The school are not obliged to directly involve the police in any investigation unless the people under their care are in danger or a criminal offence has been committed, and the school’s own policy would dictate whether or not to contact the police regarding the concerns about Mr Forrest. We would however wish to restate our previous point: school should have made its concerns known to the Local Authority Designated Officer.
However, one point that is a little puzzling is the matter of the return tickets. Mr Forrest had pre-booked the ferry tickets to France to leave on Friday and return on Sunday, and the investigation was ramped up when it became apparent that they hadn't returned. They will have had their reasons for waiting, but surely disappearing off to France with a 15 year old girl will be cause for some concern and investigation regardless of whether or not they intended to return. Why didn't they act straight away?
4: Border Control

A quick note about this, as the ins and outs of border control are far beyond the scope of the point that this article is trying to make: Could the border controls for England and France have done more to check who was going in and coming out of their country?
In the case of England, the answer is no. They are not obliged to check on the identity on anybody leaving the country; only the ones who are coming in. The only reason I can think of that they would have checked on either Megan or Mr Forrest was if the alarm had been raised, someone on border control happened to receive the message that Megan had gone missing, and associated one of what must have been a large number of people coming through that day with Megan’s description; possible, but not likely.  Remember, it would not have been common knowledge at that point that they planned to leave the country, so they had little reason to suspect that they would try. Ironically, the last confirmed sighting of Megan and Mr Forrest was when they boarded the ferry…
The French authorities are obliged to check on people coming in to their country. This either happened or it didn’t, and until either party says one way or the other, we will never know which it was. However, if the French Border Control checked on the identities of every passenger coming into the county, it would be all they ever did; it’s not hard to imagine that the couple could have got away without being checked. And even if they had, Megan was travelling with Mr Forrest’s wife’s passport.  Megan and Emily do look something alike, and several people have been quoted to have said that Forrest looked younger than he is, and Megan older than she is. It may have been enough to fool the authorities into letting them through.
To conclude, then, despite the best intentions of border control in both countries, it is unlikely that they could have done anything more to prevent this from happening.
5: Social Networking

Social networking, as most professionals now know, is both a blessing and a curse. On one hand it is great to be able to keep in regular contact with people, talk to them outside of their normal working hours, and as Facebook in particular has over a third of the entire population of the internet on it, the opportunities for marketing are vast.
On the other hand there are clearly some problems with it when used in any capacity, particularly professionally. As communication is often limited to text, tonal inflictions on messages can be easily misinterpreted, giving the wrong message and potentially causing offence. Writing is considered a pre-mediated act and once something is made in writing, it is very difficult to convince people you didn't mean it. Also, having the wrong sort of person in contact with you can lead to some very awkward questions being raised.
It is now common knowledge that Mr Forrest was communicating with some of his students on social networking sites, and particularly Twitter.[8] A lot of it was to do with the students coming to see Forrest’s band perform live, so Megan was not the only one. However, the nature of some of the messages between Megan and her teacher, for example: “In late-June, after Megan tweeted: “I just want to runaway forever,” Mr Forrest wrote: “Me & you. :-) Let’s just run away[,]””[9] would have set alarm bells ringing in even the least cynical people, if those messages were in the public domain rather than private. Whether any of the actual arrangements to run away were made on Twitter I don’t know, but the social networking site was certainly conducive to the development of their relationship that lead to the incident. If the right questions were asked about either Megan’s or Mr Forrest’s on-line conduct, the situation might have been resolved before they left for France.
With a substantial amount of attention on child abuse, paedophilia and how abusers might use the internet and social networking sites in order to do it, the inherent dangers of adults being in permanent contact with minors are obvious. If an adult has the contact details of a child, he leaves him or herself open to allegations of abuse – which, even if proved to be untrue, will come up on any future Criminal Records Bureau check. While there is no specific law saying that adults can’t be in contact with children through social networking sites, it is considered good practice for organisations who deal with children and vulnerable adults to forbid on-line social contact as part of their policy. It is not known at this point whether this was the case with Bishop Bell School. Some organisations like Universities or Higher Education Institutes – which isn’t quite the same thing as the issue at hand as their students are usually above the age of consent, though they are still open to allegations of abuse of position – maintain email contact or a social network-style contact with students, but this is most often done over their own secure servers on which on-line conduct can be monitored and any concerns investigated. If anybody in a school is in contact with a student over email, it should be done in this manner.
To this end it is perhaps a little surprising that nothing was done about Mr Forrest’s use of social networking. The messages between him and Megan were often private, but there was open contact on social networking sites with some of his other students, both present and previous, for some years. This conduct is not generally regarded as acceptable for a professional in Mr Forrest’s position, and, had it been investigated previously, might have brought the issue into prominence before he ran away to France with Megan.
Megan’s conduct on-line raises the same question that has been asked to parents since the advent of the internet: Do you know what your children are doing on-line  In this case, clearly not; neither parent suspected anything nor had they seen the messages between Megan and Mr Forrest, the situation would have been quite different had they done so.
Parents are encouraged to monitor the on-line conduct of their children, but very few parents would find such a task easy. It is one thing to restrict access to a computer that the whole family might use, but many children have computers or laptops in their bedrooms, and in the last few years we've seen an increased use in smart-phones and tablets. Short of running a permanent monitoring trace on all of those devices, or simply not allowing their child to use them, it is hard for parents to monitor their children’s use of networking. Apart from anything else, a child would often find such stringency intrusive, invasive and quite hostile. The environment that this would create may influence a subliminal or even forced decision that the situation is better ignored than managed.
It is quite a frightening thought, really. With an electronic device that is rarely out of reach of children, your child could access anything that is publicly available and talk to anybody in the world. How much can and should be done to monitor its use?
6: Mr Forrest’s Protestations that he ‘ Hasn't Done Anything Wrong.’

