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St Hugh Of Lincoln School

I don’t like exams. Students freeze, questions can be complicated, markers and adjudicators differ and the students are crammed to produce good results in order to justify high school fees. “Exam factory” said one student to me who reached Cambridge University from his expensively selective public school “and I hated it there. We were exam cattle and they gave us fodder.” I prefer fair and regular assessment, even including the probability of copying other people’s work. Good teachers would see through and challenge the laziness.

In New Zealand we teachers met as a team, coursework results evaluated. We knew strengths and weaknesses, laziness and effort. We had the record of all that the students had done over the year. Imagine a total of 260 was the minimum pass-mark (out of 500). Not much chance of favouritism over five different subjects: 92% would look strange alongside 4 x 42%. Fail, we would agree, without a glance at creepy favouritizer.

The students who failed were allowed to take national exams. If too many passed, then the school knew it had set too high a standard; if no one passed then the school was probably too lax. The exam boards and other schools would be watching carefully. You don’t make that mistake twice. A natural and careful awareness steered a clear course.

I liked that. A whole year’s work was of value and the students knew it and they worked steadily. I remember one smart (very intelligent) student taking on the system – not completing assignments, careless work, daring us to fail him. We did. He made a fool of himself – but he did well in the exam and obtained a university place but had already “forewarned” the university that he was lazy and smart. They would be watching.

Last week we saw general rejoicing at exam results based on teacher assessments. I trust those results more than exam-fodder schools’ results. But I saw who were not sharing in the rejoicing. Did you? They had dropped out of school over the years. Failed. Hardly able to even read or write. No home background to encourage them, no one to coach them or even coax them, hating school where books with pictures was their limit, never exploring their own ideas and those of others because class discipline was hard to enforce, knowing they would never catch up, be able to read or write or discuss with joy, able only to count money in order to survive.

Teachers in such sad schools face great difficulties – but how good they sometimes can be, how unselfish, how encouraging. And senior students who have made progress can be asked to help the younger ones who respond to someone genuinely encouraging them. When I was teaching I would ask the sixth formers to give some of their study or free time to youngsters (with school permission, of course) and saw such good results: the genuine reward from helping the weak, the genuine gratitude for being helped.

Which is why on Tuesday 10th August we began to plan our own school from St Joseph’s parish, open to everyone but especially to youngsters who want to improve in reading and writing. The school is dedicated to St Hugh of Lincoln, the teachers will be boys and girls at school who are willing to help slow learners a little younger than themselves. The headteachers (a woman and a man) have accepted their supervisory role – they will not teach, simply support this new school. The teachers will be girls and boys.

The inspiration comes from a book “Letter to a Teacher” written by eight Italian boys who founded “The School of Barbiana” in the 1960’s to point out hat the Italian education system had failed them badly. The book is a fierce, brilliantly-argued, attack on the favouritism given to wealthy fee-paying families – such as the UK knew until higher education became possible for many, with the 11+ exam after World War II and the ideals of Comprehensive Education later “Letter to a Teacher” is published by Penguin (still in print) as an Education Special. Read it, absorb its sadness, be inspired by its message. Eight young boys set Italy on fire with their message: the Italian education system favours the wealthy few but fails the great numbers of the poor.

Please pray with us. The seed has been planted. The power of the internet may carry our school everywhere because every youngster knows how to text – but they need to learn to spell, read, write – and to teach those a little younger who will in their turn teach the younger . . .

I share a memory with you. I knew the family well. They spoke only Italian at home. The boy knew no English. He came to our parish school, aged four and a half. “Will he cope?” I asked the teacher whom I knew well. “Yes, easily,” was her reply. He as good at football, she had seen: the boys liked him and he was already learning to speak from them. The girls liked him – he was different, not shy, laughed easily. They were glad to talk to him, explain patiently. At the end of ONE year he was completely bi-lingual. At home he spoke with an Italian accent like his parents, at school he sounded as Welsh as the rest of the class. “Easily” the teacher had said. She knew. In one year! Children learn from children naturally. We pray with people like Malala to see the right of a good education for everyone.

God bless us,

Fr John

(15th August 2021)

Related Links: Popular Reads and Fr John’s Parish Newsletters

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Help The Poor

Our World

Latest estimates put our World Population at around 7.4 billion. 5.65 billion live in Asia and Africa, compared to only 1.1 billion in America and Europe. Today, an estimated 1.2 billion will suffer from hunger (calorie and nutrient deficiency) and annually, 9 million will die as a direct result.

In 2016 there were 1,810 billionaires in the world, worth a combined wealth of $6,500,000,000,000. The cost of living index (Consumer Price Index) in the UK is 81, the US is 74, Vietnam 39 and the Philippines 35.

