Club News
January: Vice Chairman, Andrew Carver (in the Chair), welcomed 19 Members and Guest Brian Udall. Also, guest speaker, Gaye Illsley. Andrew was pleased to congratulate Lucy (Luncheons Manager) who is expecting this month. Andrew reported that several members attended Alan Smith’s funeral (see eulogy, page 3).
Induction of New Member: Our Chairman, Tony Farrell officiated at the induction of new member Philip Kent (presentation of Badge, Tie and Handbook). Tony, although still weak, is hoping to take back the Chairmanship this month.
Outings/Events: Any suggestions please to Terry Ribbons.
Lunch changes by 10.30am the prior Tuesday to chris@moniz.co.uk T: 020 8660 6063.
Member News to Welfare Sec., Bill Ainsworth T: 020 8660 0399.
Please email vincent@fosdike.com with articles/news for the Newsletter.
AGM 7th March 2024 (after lunch): Election of Committee for 2024. There is a committee designate, however, further nominations (or self-nominations) are invited from Members. Please contact Secretary by 22nd February. Positions vacant are: Vice Chairman, Secretary, Treasurer, Social Sec., Speakers Sec., Welfare Sec., Without portfolio. Final nominees will be published in the March Newsletter. Not on the Committee are Newsletter Editor, Vincent Fosdike and Webmaster, Jim Mulvey. Brian Morris is willing to be re-appointed as Independent Examiner.
Speaker today: Steve Bird ‘The Dutch in the Medway’
AGM: 7th March: Speaker from the Chairman’s Charity.
January Speaker: Gaye Illsley: ‘Lasting Power of Attorney’
Our January speaker Gaye Illsley of ‘LPA Made Simple’, gave a clear and practical outline of the role of Lasting Power of Attorney in enabling the management of the financial and medical care of a person who is no longer able to manage them themselves. The execution and registration of such a Power will prove invaluable to anyone who finds themselves caring for a person who, perhaps very suddenly, can no longer cope with these aspects of life. Of course you may already have such a power possibly drafted by your solicitor but some may not or it may need a variation.
From the outset, Gaye emphasised that Lasting Powers of Attorney and Wills fulfil separate and distinct functions and are in no way substitutes for each other.
In writing this summery I have decided not to go into the very important details of how to go about the giving of such a power by a person (probably everyone really), who can envisage a situation arising from mental or physical incapacity which renders them dependant on a trusted loved one or perhaps a solicitor to act on their behalf using their resources for their benefit. Accidents and strokes will not give advance notice! They can often result in bank accounts being frozen and bills pilling up when they would have been paid easily by the affected person BUT their loved ones may not be able to use their resources on their behalf. This is where the Power of Attorney is needed and must be given when the donor is mentally well enough to execute the document so that it will be readily accepted by banks and medical staff when presented as proof of authority to manage the affairs of the donor.
Clearly if we give such a power, we must trust the recipient who is under a legal duty to use our resources exclusively for our benefit. There is often more than one recipient to cover eventualities such as predecession or incapacity to act etc.
It cannot be created RETROSPECTIVELY e.g. the day after a stroke. So act in good time.
There is much to be said for seeking professional help and advice. Powers can fail for incorrect completion, procedure, uncertainty etc even after they have been registered with the appropriate government department as is required. So the use of the forms available online should be viewed with circumspection if you are minded to use this facility to create your own document. Very few of us can envisage the twists and turns that the future will bring and an experienced practitioner can be a real help.
Our thanks go to Gaye for such a clear exposition of the subject.
Alan Smith: 1931–2023
Alan Smith was born in 1931 in East Ham, London, to William & Ethel Smith. Alan’s earliest memory was drinking lemonade in the garden with his brother Ken (6 years his senior) and his cousin Don. Tragically, when Alan was nine, his mother Ethel died of a weak heart. Alan’s father, William, then married Ivy who became Alan’s stepmother. That same year, William’s job moved to Doncaster when LNER relocated head office to their main locomotive manufacturing works.
Alan attended Doncaster Grammar School, then started an apprenticeship at 16 years old in the chemist department of the LNER. He also passed the ‘Royal Institute of Chemistry’ exams at night school. Alan’s National Service was in the R.A.F. and then back to the railway. Alan & Doreen were married in Doncaster in 1959. In 1962 Alan joined Turner’s Asbestos Cement Company as an analytical chemist. They moved to Sale (Manchester) where Emma was born in 1967 and Jonathan in 1971.
In the asbestos crisis of the 1970s Alan’s company moved to Widnes and switched to manufacturing fibre-cement roofing slates. Alan and Doreen enjoyed family life in Manchester – Emma and Jonathan both attended grammar school and went on to University at Lancaster and Birmingham respectively. Holidays were in the UK or Europe, or visiting William and Ivy who had retired to Frinton.
After retirement in 1996, Alan & Doreen took trips abroad and in the UK. Emma had triplets in 2001 and, being located in South Croydon, Alan & Doreen decided to leave Manchester and come south to help out, regularly taking the grandchildren to school and enjoying outings during the school holidays. Another grandchild, Sophie, arrived in 2009 – Jonathan’s.