Sorry Jeremy, but yes you have. You've done many wrong things on a number of different levels, not least of them:

• Forming a relationship with a student half your age, and more importantly for whom you had responsibility as she is legally a minor and under your supervision,
• Running away to France with said student, where different laws on the ages of relationships apply,
• Disregarding the rules of your workplace and the safeguarding training it provided, bringing your school and a number of your colleagues in to disrepute,
• Ignoring the media messages going out for the last decade which should have indicated to even the least observant individual that there was no way this was going to go unnoticed and un-investigated,
• Effectively cheating on your wife in order to do this.

So physically, mentally and morally, Mr Forrest did get a lot of things wrong. This list does not include the many fundamental errors in the execution of the plan that eventually lead to his arrest, including dumping his car, the CCTV footage, running to a place where his parents guessed he would be… we could go on.
Given the happy fact that cases like this often end in tragedy, it’s hard to see Mr Forrest as a villain in the same light as Ian Huntley, Julian Levene or Josef Fritzel. His own father has been saying that while he is not a violent or evil person, [Jeremy’s parents] have been worried about him for some time; he is in a bad state.[10] He didn't intend any harm to come to Megan and was apparently convinced they were doing the right thing; a bold thing to say in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. More likely, then, he made a severe lapse in judgement and behaved extremely irresponsibly towards his friends, family and the students he had responsibility for. Does that in any way excuse his actions? No. I think I can almost guarantee that nobody in the United Kingdom is going to take this lightly.
Mr Forrest will, however, have this hanging over his head for the rest of his life. He has been quoted to have said that he will not fight extradition so he can come home to be “near to the one he loves.”[11] Sorry, but that’s not going to happen. He’s facing a charge and indisputable evidence of child abduction; he’s not going to get away without doing at least some time. His wife wants nothing to do with him, and he can pretty much forget about ever being a teacher again. So that’s his marriage, career and relationship over before he will even be allowed outside without supervision. Even if he should be granted anonymity, the whole country knows his face; he’s going to have to start his life all over again.
Jeremy Forrest also wants to tell his whole story. The tale of this entire incident told from the point of view of its instigator will make for very interesting reading indeed, and will most likely raise as many questions as it answers. On a personal level, one question to which I am looking for an answer is: Is it possible to feel pity for the man? We recognise that it would be difficult for the parents of children who could potentially be put in this position to feel the same way, but nonetheless, there are a lot of factors that contributed to this situation. It would be a sensible course of action to examine these factors in order to fully understand why it happened.
Conclusion

