So what in my University department which had a specialism in education, all of one staff member had been an actual teacher- and he had resigned after shopping his school to the press for STOPP….nice guy, very bright, but hardly representative of the teaching profession. ! Within a year I was teaching in University, a Polytechnic, and two Teacher Training Colleges (different denominations so you couldn’t escape!). …….for the colleges someone with a first in modern sociological theory was a real find……..

Now don’t get me wrong, no one was shortchanged. I just think the colleges may have taken their eye off the ball. .and it wasn’t just them. My first full time University appointment was sealed when the Head of Department said …’I wanted you , you see we have no one whose even read , let alone understood Althusser…….and this had been identified by internal validators as a weakness…..’Mind you on day one i was challenged in the staff bar by two classically atired engineers…plus a change