The education section in the library provided me with a fun pervertable book meant to help parents choose a school for their kids, “The New School Rules” by Francis Gilbert.

There was this bit about how you shouldn’t go visit a school on an open day, but insist on being shown around when there’re actual students there. This is how you find out whether the teachers are any good.

“In all schools, it was the head teacher who showed us around. Generally, the head teacher was treated with respect, but in one school, a couple of pupils notably forgot to hold open doors for him, it was almost as though he was invisible… His study was set well away from the rest of the school, and I sensed that he didn’t get out much except for parents and inspectors. At the other two schools, the head teachers were treated with much more familiarity and respect: doors were held openfor them, they were greeted as they entered the classroom, the teachers seemed comfortable arouns them but also anxious to please them.”

What the book is then missing is an episode to the effect that the head teacher in the best school was so sharp and observant that, when he noticed a girl at the end of the corridor push another girl, he called her over – by name, because he knew everybody’s names – and told her to hold out her hands there and then. He had a tawse in the inside pocket of his jacket, which he applied with considerable vigour to the the miscreant’s palms. Then he dismissed the sniffling girl with a comforting word, apologised for the interruption, and continued the tour.

The reason for everybody’s respect and anxiety to please him was rather apparent there.