It is hard to know how much more could have been done for either Jeremy Forrest or Megan Stammers to prevent this unfortunate incident from happening. The school had taken appropriate measures by delivering safeguarding training and were supposedly investigating concerns. It is unlikely that anybody else knew they were planning to run away, or if they did, they didn’t believe or report it. It is possible that mistakes could have been made by the Police and Border Control, but their decisions were made for a reason and given the circumstances, they were bound to get a few things wrong. And whole books have been written on the potential dangers of social networking for all concerned.
Mr Forrest himself remains something of a mystery. With the reports emerging of a bad state of mental health, plus the fact that he is still pining for a relationship that cannot exist with his student, it can be suggested that the man is not in a good place at the moment, nor was he when they ran away. However, this could, should and in some cases was recognised by his friends, family and a great many others, not least of them Mr Forrest himself. Confidential help does exist, but he chose not to seek it, and it has not been reported that anybody close to him suggested that he should do so. Instead, he formed an illegal relationship with Megan, made and executed a plan to run away to France which he must have recognised he would never get away with. As Megan is a minor, Mr Forrest will take responsibility for this and the consequences will be deserved. But maybe he needs some form of help that the British Judicial System is unable to give.
As part of our commitment to maintaining our understanding of safeguarding issues, DY3 Solutions will be attending the Child Protection Conference at the end of October. It provides an annual update in terms of legislation, practice and case law. We will be very interested to see how this case affects the climate of safeguarding, and whether it will influence any change in policy and law. We will keep you updated with any relevant information.
Matt

They Aimed Higher and Made A Difference

My working life is blessed. I meet great people and work with them on interesting, challenging and worthwhile projects. Aim Higher is one of them. If there's a downside to Consultancy, it's that you don't always get to see the outcome or bigger picture of your work and its impacts.

Yesterday was very different: Having been invited to join an awards panel, we adjudicated on who should be recognised in theses categories:

• Mentee of the Year (Key Stage 3)
• Mentee of the Year (Key Stage 4)
• Mentee of the Year (Year 12)
• Mentor of the Year
• Mentor Co-ordinator of the Year.

Without going into the way the activities relate to each other, it is sufficient to state that you don't get deliver high quality mentoring to Learners and Students without engaging capable, enthusiastic and committed mentors who are received in schools, academies and colleges by co-ordinators who are professional, flexible and sure footed. All of this needs to be underpinned and led by high-quality professionals who are capable of  imagining, actualising and delivering. Yesterday it all came together as awards were allocated in recognition of commitment, endeavour and dedication.

There are commentators on today's young people who would do well to one day "share a chair" on such an occasion and listen intently to the difference made by dedicated students, in the middle of their course-work, holding down part-time jobs, dealing with new and challenging cultures, making their way in an increasingly hostile and challenging world. I would want them to hear what I heard: passion, determination, humility and purpose in engaging-as mentors-with learners who need an extra input in order to enable them to begin to reach for their full potential. There was yesterday, no place for cynicism: just the acknowledgement of the power of dedication, service and a determination to improve the lives of others through actions.

The drive home along the relentlessly unforgiving M6 is some days better than others. Yesterday was one of the best ever!

Why Do People Delay Before They Report Child Abuse?

The NSPCC’s review of its Helpline Service “Helping Highlight: a Year in Review” http://bit.ly.Hn6qTh produces some interesting and worrying information. In 2011 nearly 45,000 people contacted the NSPCC, worried about a child. For those watching the Manchester derby tonight, it’s about that many-a ground full.

This is a 29% rise on last year’s figures-good, more people are getting in touch with their concerns. Here’s the worrying bit: 56% of those whose call produced a referral said they’d delayed getting in touch for over a  month-thus leaving the child at risk for a longer period. Here’s the breakdown:

• 12,000 (almost) calls-Neglect
• 8,000 (over) calls-Physical Abuse
• 6,000 (almost) calls Emotional Abuse
• 5000 (over) calls Sexual Abuse

The amount of calls to the NSPCC has, over the past 5  years, doubled. The NSPCC now has a facility to contact them by text message. (  88858 ) they aim to make contact within 3 hours of receiving the message. In 2011, 40% of those who contacted the NSPCC by text said they would not have made contact without the texting facility

Without ever under-estimating the difficulty in making a contact, we need to work hard to deliver the message that we all share a Common Law and an Ethical Duty of Care towards Children, Young People and Vulnerable Adults. The abuser’s power grows in the assumption of silence.

