GGGG Ep 7 – And finally

Hello and welcome back to Education on Fire and the Ger Graus Gets Gritty series with Professor Dr. Ger Graus OBE. Now, each of the seven episodes are based on a chapter from his book Through a Different Lens, Lessons from a Life and Education, which is published by Routledge. Now details of how to get your copy are in the description and we would love for you to get involved in this using the hashtag educationonfire in your social media posts. Now you can send your thoughts, comments and messages via my website at educationonfire.com or join me for a live show every Wednesday at 5pm UK on YouTube. At the end of the series, they'll be joining me for a live discussion with Q and A. And you can be part of that show by just signing up to the newsletter on the educationonfire.com homepage. Keep inspiring and thank you so much for being part of these incredibly important conversations. Hello, my name is Mark Taylor and welcome to the Education on Fire podcast, The place for creative and inspiring learning from around the world. Listen to teachers, parents and mentors share how they are supporting children to live their best authentic life and are proving to be a guiding light to us all. So we reach our final episode of the book itself. We're going to have three more episodes based on different areas going forward in terms of the early years are schooling and further higher education. So this is our section of and finally. So finally what is it that we'd like to, to share and what are those thoughts?

G. That's an interesting one. The book kind of. Andreas Schleicher wrote the. The. The director of Education for OECD wrote the afterwards. Carla Rinaldi wrote the forward and I'll quote from Andreas afterward in a little while if I may. But when it came to ending the book at the end of that chapter about more than a school, there were just a few bits where, where I kind of thought was so what? Really? And so does so what? Which feels a bit blunt as a, as a chapter title became unfinally almost like, almost like Trevor McDonald in the news. Although of course the final stories on the ITN news were always, always good news and I suppose the and finally in the book is is good news but, but there were just a few, a few questions that kind of as you go through this that, that, that raised their head I suppose. And also you know we are as we're recording this today is 4th December 2025. On 4th December 2024, I was diagnosed with cancer of the esophagus so today is the anniversary, as it were, and that period during which the book was published, that experience makes you think differently and makes you look at things through a different lens. And one of the questions that I, when I read the book again and before I wrote that last bit was about so what? So all of that in over 40 years and what's the difference? And it was stark because what had happened was that of course, in 2024, in the United Kingdom, a new government was elected. It made certain promises to eradicate child poverty, for example, and it reminded me of the promises that were made in 1997 to eradicate child poverty. So I said, oh my goodness, we haven't done well, or has it come back? Or what's happened really. And then I looked at my time, particularly my time in Wythenshawe, from which came all sorts of other things, from which came my perceived need for the Children's University and the work with Kidzania and the research, etc. And that then led me to do a little bit of writing on the back of an envelope. And in 1997, Wyden Shore, 1999, I beg your pardon, Wythenshawe was one of the 25 most deprived areas in England, most disadvantaged areas, I think. I think it was fifth or fourth, bottom, bottom. And so I did, did a little bit of homework and doodled on the back of an envelope and guess what? 26 years later, so from 1999 to 2025, I suppose windshield is still in the bottom 25% and they're still fourth or fifth from bottom. So the question becomes, well, what relevance has all that work had? Because. Because you haven't shifted the dial. And I kind of concluded, I hope not as a cop out. I don't think as a cop out in my mind that certain dials are too big to shift by one person or by one small organization. But it's a concerted effort and in order to see the big picture, all pieces of the jigsaw need to fall in place. And that's clearly what hasn't happened. But I know from conversations with what were young people in 1999 and are now grown ups, active members of society, good members of society. I know from the girl who played Juliet in Romeo and Juliet in the Shakespeare productions that we did in Northern Italy, for example, in my windshield, she will unequivocally tell you that those experiences have changed her life, that from that she started to engage with school again. She never lost sight of it. She now has a successful career and family and whatever else. And without those experiences, that would not have happened. She was the girl who quoted in the documentary that one of the main things from that experience was that she proved her parents wrong. I can do things, so I take the little wins. And often I was also asked the question fairly recently in an interview, so looking back, what would you have done differently? And my answer became, well, actually, I want to focus on what would I have done the same and would I still do it and how different, because I've learned the lessons of what I wouldn't do. And some of those are. Most of those are actually my lessons in terms of leadership and management. But what things did we do as a collective that I would do again, that clearly made it better? And one of the things is, you know, I think I mentioned it before, those 29 schools in windshield never collaborated until the zone came along. They weren't the unit, they didn't help each other out. There were small pockets, the heads that never met as a group of 29 that never positively constructively worked together for the benefit of the young people. To this day, they still meet. When I walk between Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 at Manchester Airport, I see the posters, the posters that say more than an airport, posters that. One of the posters that features Children from St. Anthony's Roman Catholic Primary School in Windshield. And the poster says, more than an airport, more than a school. And so bits of it have survived. They've never gone away. They've made the profession better. But overall, the conclusion, I suppose, is this. The conclusion has to be that patience is a virtue, that change takes a long time. And I remember at the time of the Education Action Zone, in the conversation with the politicians, the Secretary, the then Secretary of State for Education was in on that meeting. And I was asked the question why progress wasn't faster. And my reply was that it's taken you since the 1944 Education act to keep getting it wrong. Whatever made you think that in five years we would solve all your problems? And I think that's that, to a degree, is where we are. And we were swimming against the tide. The thing I should have done better and should have realized at the time, and I was, I suppose, politically naive, was we should have fought harder much earlier on for something like Education Action Zones to continue. That was about locality, that was about local context, about local people, about communities and making a difference collectively. In that I assumed it would continue. And I recognized with hindsight that that was naive. I look back at those at those times with pride. I Look back at the awards and the rewards, and I suppose I was asked the question also, and I think it's nice in this light. I was asked whether I was proud of my own book and fairly recently, and the answer was yes, because one, because I never thought I'd be asked to write one. Secondly, I never thought I would write one. And thirdly, when you look at it on reflection, then there are many more good things that made a difference in there. Then there are bad things that didn't make a difference. But we have to be careful to manage our expectations in terms of moving the dial. It's complex and it's big. And it's sad that the children who were poor 26 years ago, that their families, or at least the families who live in those areas, are still poor. And that in itself needs to be a lesson. And if I'm going to do anything for 40 years that I've got left, that's where my energy will go. But I have enjoyed writing it and I have enjoyed that conversation. Thank you for those two. Let me read one bit before we finish, because I said I would. I. And it is. It is in the light of that. It is what Andreas Leicher writes in his afterword. I'll try and find it. Here it is. He writes in his Afterword, on page 191, he writes about the book and then he concludes and says, ger Graus makes us realize that it is within our means to deliver a future for millions of learners who currently do not have one, and that the task is not to make the impossible possible, but to make the possible attainable. And I suppose in that he sums up much better than I could what I think it was all about.

