Last week I was greatly saddened to learn of the death of Mrs Angela Trueman, a teacher at Manchester High School for Girls until her retirement in 1996, and my personal saviour a couple of decades before that. Nor was I alone. Tributes have been
flooding in on the school’s website and Facebook page, with my fellow pupils calling her inspirational and a life-changer, both of which she was.
Words cannot do justice to this wonderful woman and the effect she had on so many of her students. Teachers get a very bad press these days, sometimes with good reason, but Mrs Trueman is a real reminder that a truly wonderful member of the profession can change the course of a person’s life.
Forgive the personal story, but in the 1970s, my family moved from the United States, where my school didn’t put much store in discipline nor, indeed, education, to Manchester, where I was sent to the acutely academic MHSG. I was behind in absolutely everything and failed all my exams bar one at the end of the first year.
Matters very slowly began to improve, but everyone clearly thought I was a bit thick. And then, three years after I got there, Mrs Trueman arrived. She saw something in me that no one else had done and within two years had turned me into Oxbridge material. She gave me genuine self-confidence and it is no exaggeration to say she changed my life. I owe her a debt of gratitude that can never be repaid.
I was incredibly lucky but I am not alone: despite frequent criticism of the profession there are many teachers out there who do the same for their pupils. Isn’t it time we started to value them a little more?
In my grandparents’ day teachers were viewed as among the most important members of society; now many of them have to put up with abuse from both students and parents alike.
Of course there are real issues of concern, the frequent stories emerging about some teaching that grammar isn’t important or that the British Empire was wicked or that there are any number of genders don’t instil a great deal of confidence in you. But then you hear about the likes of Katharine Birbalsingh, often called “Britain’s strictest headteacher”, and the spirits lift once more.
Apart from their actual parents, there is no one more important than a teacher for a child. We banged drums for “our” NHS; shouldn’t we do the same for teachers? We throw money at wholly undeserving professions like train drivers.
Here’s a thought: why not do the same for people who will change children’s lives?