Six Ways To Destroy Yourself: Regularly and Often

I was going to attend a Business Networking Meeting today and can’t: I have had to re-prioritise a couple of things that have to be in place by next Monday and that’s it. So what to do? Telephone my friend and associate T and tell him that “I can’t make it and here’s why. ” Do I enjoy this kind of call? No, and I wrestle with my sense of letting myself and others down. I do understand though that there is a greater loss if I fail to complete on the other tasks-due next week and running late. So, a call to make and a blog to write.


I thought I’d use today’s example as one of the ways in which we occasionally tear ourselves to bits. Competing priorities are only part of it. A more difficult challenge is “What do our decisions say about us?” Well, here’s the rub: “Is it better to make an early decision and state that this can not be done, or is more desirable to turn up, rushed, distracted and pre-occupied: which is the more damaging message and which will, in the course of time, cause more reputational harm?” So, I’ll work through today and resolve the outstanding priorities and bear in mind as I’m doing so, they are reasons, not excuses.


I picked up a copy of Dale Carnegie’s “How to Win Friends and Influence People” -timeless and sure footed in its message-you need to be active and positive in the manner in which you engage with the world and the people in it. He gives-in a nutshell-Six Ways To Make People Like You and I love the simplicity of the message. Here they are:


Principle 1


Become genuinely interested in other people
Principle 2


Smile
Principle 3


Remember that a person’s name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language
Principle 4


Be a good listener, encourage people to talk about themselves
Principle 5


Talk in terms of the other persons interests
Principle 6


Make the other person feel important-and do it sincerely
OR


Self Destruct Principle 1


Others don’t matter, they have little to say that’s of any interest unless you feel you can make a few quid, dollars, euro out of them. Beyond that their lives are 1 dimensional and beneath your contempt.


Self Destruct Principle 2


Smiling is for sycophants who honestly believe that their ingratiating fawning will work. Think yourself as a player in a world-wide poker game in which any betrayal of emotion will lose all you’ve gained, making you vulnerable and beaten, add into the equation an air of mystery and inscrutability-practice these expressions in the mirror (not the one in your car-others will think there’s something the matter with you-and if you’re doing this, there probably is!) Try your new found skills at your next meeting social gathering: bring something to read.


Self Destruct Principle 3


Just tell other people this, “I’m bad at names, I meet so many important people in the course of a day I have to prioritise my brain-space, so remind me; who are you again?” This I find is a brilliant way to secure seclusion, tranquillity and ultimately, poverty.


Self Destruct Principle 4


Learn how to feign attention, interrupt and tell people about something you’ve done that is more exciting, has earned more money or has demonstrated how smart you are. Combined with Self Destruct Principle 3 above, this becomes a powerful strategy that ensure that people will never forget you. They might not want to remember you but that’s not the point.


Self Destruct Principle 5


Other people’s interests are just that: they are other people and therefore consigned to the midden of “dull and pointless”. What of course, they are really waiting for is to hear about you.


Self Destruct


It’s much more important that other people understand how important you are: you might forget them abut they must not be allowed to forget you. The above Five Principles, applied singly, in combination or (and why not go for it?) all together will leave an indelible impression on those lucky enough to have met you.


Good Luck!

Let The Non Swimmers Drown-The Coalition's Approach to Domestic Violence

Introduction


The Guardian has published bad news for that will reduce access to legal aid for targets of Domestic Violence.

 http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/oct/30/female-domestic-violence-victims-lose-out-in-legal-reforms

We offer Awareness Raising programmes to the Public and Private Sectors-feedback from our programmes has been exceptionally positive: we base them on verifiable information that is delivered in a direct "no frills" manner, allowing the power of the information to create the impact.

Participants aren't wilfully ignorant however it remains pretty clear to me that unless you are

• A target of domestic violence and abuse
• A friend or relative of a target
• A support worker or other professional

it is less than likely that you'll have a picture of the reality for the 3 million women per year (UK) whose lives are blighted by an abusive relationship. It doesn't stop with the target: children too are adversely affected with well researched impacts on their educational and emotional growth.

