New school beginnings

Thousands of pupils around England went to new places in their education today. Reception classes blended those who have been socialised as they were marshalled through the Nursery ranks with those who arrived unshaped by any contact with the outside world. Pupils recently top of the primary school pile were added on at the bottom of the conveyor track that will end with them being dumped on the labour market or wheedling their way into higher education. To both groups, today was a rite of passage as daunting as anything devised by a jungle tribe.

Our new special feature School Cuttings will record the impact of the new Academy, The Fred Best Academy A-Go-Go that opened its doors today, as it attempts the improve on the performance of its now defunct predecessor that singularly failed for many years to contribute value-added in anything but criminality and personal deterioration.

This week our special education correspondent, Teagan Short, charts the experience of one Year 7 pupil entering the new Academy that will serve the village in place of Pratts Lane Comprehensive School.

School Cuttings

Q. Sebastian, tell us about your first day in the newly opened Academy?

A. We got to wear this new uniform, purple blazer with yellow bits around the edges and a badge with a crow, or maybe an owl, or some bird sitting in a tree that means something. I can’t remember what it means. Bigger kids don’t get to wear the uniform yet, only us new kids. It’s crap looking and everyone laughed at us. One kid had the sleeves of his blazer cut off by older kids.

Q. What was it like with your new teachers?

A. Not like my primary school. We used to have just our class teacher, or another one when she was crap at something, like she couldn’t do maths, or music, or football, or draw, or do experiments, or if she was off having a baby. We don’t have anything like that here. We got a woman called a form teacher, though that isn’t her name. She must be crap at everything because she got loads of other teachers to teach us. She just marks the register and some other stuff. The others are called subject teachers but they have names as well. I can't remember their names. They live in different parts of the school and we got lost trying to find where they were hiding.

Q. Who is your form teacher?

A. Ms Fortisque-Blyth. She said we must lean hard on the ‘s’ when we say ‘Ms’ and always remember her name is hyphenated. Billy D. Kidd asked her what that meant and she said not to ask questions because he is not in primary school now. We aren’t allowed to leave our desks and we can’t stand up and scratch our willies even when itchy and we can’t ask for pencils or say we don’t know what the teacher is saying, because we are not in primary school now. Loads of teachers said that to us today so it must mean there was something wrong with our primary schools. The maths teacher said to forget what we learned in primary school because it was wrong and anyway it was only for babies and she wanted us all to start off on the same level because some kids went to schools that were better and they know a lot more. I don’t think I went to one of them better ones because my school was crap.

Q. What was it like with so many other pupils?

A. Older kids don’t like us so we stay away from them. Nobody knows my name yet except for Billy D. Kidd and Tarquin Tighthold because we went round together. One teacher asked Billy what the D. in his name stood for. Billy said it stood for nothing, it was what his Dad called him and is just a letter in the alphabet. Teacher said he was being a smart arse, but then he spelled my name wrong and wrote Sebastion Feuchs so he wasn’t as smart as he thought.

Q. What did you like most about today?

A. Nothing.

Q. What struck you most?

A. Rules. Every teacher said there are rules and we have to keep them because this is a new school and we are not in a primary school so it is important that we do not move, or ask questions, or do anything until we are told because there are rules, except no one told us how many rules or what they are. As well, some older kids told us to watch out for this old woman in a white coat who walks through the science department carrying test tubes because she is draining blood from kids when they are not looking and she sells the blood to the hospital in Redditch.

Q. Why is the Academy called The Fred Best Academy A-Go-Go?

A. Nobody told us nothing like that. They were too busy shouting at us to keep quiet or telling us there are rules because we are not in primary school now.

Q. Are you looking forward to going back tomorrow?

A. My Mum said I don’t have no choice.