Settling in Purley, Alan joined Probus of Purley in 2007 and served as General Secretary from 2010 until 2020. His amusing minutes were appreciated by his colleagues. In 2018 he became Chairman but declined a second term due to failing health and sadly retired from Probus in 2022. He is remembered for his quiet wit and charm, a true gentleman.
During Covid, Alan mastered Facetime via his new iPad to stay in touch with the family. The family celebrated Alan’s 90th birthday all together, but sadly, his health began to decline. The whole family would last be together at Christmas 2022.
Doreen continued to care for Alan at home throughout 2023, until his last few days at St Christopher’s hospice.
‘Goodbye Mr. Chips’ by Vincent Fosdike
School days are the happiest days of your life. Did anyone ever say that to you? Perhaps a grandfather when you were lamenting the end of the summer holidays. I doubt that you believed them although perhaps a few of us look back with rose coloured spectacles and feel there may have been something in it. If pupils were not enthused, how did teachers feel and how do they feel now?
Most teachers will have at least a first degree and then a teaching qualification meaning they have effectively put four years into preparation. They will then serve a probationary year when they start work. Common statistics show that 12.5% then leave within one year and that by 5 years between 50 and 60% have given up the profession. So, it looks as though the pupil-teacher interface may well be unhappy for all concerned. Increasingly governments try to use education to remedy bad behaviour and poor outcomes. School leaving age has been raised and the threat of forcing re-sits for those failing Mathematics and English at 16 seems likely to go through. This is against desperate shortages of teachers in those areas, very few maths graduates fancy handling classes of any sort let alone compulsory re-sits who would tell them to the nearest wrongly calculated decimal point how useless they are at teaching and how boring their lessons are. Nothing the Department of Education dreams up or demands will touch this reality. The tragic suicide of a head teacher following a downgrading of her school by the inspectorate shows the gulf between those at the chalk face and those wise enough to back away from it.
Pressure on teachers comes from children, their parents, the school management, the media and the general public. But they have only their own strength of character and commitment to society to sustain them in their lonely role. They average a workload of 50 hours per week. Quality control is inherent in the work as poor lesson preparation or less than skilful class management results in increased stress.
So, what is the future of schools and why do we send children to them to struggle through exams in subjects which are irrelevant to earning a living? Normally it is to enable them to repeat the process at university whilst incurring huge debts. There are well known justifications for studying history, classics and the media. Civil Service etc will take up the best graduates in these areas often leaving others to, “Guess what”? Go back into the trenches (teaching).
Few children aspire to a safe job in a bank which will shortly be online DIY customer machines only. No, they look to have followers on the net or perhaps become footballers, even celebrities.
I attended an inner London comprehensive school now razed to the ground save for the Victorian part including a chapel. In the remains still standing is a restaurant in one corner of which is mounted the very same pulpit from which I had to give a reading to 800 students. We had uniforms, belonged to houses and wore white shirts if studying academic subjects and blue for technical “O” levels. Our teachers worked very hard but the socio-economic tide was flowing ever faster against them. Discipline was daily eroded, supported by populist politicians and the parents learning how to play the blame shifting game to their advantage. The echoes that old pulpit may still have within it certainly resonate with me when I drink a pint by its base. I guess there will be few if any of those teachers alive now. Many of them were war veterans, one a rear gunner in a Lancaster bomber who had a bullet scar on the side of his head (he taught music), and it was a very foolish boy who would interrupt him. Another had served on convoy escorts of the type shown in the film The Cruel Sea which was our “O” level set book. He talked about it to bring the book to life. They tried to prepare us to work in dull offices or if we were lucky get an apprenticeship with the Gas Board or in metal fabrication.
Today I suppose it is I.T., Media studies and some sciences, mainly electronics. We (the top form) were expected to get 5 “O” levels. Now, 10 GCSE’S are expected, and teachers would normally need to offer a range of subjects to start the kids on their way to “UNI”.
Overall, this is the increasing likelihood that online learning will displace traditional teaching as it did during the pandemic and as it increasingly replaces routine work in offices. Programmes already take on medical diagnosis with apparently slightly greater accuracy than doctors. Legal programmes do similar work. The professions with their need for factual learning and analysis are more than ripe for Artificial Intelligence to take on most of the low to mid-range work. Client interaction is often online now. Medical diagnosis the same with touch screen to do readings.
What could or should be left for poor old Mr. Chips, and his reluctant “followers”? Just a glorified teenage minder, waiting for the bell to go? We are in a post-industrial revolution whose consequences for employment and learning are ever more difficult to predict.
Perhaps the real load on teachers is a form of culture clash between what the politicians think best for the economy and what the community see as worthwhile.
How should schools and their curriculum meet the social, behavioural and I.T./A.I. challenges which now engulf them? This is your homework. To be given in by next Probus meeting (March 2024) just in case those of you at the back can’t be bothered to work out when that will be!
A colleague once wrote on the required lesson plan under “objectives”,
‘To keep them in the class throughout the lesson.’ It was seen by an HMI (Her Majesty’s Inspector) and passed as an acceptable objective during an inspection. A compassionate blind eye may have been turned or was it a surrender?Mr. Chips (retired).