I wonder what questions the decision makers asked themselves: here are some from one of our training packages

(a)   How do perpetrators isolate women? How do perpetrators make women feel unable to do anything right through enforced trivial demands thus taking away their confidence in believing that they can make a change for the better

(b)   How do perpetrators degrade women, what threats might a perpetrator use? Well, one of the ways is to make the financially invisible and therefore almost completely dependent.

(c)    How might a perpetrator display total power by showing who is in control? What small “nice things and treats” might constitute occasional indulgences? Total financial control equals total power. The occasional indulgence? More power and control

(d)   How are women kept physically and emotionally exhausted by perpetrators? What distorted perspectives might a perpetrator use to justify his behaviour? There are as many as there are perpetrators and targets-what we know is that the collective impact of the behaviour is to take away the individual's capacity to believe that they can break out of the relationship and begin a new life under the protection of the law

And it's my belief that unless you are asking these questions and plenty more you are not going to understand the impact of a decision that restricts access to legal aid and support at a critical time.

They might also want to ask

How might perpetrators use children to increase their control and decrease the resistance of the target? How might they use children to:

1. Humiliate
2. Force compliance
3. Ensure silence is maintained
4. Force a woman to stay in an abusive relationship

and that often the resolution of such complex issues requires the force of law.

Is it that they do not understand that impoverishment is part of the abuse and that the target may be effectively without any means of support at and beyond the point of leaving?

This is a poorly thought out decision that requires challenging in a very public forum. There is, as far as I can ascertain, no evidence of alternative funding streams. A disgrace.

Last Month Coady Consultants made significant progress in the way our training is delivered by recording some audio tracks and asking the trainees to respond to them. While this sort of thing is not unknown, it is the first time the company has tried something like this and we really were going out on a limb in order to make it work. Here’s how it all happened:

"Reflective In The Studio"

One of our clients has us involved with a project called Dignity At Work, where if somebody is having a problem at work with, for instance, their colleagues, or procedures that don’t fit their comfortable work patterns, they can call a Dignity At Work advisor who can advise on what to do, which procedures to follow, who to talk too etc. The project has been live for several months now, and though it has been useful when it has been used, the feedback that we received from our training sessions gave the impression that the team were becoming disillusioned with the lack of calls they were receiving. It is difficult, therefore, for development as an advisor to come with experience, so the group meets up every so often, typically 3-4 months, to discuss progress and how to move forward to deliver a better service. In response to this, Coady Consultants took the step of devising a way to deliver some training that would give the team some experience and knowledge of dealing with issues that might arise in their role.

The initial idea was to conduct the training in the form of a ‘role-play’ scenario; however this was not well received. Role play is a challenge which not all the members of the team were willing to accept, and it would be difficult to construe what was happening in the role play as a ‘realistic scenario.’ John Dooner then came up with the idea of doing it as an audio recording, and called me in to a meeting room to brainstorm the idea…

The project started off with John suggesting that I write ‘radio playlet’ scripts for the audio tracks that eventually became the sound project. This was something I was more than happy to take on; creative writing is something I really enjoy doing! Then we brainstormed ideas on how we might get these scripts in to a presentable form for delivering training. The suggestions went from recording it into a mobile phone – not a popular one for presentation – to hiring actors, recording studios, equipment, engineers and doing a massive production job. I must admit at this point I was feeling somewhat incredulous about all this; it sounded like a great idea but it also sounded like one of those things that sounds great when you’re talking about it, but when it comes down to actually doing it the whole thing becomes too mad, breaks down around you and you just get on with the mundane activities that keep your life ticking over. But then again, through my experience as a musician I’ve had experience in dealing with recording studios, I know some actors, or at least some people who could do it, and as I have said, I enjoy writing… there’s no reason why it shouldn’t work. So I took on the project, and threw myself in to what became one of the most challenging and enjoyable experiences of my employment.

