“If I can’t do it then nobody can………………..”
I have been reflecting recently on the “Everybody matters, everybody succeeds, everybody helps” motto that the school endeavours to exemplify through our daily activity. For those of you already sympathising with the quality of life somebody must have to spend their quiet moments reflecting on such things, I would reply that this is not the only thing I have been reflecting upon and would ask that a little leeway is given in this instance as the alternative theme for this week’s blog was based upon the fact that today is the feast of St Anthony, the patron saint of gravediggers.
My reflections have led me to the conclusion that, neat and pithy as the motto is, were we to consider redrafting it there is probably the need for a fourth point to be added, something that Mr Prutton picked up in a school assembly delivered before Christmas. Both as individuals and as a school community I believe that we can all be very proud of our willingness to help others, the missing element is one relating to how willing any of us is to recognise the need for help and to accept assistance when offered. Much as it pains me to admit it, to be even more specific the missing element relates to how willing the male members of our community are to recognise the need for help and to accept assistance when offered.
Male pride, otherwise known as pig headed stubbornness, has many manifestations, from refusing to ask directions when lost to a pre-programmed response of, “I know!” when told how to do something that was, until that moment, a complete and baffling mystery to us. If this inability to accept help is common to all males, it is certainly at its peak during the teenage years when most self-respecting boys would rather gargle with rusty razor blades or volunteer to have their toenails removed with pliers rather than listen to advice and act upon it. I would like to claim that such an attitude is confined to the young but, having recently received a present that I couldn’t work and felt a tingle of smug satisfaction when others couldn’t work it either, none of us are exempt (it took the man in the shop I took it back to 3 seconds to solve the problem – I said I was bringing it in for a friend).
Although this stereotypically male attitude has its amusing sides and on many occasions is little more than irritating, there are times when it can have disastrous consequences, none more so than in relation to examination results. In common with the rest of the country, boys at Fulston Manor achieve consistently and persistently lower grades than their female counterparts in external examinations, something not related in any way to levels of ability. A significant part of this underperformance is linked directly to an inability to seek help or to act upon advice given and I would urge all male readers of this piece to reconsider their attitude to assistance as a matter of urgency. Whilst it may lack the neatness and snappiness of the current motto, Fulston Manor would become an even more successful school were we to live by a code that stated, “Everybody matters, everybody succeeds, everybody helps and all males in the community accept and act upon all help and advice that is available without becoming stroppy, grumpy and sulky” - might be difficult to fit that onto official documents but nonetheless ………