A Street Story

The endless number of stories that could be shared is equal only to the millions of poor in our world. This is one such example, one poor child.

A Child Sleeps

I stopped outside a modern-day shopping mall on my way from a nearby Soup Kitchen. The two photographs below are real life.

It was around twelve on the morning of 7th July 2015. The boy, probably older than he looked, perhaps 13-14 years of age, was sound asleep close to the entrance of a busy high street restaurant and oblivious to everything going on around him.

The area he had chosen as his bed was dry and relatively clean. The ground had a slight upward slope to the restaurant door, perhaps with his arm, it acted as a kind
of pillow! Maybe it was exhaustion that led the boy to select this spot as his bed, or maybe he knew the canopy above would shelter him from the scorching midday sun. Either way, it didn’t seem to matter to him, nor sadly, the many pedestrians who passed by during his, by now, two-hour rest.

Then something unexpected happened. An old man stopped and bent down beside the boy. He shook him by the shoulder and waited.

The boy slowly emerged from his deep sleep and as he did, the man, choosing his moment, forced something into the partially opened palm of his hand. The boy, alert to the man’s actions, continued stretching his arms and legs as he struggled to compose himself.

Slowly he stood up and, in his daze, he watched the old man walk towards the restaurant door and enter. At the same time, he kept looking back into the palm of his hand… his thoughts were his, alone!

Uneasily, the boy followed in the direction of the man but, after only a few paces, his path was blocked. He knew the rules, only customers were allowed inside the restaurant. As a street boy, he was barred and the armed Security Officer strictly applied the policy. Indeed, he didn’t have to do a lot to deter the boy, just show his uniformed presence.

The young boy waited for the time when he would catch the eye of the old man through the glass door. It seemed long in coming, but when their eyes met, it was overwhelming for the boy. No longer dazed, he smiled, laughed, waved, jumped… and shouted, “Thank you, Sir,” “Thank you, Sir…,” while keeping his hand firmly shut.

The boy’s presence at the restaurant door was soon considered unwelcome. With a hand gesture and slow return walk towards the door, the Security Guard instructed the boy to leave. Before the guard could open the door, the still joyous boy had walked back to his “old bed” and picked up a small unnoticed plastic bag! The bag contained his sole belongings. He had placed it in the corner behind him while he slept. It was a small bag of cooked rice, shared with him earlier in the morning by another street child.

Our Help Projects

Not all poverty is the outcome of war and violence. The two countries that we work in, the Philippines and Vietnam, are peaceful. The Philippines, 102 million people, gets 13.5% of its GDP income from overseas Philippine workers sending their salary back home but an estimated 1.5 million of their children don’t go to school. Vietnam, an estimated 94.5 million people have around 10% of its people, mainly ethnic tribes and the disabled, living in poverty.

Our, “Help For The Poor,” projects include:

A.  Food and Clothing

i) Dollar-a-day meal provision:

The meals are cooked by volunteers or provided through local businesses, at a very generous rate, to a Feeding Center or School. If a school, the Headteacher identifies the “Severely malnourished” and “malnourished children,” with the help of local Health Advisers. Often the attendance of participating children improves dramatically; they know they will receive something to eat on school days!

ii)  Children and Family Basics

It’s inevitable when working with the street poor, additional individual and family needs will arise; we try to help. Basics will often include help with clothing, laundry, general hygiene…, as well as, a little food for the family weekend.

iii) Religious Trainee Experience Bursaries

Anyone who has walked hand-in-hand with the street poor will have been filled with multiple emotions; from fear to humility. We provide a small number of bursaries for Trainee Priests and Nuns to identify a project, use the funding to buy clothing, food or other resource and then go out among the poor and extend their hand of care.

B. Education

The old adage, “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day, teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime;” it’s very true.  Everyone needs self-respect and life skills. The point at which we yearn for such a life starts in childhood. Helping poverty-stricken families to break their cycle of destitution can often be broken by supporting their children’s education.

Although education is theoretically free in the Philippines and Vietnam, charges still apply. The poor cannot pay for their children’s uniform, shoes, bag, books, pens… or the expected routine school extras.

We won’t create lawyers, doctors or teachers from among the street poor overnight but we can set the seeds of growth in motion, today. Our, “Help For The Poor – Education  Projects,” include:

i)  Home-school Bursaries

This project’s main focus is street and highland/rural children. It has a few simple principles: encourage families to send their children to school, pay for their uniform plus extra needs and raise each families self-esteem. Periodic events are arranged for the families and regular checks on each child’s attendance as well as their end-of-year report is overseen by a trained volunteer.

ii) Help for the Disabled

Our love to help the disabled will be no surprise; it’s everyone’s hope that the disabled are fully cared for. However, specialist skills and enormous resources are required. Sadly, if you are a disabled child in a poor family, of course, you are loved, but you are not generally their first priority. The groups that we make a small financial contribution to, seek out disabled children in communities, provide access to a daily education (plus residential overnight care where needed) and give ongoing parental training and support.




