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#1: Women: Old Girls as Staff Author: Róisín, Location: Ireland

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 7:36 am
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Old Girls as Staff - eg Biddy, Rosalie, Nancy et al. What did you think of the grownup mistress vs the young pupil - do they progress naturally into the woman they become or can they seem like different people at times? Are there too many of them - should EBD have chosen more staff from the outside world to introduce new characters and freshness, or is it preferable for us to see how these girls turned out? And anything else you can think of would like to discuss in relation to this.

Please join in Very Happy

#2: Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 8:06 am
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It's possibly a bit unrealistic that so many Old Girls became mistresses. Having said which, teaching would have been the most popular career choice for middle-class women at the time so it's not surprising that so many Old Girls became teachers, and I suppose there was a lot to be said for the "better the devil you know" attitude from both the school's viewpoint and the mistresses' viewpoint.

Also, not everyone would have been suited to a job where you were expected to be trilingual: they all seem quite shocked when Pam Slater points that out, but how many people speak 3 languages well enough to teach in all of them? Plus, after the Miss Bubb disaster, it's actually said a few times that they want people who are used to their "traditions" (e.g sending people to bed every time they sneeze!).

I quite like seeing how Old Girls turned out - although it's a shame that many of the later mistresses who aren't Old Girls, e.g. Sharlie Andrews, Ruth Derwent, etc, never really have their characters fully developed.

Some of them do change considerably as they grew up, but usually it's just people maturing, e.g. Biddy stops being a "wild scamp". However, Nancy Wilmot changes completely from someone fairly lazy to someone very responsible. Then again, other people - e.g. Mary Burnett, Gillian Linton - do pretty much become the adults you'd expect the schoolgirls they were to become (if that makes sense!).

I do feel sorry for anyone else who applied for the jobs, though! For example, when Kathie Robertson applies for the job as head of the Swiss kindergarten Hilda more or less says that she decided on her straight off because they knew her.

#3: Author: Laura V, Location: Czech Republic

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 9:36 am
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I agree with Alison. There is a disproprtionately high number of Old Girls whoo become mistresses, though, Biddy and Simone excluded, all of the Old Girls who return to teach are British. Considering there were so many none British girls attending the school why didn't more return as mistresses? Confused

#4: Author: Mel, Location: UP NORTH

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 10:21 am
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I think it is realistic to expect a lot of Old Girls on the staff. In EBD's eyes, the Chalet School is the best school in the world, so they would all be longing to return and would find other schools dull. But EBD spend little time on the non-Old Girls staff. I always find Ruth Derwent disappointing as Head of English, as that subject is so important to the school. Perhaps no-one could up-stage Hilda? To many people, as has been said, teaching in three languages would be a nightmare as well as being ludicrous. Some of the Continental girls returning would be a great idea and would be a relief to the excessively overworked Jeanne!

#5: Author: Caroline, Location: Manchester

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 10:22 am
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Because, as you should know, all well-brought up Continental girls leave the Chalet School to marry young and bring up squads of children. Only very rarely do they seem to be allowed to go to University and take up a career (before marrying and bringing up squads of children... Rolling Eyes

Seriously, can you think of any non-English old girls who went to Uni and *could* have come back to teach? I've got as far as Simone (who did both, of course) and Ilonka Barcokz. Can't think of any others.

#6: Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 11:07 am
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Maria Marani (although I'm not sure whether or not she ever went to uni) was supposed to be helping with the language teaching whilst she was working for the Maynards, before she married Walter Maclaren, but IIRC we never see her either in a lesson or in the staffroom. I'm not sure if EBD forgot about her or what: when it's mentioned in Problem we're also told that Gottfried is coming to work at the Gornetz Platz, but he never does; and that Herr Mensch snr has died, but then Joey and co go to visit him in Innsbruck in Coming of Age Confused

.

Also struggling to think of other Continental girls who went to uni and could then've come back to teach ...

#7: Author: Eilidh, Location: North Lanarkshire

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 11:28 am
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I think the problem is that the continental girls are in two sections. There are the Tyrol girls, who, given the time the books were set and EBDs obsession with marriage could perhaps be expected to go home and marry. At this point, very few girls are leaving the school for University, continental or otherwise. Juliet, Grizel, Mary Burnett, Rosalie(?), and Simone are the only ones I can think of at the moment. Not a very long list when compared to Gisela, Bernhilda, Wanda, Bette, Gertrud, Luigia, Thora, Diera, Joey, Frieda, Marie, Paula...

Then there are very few continental girls while the School is in England/Wales during the War years and afterwards.

More start to arrive after the move to Switzerland, but by that time the books are focusing on firstly, the Gang, and secondly, the Triplets and their friends. Neither on these groups has any continental girls really (I know there's Odette Mercier, but she rather fades into the background and disappears) so we don't hear about the later girls who go to University.

I know, completely off topic...sorry...

(Also preparing to be wrong - it's a while since I read the later books)

#8: Author: Ruth B, Location: Oxford, UK

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 11:40 am
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Something that has always grated with me, is that Nancy Wilmot declares in New that,

Quote:

'In my humble opinion all maths people are the extreme edge!’

yet she ends up back at the school teaching it!!

I think Biddy is the most realistic portrayal, certainly her prefect self and her mistress self are fairly similar.

As Alison said, given that being trilingual was one of the job requirements, I think the high proportion of old girls is to be expected.

#9: Author: Mel, Location: UP NORTH

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 1:08 pm
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I think there must have been some girls who would teach, there must have been plenty not in the limelight. If EBD could dredge up Nancy Wilmot, Winnie Embery and Maisie Gomme she could find a French or Tyrolean girl or two.