The first step was to write the scripts. My brief was to come up with several different ways of how not to answer a call that you might get as a DAW Advisor, and a couple of good ones as well. We had chosen to base the tracks on a true story of a long-running piece of work we were in the process of completing. We changed the names and places, but I was writing about real things and real people with sensitive issues. We were always going to do this; it lends an extra layer of plausibility to the end result. But as with any piece of creative writing, it’s not going to work without some semblance of a plan, and I had to keep in mind that everything that happens in a call – what is said, how it is said, why, how it all ends etc – happens for a reason. I therefore set about coming up with a few scenarios for the complainant, Emily, based on four points during her sorry tale where she might have called a DAW advisor, if she had the opportunity. I did the same thing for scenarios that somebody who works in an office might find themselves in which might be reflected in their mood and how they deal with the call, e.g. the end of a long day, just come out of a disciplinary hearing, in the middle of a meeting, bright and enthusiastic. It was then a case of matching the two separate scenarios together, and writing the scripts around that.

The actual writing was easy after the initial planning stage. The fact that I have met the people on whom this story was based and know quite a bit about them meant that it was not hard to deduce what might be said and how an advisor might respond. One point discussed in the initial meeting that I was eager to get across was the fact that some people may be struggling with quite a complex set of emotions, and would have to make a terrific effort to convince themselves that it is worthwhile making a call. What that person doesn’t want is to be told that the advisor is too busy to talk to them, or that they think their problem is petty and below their attention. This was a matter that came up in discussions with the actors I eventually hired and the team to whom we delivered the training; the issues that Emily was calling with do seem quite petty and spiteful, playground stuff that shouldn’t really have found it’s way in to work. And yes, it was all that and more – but at Coady Consultants we feel that the fact that Emily had to deal with these problems, which also included a troubled personal history, on her own with little or no help from her employers, made a significant contribution to the damage it eventually caused.

Incidentally, one of the scripts was actually written about half an hour before the first and only rehearsal the actors had! This was due to some communication difficulties; my scripts had highlighted most of the pitfalls that DAW advisors might fall in to but not all, and it took a while before I was informed of what I had missed. Bearing in mind that I did not know from the outset exactly what ground to cover, getting 6 out of 7 correct is not bad at all, but I’d left out the idea of over-promising, so when I finally found this out I had to come up with a script for it very quickly. However, this wasn’t a problem; I came up with a generic script for Emily and an enthusiastic response from her DAW advisor and all was sorted out.

The next step was to hire three actors; a significant challenge. I could, had I wanted to, have found some booking agents and hired out professionals to do the job. A number of things stopped me from doing this, not least of which money. While I had been given no specific budget to work to, I knew roughly how much money we were making from the job itself, and I guessed that I wouldn’t be allowed to throw money around indiscriminately. Also, it was the first time I had tried to do something like this and I didn’t want to hire professional actors to do a job that I’m doing at – not an amateur level, but I would prefer if my actors came in with no expectations that I expect to fulfil. So I had to find my actors elsewhere. The plan was to go for Universities and Colleges; I’m all for giving young performers a chance and they wouldn’t necessarily be above working for a comparatively small amount of money.

The first one was easy enough: My old friend Katie Saunders, who I know to have a huge amount of talent anyway, had recently completed a degree in Drama at Aberystwyth University. Knowing the problems that many graduates find in looking for work after their degree, I guessed she would have no problem with taking on the role of Emily. I did inform her about exactly what had happened with Emily and why to enable her to get in to the role – but not before asking for a confidentiality agreement, remember we’re dealing with real people here!

Katie: Ready to record!

Kate actually found the next person: her old friend Guy Oliver, who I understand has also completed a similar degree and was very interested in the role as the DAW Advisor. John also asked me to find someone to play the part of a female DAW Advisor, and for this one I spoke to Andy Nicholls at Dudley College, asking if he had any Performing Arts students who would be interested in the role. A few days later I got a phone call from a young lady called Gabrielle Thomas, and the following week I drafted her in to the project after someone else pulled out of the role.

Guy, the right Guy for the role?