Additional Info: Our expenditure has ZERO on-costs. Our program delivery is 100% free of personnel costs or other administration fees; the people who deliver, give freely of their time. All funding goes directly to the purchasing of meals, clothing, materials, etc. using local providers or volunteers. We work closely with other agencies including, Religious Orders, Church agencies and local schools. All our projects are long-term, generally a minimum five-year commitment.

 

As Jesus said, “The poor will always be with us,” so, we must help.

God Bless you for listening to the voice of the poor, they heartily thank you.

Don’t forget the cry of the poor:

Your prayer is all I ask.
Your prayer that asks the Lord.
To bless those here beside me.
The hungry, the broken, the beat, the poor…

… Thank You, Jesus …

[Prayer based on poem by Spencer Betz]

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Help Projects

Smiling Indian girl writing with a pencil.

Today, children, both boys and girls, are still an unwanted burden in many poverty-stricken parts of our unequal world; they receive few, if any, basic rights including, food, education and medical care.

Daily Prayer donors continue to answer their call in many small but great ways. We fund the delivery of multiple projects through dedicated local volunteers who get to know the poor families personally and form lasting friendships.

Our World

In June 2019, our World Population was estimated to be around 7.7 billion; 5.91 billion of them living in Asia and Africa compared to only 1.1 billion in America and Europe, the wealthier world nations (Worldometers).

In March 2019, there were 2,153 billionaires in the world, worth a combined wealth of $8,700,000,000,000 (Forbes).

This year, an estimated 1.2 billion people will suffer from hunger (calorie and nutrient deficiency) and 9 million will die as a direct result.

A Street Story

The endless number of stories that could be shared is equal only to the millions of poor in our world. This is one such example, one poor child.

A Child Sleeps

I stopped outside a modern-day shopping mall on my way from a nearby Soup Kitchen. The two photographs below are real life.

It was around twelve on the morning of 7th July 2015. The boy, probably older than he looked, perhaps 13-14 years of age, was sound asleep close to the entrance of a busy high street restaurant and oblivious to everything going on around him.

The area he had chosen as his bed was dry and relatively clean. The ground had a slight upward slope to the restaurant door, perhaps with his arm, it acted as a kind of pillow! Maybe it was exhaustion that led the boy to select this spot as his bed, or maybe he knew the canopy above would shelter him from the scorching midday sun. Either way, it didn’t seem to matter to him, nor sadly, the many pedestrians who passed by during his, by now, two-hour rest.

Then something unexpected happened. An old man stopped and bent down beside the boy. He shook him by the shoulder and waited.

The boy slowly emerged from his deep sleep and as he did, the man, choosing his moment, forced something into the partially opened palm of his hand. The boy, alert to the man’s actions, continued stretching his arms and legs as he struggled to compose himself.

Slowly he stood up and, in his daze, he watched the old man walk towards the restaurant door and enter. At the same time, he kept looking back into the palm of his hand… his thoughts were his, alone!

Uneasily, the boy followed in the direction of the man but, after only a few paces, his path was blocked. He knew the rules, only customers were allowed inside the restaurant. As a street boy, he was barred and the armed Security Officer strictly applied the policy. Indeed, he didn’t have to do a lot to deter the boy, just show his uniformed presence.

The young boy waited for the time when he would catch the eye of the old man through the glass door. It seemed long in coming, but when their eyes met, it was overwhelming for the boy. No longer dazed, he smiled, laughed, waved, jumped… and shouted, “Thank you, Sir,” “Thank you, Sir…,” while keeping his hand firmly shut.

The boy’s presence at the restaurant door was soon considered unwelcome. With a hand gesture and slow return walk towards the door, the Security Guard instructed the boy to leave. Before the guard could open the door, the still joyous boy had walked back to his “old bed” and picked up a small unnoticed plastic bag! The bag contained his sole belongings. He had placed it in the corner behind him while he slept. It was a small bag of cooked rice, shared with him earlier in the morning by another street child.
Young boy sleeping on sheltered pavement
Young boy sleeping on a sidewalk
Young boy awakened by passer-by
Boy waking up

Our projects are primarily in Vietnam and the Philippines; two countries with very high levels of poverty. Here is a sample mix of past and continuing events:

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