Teacher to retire after a 36-year career at Aston primary school
Paul Hunt is to retire after 36 years teaching at one Birmingham school. He talks to Jane Tyler about the revolution he has seen in education.
When Paul Hunt began his teaching career in 1974, computers existed only in science labs, calculators were locked away in classroom cupboards and Ofsted and SATs were acronyms waiting to be invented.
But by far the biggest – and most important - change as far as he is concerned has been inside toilets.
“Having to trek across the playground in freezing weather to go to the loo... horrible,” he shudders.
When the term finishes at Canterbury Cross Primary in Aston in a couple of weeks time, it will be the end of an era for Mr Hunt.
At the age of 59 he is retiring after 36 years. And his career has been unusual in that it has been spent entirely at just one school.
Most teachers move around during their careers, so Mr Hunt is a rarity. But he has no regrets.
“It is unusual for a teacher to stay at the same school for this length of time,” he said. “But in the time I’ve been here I’ve seen enough changes with the curriculum changing every five minutes, and who knows what’s going to happen in the future?
“I didn’t want to move to another school because I’ve been happy here, and I didn’t fancy a headship because heads don’t have time to teach any more. I know where my strengths lie and that’s in teaching, and that’s why I’ve got no regrets about staying here.”
Canterbury Cross is a traditional Victorian school dating back to 1906. But while the school has changed little since it was built, the pupils and teaching methods have.
When he started in 1974 the pupils were a mixture of Asian, Afro Caribbean and white. Now 99 per cent of its 400-plus children are Muslim.
But along with the change in the ethnic make-up of the pupils, the biggest change has been the teachers’ day-to-day lives.
“When I started you were given a class and left to it,” he said. “You decided what you wanted to teach and were then left alone until the end of the year.”
“But now we’ve got so many people breathing down our necks: SATs, Ofsted, the national curriculum. There have been some good developments though, establishing a framework for literacy and maths is good, I also think all the technological improvements I’ve seen are great.”
When he started pupils were not allowed to use calculators for maths lessons and computers – if the school had any – were locked away in the headteacher’s study.
Now teachers and pupils are spoilt for choice with laptops, computer games, mp3 players, whiteboards and interactive tools.
“There are so many resources available to help teachers grab the pupils’ attention,” he said. When I started you only had books, the radio and television – now virtually any topic you want to cover there’s something you can use to support it. We have to keep up with it because the pupils are using these things at home and picking up so much from outside school.”
Though he is retiring, Mr Hunt is not severing complete ties with Canterbury Cross as he will be returning to teach three days a week.
“I always said I wouldn’t work beyond 60, and now is the right time to go. I won’t miss the paperwork but I will miss the kids and teaching, But by coming back part-time I can keep my hand in,” he said.