And I think it's interesting that Ger is working with 40 countries around the world, or authorities in 40 countries around the world. He's working with ministries of education, he's working with organizations that provide schools. And yet in England, where he has spent most of his career, he hasn't got that access and his views are not being picked up and not being run with in that kind of way. And I think that's sad. And that's why, as I say, I think it's a crucial time, because we've got a schools white paper that will be coming out in the near future. We have just had a change of government last year, and it ought to be an opportunity to change direction, to bring in a new philosophy, a new way of learning, a new way of working with schools. And I think that Gare's insight. Ger's experience, Ger's wonderful way of telling stories and of communicating is absolutely vital, coming at the right time. And I really hope, I've said in one of my reviews, I've forgotten which one, but I said in one of my reviews, I hope everybody at the DFE reads this book because they should, and not only read it, but then draw from it and do things about it because it is important, really important. And I'm just really glad, as I said, I have written a few blog posts myself and I've written things on similar lines, but I'm really glad that somebody like Ger, who is much more articulate than me, a much better writer than me, much broader experience, much, much going to a higher level that somebody like that is actually saying these things and saying them so well. I. I think it's a really important work.

You know, money's a key thing. If all your emphasis is on testing and providing metrics, then that know you've got to be prepared to spend a lot of money. We used to enter almost every child for GCSE English and English literature. The fees for examining year 11 children for those two exams cost more than the money I could spend on books, stationery for all the other years. So that, you know, that, you know the old expression follow the money. Well, if you follow the money, you realize that certain things are just not going to be possible. Yeah, I know. Ger thinks too, that, you know, we live in the same. Times have changed. We live in the safety, first aid. Some of the things that he was able to quote, get away with on German exchange in terms of, I suppose, child protection issues, you know, do you db, you know, do you have a disclosure barring service for the parents of children in Germany and, you know, correspond and who would be the, who would be the authority who could adjudicate on whether it's safe for this, this exchange to go ahead? I don't know how schools do it now. I think increasingly they don't take those kind of chances. So a really, you know, something that I can remember children that I taught coming back from exchanges and so my own children and the exchanges that they did with French, French children and their families, I guess, you know, there'll be less of that.

There's this difference between formal education and informal education and the education we get at home, the education we get on the job and just that lived experience. So if we think about lived experience as its own type of education, I think that Gare is a big proponent of that kind of Education. How do we add lived experience? There might be a better word for it. Informal isn't the right word, but it's the difference between formal, informal, everyone understands. But that lived experience, I think that begins younger than we think because there's the. I've studied extensively. What should a young person know at 25, at 20, at 15, at 10, at 5? And that's what he's looking at. What, what are we learning in the home? What we learn on the schoolyard? But what do we learn when we're away from all of those things? Right.

