I can still feel the miserable intensity of the moment more than 30 years on. I’m sitting in my primary five class and we’re learning about Robert the Bruce. I love history and I’ve just put my hand up twice in a row and answered two questions correctly. The teacher steps out for a moment. While she’s away, the rest of the class stare at me and start a chant of “swot, swot, swot”. Its rhythmic humiliation penetrates me. My stomach is lurching; I can feel my throat drying up and tears pricking at my eyes.
I hear it ringing in my ears for months to come. I recover, but make sure never to put my hand up in class again. I know very well what I have done to deserve this humiliation: I’ve tried to be clever. And being clever isn’t cool among my classmates.
I thought of this moment as I read about the stooshie caused by Andy Burnham as he launched his campaign to be Mayor of Manchester. Labour’s Shadow Home Secretary, who grew up in working class Merseyside, suggested the North-South divide is still very much alive when it comes to educational attainment. “It’s hard growing up in the north,” he said. “If you say you want to be a doctor, lawyer or MP you get the mickey taken out of you.”
Predictably, a load of clever and successful people from the north of England lined up to criticise this “grim oop north” assessment, among them Guardian journalists and Conservative MPs. I’m sure, too, plenty of folk from working class areas of London and the south-east of England were lining up to tell how they were similarly pilloried at school.
I agree Mr Burnham was probably wrong to bring geography into the matter. But he was certainly right to highlight there are still plenty of working class kids being mocked by their peers for showing academic aptitude and wanting more from life than their communities can provide. Depressingly, these kids live all over Britain. Equally as depressing is the underlying truth that it is class, not geography, that really counts.
We need only look to our own doorstep, where despite the best attempts of well-meaning Scottish governments for the last 15 years, the educational attainment gap is widening, meaning youngsters from poorer communities are falling further and further behind their wealthier counterparts.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has commendably put her personal reputation on the line by asking the electorate to judge her on whether her government makes progress on this. This week, she tasked perhaps her most experienced and dependable minister, John Swinney, with the role of Education Secretary, signalling a serious intent to push up standards. I don’t doubt this was a good move.
But there is only so much politicians can do, and we must recognise this. The goodwill and commitment of individual teachers is just as important for working class kids, as is – and this may not be popular with many on the Left – the particular personality of the child involved.
The social and psychological complexities and sensitivities make this issue particularly difficult to tackle. It’s not just about academic ability, as those of us with experience can attest. Realising you are probably going to have to reject what those around you seem content with is hard, and it makes you feel guilty. Your friends and family, meanwhile, may feel uncomfortable and hostile towards difference. I’m reminded of The Smiths' song London, with lyrics on this very matter by another working class Northern boy made good, Morrissey. “Didn’t you see the jealousy in the eyes of the ones who had to stay behind?” he wails.
As Morrissey and even Andy Burnham no doubt knows, it takes drive and guts to go your own way in life. As for those working class children that do achieve academically at school, in my book their As and Bs at Higher should be given greater weight by universities than those of their middle class counterparts who can rely on parents and personal tutors for help and guidance.
Money is also important, and today’s bright working class kids should be afforded the huge advantage I was given in 1993 when I became the first person in my family to go to university: a full maintenance grant. It was this that helped convince my parents that higher education was affordable for our family.
By this point, thanks to some wonderful teachers at secondary school and, I suppose, my own inner drive, I’d left that hideous primary five experience far behind. But I’ve never forgotten its power. It breaks my heart to think that the same thing is happening to kids like me today, and that they have even less chance of doing well academically than I did. I can only offer them the following wisdom: being clever is cool. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
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