Finding the studio wasn’t difficult, but it was harder work than it should have been. I spent some time looking at websites for various studios to see about how much it would cost and whether it was equipped for purpose. I thanked my lucky stars that I’m working in an era where such information is available online; in the past I would either have had to make many phone calls and visits to find this sort of thing out, or book a studio and hope for the best having no idea what I was getting myself in to when I walk through the door! I narrowed it down to two candidates who fit the requirements, and chose the one closer to the Wolverhampton area where the actors and I live. Unfortunately they didn’t answer their phone once in six days, so I eventually went with Robannas in Birmingham, who were more than happy to have our business!

Robannas Studios-Birmingham: Professional and plenty of parking!

I then got the actors together for a rehearsal. I don’t know whether a rehearsal is usual in this sort of thing, but I got the idea from watching the DVD extras to Family Guy of all things. The voice actors all sit around a table with copies of the script and read out their parts as they come along. It was possible that the actors could have read their parts of the script in the studio without ever meeting one another. However, because of the way I am used to working with musicians, I am used to an environment where everybody contributes, so what you eventually hear is the combination of voices and scripts that we just wouldn’t have got by working individually. If there was sufficient time, money and inclination, I might have tried to arrange matters to take this idea forward. However, for this project, it was absolutely crucial that the actors had an idea of what the conversation with their counterparts was supposed to sound like, and I think we achieved that. In hindsight, I could have arranged it a little better – nobody knew where the office was, including me, so we were a bit late in getting started, I’d forgotten to print a script off for myself and ended up sharing Guys, and I’d had no lunch so I was starving hungry - but it served its purpose and it’s a step that I’m very glad we took.

The recording itself was the following Friday. That actually went quite smoothly. The three actors conducted themselves with great professionalism and gave stunning performances. I had over-booked the actors slightly; I had given them two hours each to record their parts but in practice most of it was done in less than an hour, and Guy managed his scripts in 30 minutes. That meant that there was a lot of downtime in between actors, however the engineer Slawek used this to our advantage by chopping up the separate lines which actually saved us a lot of time later. John turned up at some point to see what was going on; the actors had left by then but he filmed the inside of the studio to show people what we were doing.

The only slight problem we encountered was that we had no ambient background track to use. This was something that simply hadn’t occurred to me while preparing for the project, and I ended up spending a significant amount of time hunting around the net for an appropriate sound recording. It didn’t help that I couldn’t get any sound out of my laptop either; I need a new one! The one we went with – simply called ‘Post Office’ – wasn’t ideal; it was a lot of echoey noise that was not really representative of the environment we were trying to emulate, but Slawek tweaked it a little bit, and put a few sound effects built in to his computer onto the track as well to make a fairly convincing backing track.

The mixing took a long time; Slawek unfortunately hadn’t heard what the scripts were supposed to sound like before we recorded them so we spent a lot of time working together to make sure all the lines were in the right order. It was a long and arduous process but one that was one hundred percent necessary. It turned out that we needed some extra time anyway just to finish it off and master it; I had no problem with this as we had worked very hard in the day and it was worth the extra money to walk away with something we could be certain was the finished product.

I must also give an honorary mention to another friend Sam Draisey, who wrote and performed the introductory music for the CD. It was certainly no worse than most of the tracks available online for the same money, better than many, and quite well written given the fact that my mind went blank every time he asked me what sort of artists he wanted the track to sound like. (For future reference, Massive Attack would be magnificent!)

We were delighted with how the CD turned out in the end; however there are always things you would do differently next time, so here are some developmental points for me for when we do another one:

More time to do the mixing would be my first priority. Whether that means booking the actors for less time, or booking the studio for more time, we need more time to use the material we have. When we recorded the actors we did about four or five takes of each track. The procedure then would be to choose the best bits of each track and use them in the final mix. That wasn’t really possible for a couple of reasons, time being an important one; we ended up using the first take for near enough all of them, and it was only when I happened to remember that they performed one or two lines better in the other takes that those takes got used. This is a shame because I do remember the actors performing generally better on some of the other takes. The knock-on effect of not having that backing track ready to begin with was not catastrophic but it did cost us. Because I spent most of the recording searching the net, I couldn’t be anywhere near as attentive while the actors were recording, so I couldn’t really be methodical in deciding which of the takes to use in the final mix; the first time I really listened to any of them was when we were mixing. There wouldn’t have been much we could have done anyway because of the time constraints, but it’s a step I would like to have taken.