That.

That's a valid. And. And something I think we don't pay enough attention to. And I think that he does pay attention to that because he, he watches them. What's, what's very interesting about him. And I think it's another thing that, that we have in common. I like talking to kids. He loves talking to kids. I love talking to kids. And he's, he. He comes at it like he's a scientist, he's a researcher, he's a teacher, he's an educator, he's a dad. He's a human who cares about young people, and he cares that they feel as if they're heard. And, and he's shown. He shows that in everything he's done. And it really shows up in the writing. And I think if you can, if anything that someone gets. It's the curiosity of how someone learns and a lifetime of study of how we learn and all the dimensions of learning, which is something I'm particularly interested in. And that gets you, if you're a parent, if you're a teacher, and you can look at things differently and not just do it by the book, but, but do it from that experiential thing because we kick them out of the school and say, hey, good luck. Hope you make a good citizen. Be a good citizen, please. And then like, you know, we're done, we're not. And so I think is. I think one of the things he would say is that he wants to teach children, but also to teach humans how to learn.

Frankly speaking, this book really valuable to the community today, and it means a great deal to me personally. As I said, I was moved by its wisdom and earnestly at times, it brought me to tears. The author's sincerity and trust in the reader are among the book's greatest trenches. What kind of lessons, what kind of. What is the value of this book? It learns about the importance of early development and high expectations for children. It's very, very important for teachers, for Parents for governors. We learn about the value of learning through the play and experience. Education is not only schools. Education is not only universities. Education, education is a lot of things that children do every day with his friends, his parents, with yourself. And Graus's book learns us that education is an experience. For me, the very important the earth's vision for the future of school. And we would like to think about the future as Graus thinks about it in his book. And for me the book is an excellent motivation for teachers, parents, parents and anyone who believes in the power of education. Now we are in the situation where we don't trust in a lot of things and education is among these things. A lot of people don't believe that our schools and our universities gives us a real education, a real value thing. But Ger said us in his book that education is a great thing for everybody. But it's not the same that schools and universities. But we can make our schools and universities valuable for our education, valuable for the education of our children. I would particularly highlight in the book terms relating to inequality. It's very close to my interest as a researcher and my aspiration to bring this topic into educational policy and other part of my impressions from the book. Grouse is a superb storyteller. His narratives are model of how to tell a story. Well, we should tell good stories about education. What stands us out most is how he shows that the values behind his projects grew organically from his own life and experience. They are not simply borrowed from books or from political doctrines of past or present. Though he acknowledged the influence, but spring from his biography. At a very key stage he shows agency and acts as a free individual, not as a representative of any party, ministry or allied group. And nowadays we need this position in the time of post trough. It's a very earnest and very valuable position. And the book is full of memorable images and lines. The fleece and a jar metaphor, the simple answer happy. The phrase I've jumped and the idea that children can only aspire to what they know exists. These are brilliant resonant touch that make the book outstanding. For me, this book, as I said, a textbook, a textbook for all teachers, for all educators, for parents, how to love children, how to educate children and how to move and give the floor for new generation and to prepare this floor for new generation. And my last connection with actual time. We see a lot of very old people with the power in policy, in financial area, in education. And this book is about new leaders, is about new leaders. But we should support these young leaders and then we should move and give them the floor for their agency.

Just at this point, I'd just like to take the opportunity one for. To say thank you for you approaching me to actually have this podcast series. I've learned so much, both in terms of the educational history, the things that you've done, but I think personally and sort of professionally in terms of how I will do things differently, how I will think about things differently. And I think, like you said just there, about what the expectations are for this. You know, what are the expectations of having done this podcast series? What difference can it make? And I think more than anything, that sense of. Of call to action, the. The education on fire hashtag, as it were, which just seems the easiest way of sort of imagining this, you know, to be able to have. Have this as a starting point rather than a finishing point. You know, tell us what's really important about what's happened in your school. What's happened to this particular child? What are you doing that's making a difference? What is it that we can share that other people can then take on and do in there? That's the reason I started the podcast back in 2016, on a very small scale and to sort of come full circle all these years later to sort of do it on. On an international scale. You know, everybody can actually get involved, send a message, send a video, let us know what you're doing, and we can keep the conversations going, not just between us, but as a. As a community at large. And I think if we can impact one child, let alone the options of that ripple effect into the thousands and millions, then we will have been here and served ourselves as well as everybody else. So, yeah. Thank you so much.

My pleasure. Thanks, Mark.

Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.