#10: Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 1:25 pm
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I don't know why they never had any native German-speakers to teach German Confused

#11: Author: Caroline, Location: Manchester

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 1:31 pm
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Mel wrote:

I think there must have been some girls who would teach, there must have been plenty not in the limelight. If EBD could dredge up Nancy Wilmot, Winnie Embery and Maisie Gomme she could find a French or Tyrolean girl or two.

I think the tricky thing is the timing - in the 1920s upper / upper middle class girls of the kind who might have been able to afford to go to University didn't actually need a career, so tended not to go to college unless academically exceptional / driven / artistically gifted (whether they were from the UK or the Continent).

So, CS girls going to Uni at all is quite rare in the early books and tends to be restricted to those whose families are upper-ish class but relatively poor, and are gifted enough to win a scholarship (Mary, Simone, Juliet). Rosalie, who presumably needed to get a job, went to secretarial college, and Grizel, who didn't need a job as long as she went along with her father's ideas, studied music at a conservatoire. Did Carla go to study singing? Or was that Vanna?

The Continental girls at the CS are much more of a mixed bag, class wise, than the English girls - from the von Eschenaus who are upper class but not massively wealthy (and neither Wanda nor Marie are portrayed as bright enough for Uni) to girls whose fathers are 'in trade' (Sophy Hamel, Frieda). For the former, an early marriage was expected; for the latter, a job might have been required before marriage, but not a job where university was required. One exception might have been Gertrud - she doesn't marry straight away, and always seemed quite an academic type...

By the time things had moved on sufficiently for most of the CS leavers to expect go to college of some sort / get a job after leaving, the war had intervened and non-UK / Irish / Commenwealth CS girls were at a premium. I could see Maria Marani at University and teaching properly (rather than helping out) if the war / her father's death / her breakdown hadn't intervened. Robin's friend Lorenz Maico might have been a target for EBD if she had wanted a non-UK mistress. Or Lonny Barcokz.

The one girl in the later books that I might expect to see back as a mistress is Anna Hoffmann. I can see her making an excellent languages mistress.

#12: Author: Clare, Location: Liverpool

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 4:19 pm
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In a way, the number of ex-pupils returning to teach helped to ground the Chalet traditions more firmly. So they were tri-lingual, knew how they had been treated therefore applied the same principles themselves, and kept the school as it was when they were there. Which is not always a good thing Confused

but worked in the case of the CS.

#13: Author: skye,

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 5:56 pm
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Alison H wrote:

I don't know why they never had any native German-speakers to teach German Confused

I would think that prior to the war they didn't need all that many staff, during the war they didn't use German, and after the War they would, perhaps, not particularly wish to have a German on the staff.

Peace League notwithstanding, Germans were not top of the Christmas card list and would have possibly been a discouraging factor for the parents of prospective pupils!

#14: Author: Mia, Location: London

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 6:28 pm
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Do you know, a girl in my class went back to our old school to teach and at the time a lot of people were a bit scathing about it, basically implying a lack of ambition, etc, however (ironic really as none of them are in particularly glamourous careers Rolling Eyes

) however, that's probably because women's work boundaries, for want of a better word, have changed so much. In the 40s and 50s they would have been a lot narrower. I think therefore it's plausible for EBD to use old girls as teachers and it provides nice continuity for the series.

#15: Author: dorian, Location: Dublin

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 8:33 pm
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Alison H wrote:

I don't know why they never had any native German-speakers to teach German Confused

But German is rarely mentioned as being taught at all, particularly after they leave the Tyrol. Okay, during and immediately after the War German wasn't actually being taught at all; it's only reintroduced to the curriculum in "Three Go" (IIRC). But even then, the only mentions I can think of of German teaching refer to Miss Denny, who is stuck teaching the "odd" languages like Italian that hardly anyone learns. German seems to be acquired by osmosis in the Chalet School.

#16: Author: Sugar, Location: second star to the right!

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 10:01 pm
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My Secondary School had/has a lot of old Girls teaching at it. Currently in the primary school there are 3 old girls out of 7 teachers and an Old Girl as a Head. And when we were there, a lot of teachers were old Girls so I never thought the CS was odd.

#17: Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 10:19 pm
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I always thought the lack of German was because EBD herself was far less happy with it than with French. I know she makes French mistakes, but they're fairly sophisticated ones, the German feels at a much more basic level.
I love the OGs going back, I adore Biddy and think she's a very consistent character, as are Rosalie, Hilary Burn, Gillian Linton - I'm only disappointed that so many of them fall victim to a doctor and disappear fairly quickly! Nancy Wilmot is the only one, I think, who changes in an unpredictable way, and I'm never very sure where EBD dredged her up from anyway, she's not exactly centre stage as a pupil. She's a lovely adult character though, so all is forgiven.
Quite a few of my former schoolmates ended up back teaching at our old school, and there were even one or two former pupils on the staff of my last school, and it was great fun teaching alongside them. Interviews are always such a lottery and appointing the wrong person is so awful that I think it's bound to help if you have prior knowledge of the person.

#18: Author: Lisa_T, Location: Belfast

Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 10:34 pm
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Ruth B wrote:

Something that has always grated with me, is that Nancy Wilmot declares in New that,

Quote:

'In my humble opinion all maths people are the extreme edge!’

*g* I agree about the Maths thing...

BUT I don't agree about Biddy. In many ways Biddy (even her name!) is caricature of a 'wild Irish girl' who reforms and becomes anglicised. Ultimately, when she reforms enough (drops her 'wild Irish') ways, she's granted the rewards of first a post at the school, and secondly a doctor. So... taking a broad perspective, I don't find Biddy realistic. I don't find her realistic as a schoolgirl particularly, although one of my favourite Tyrol scenes is when she tells Joey about Alixe von Elsen and the banshee. I love her as a teacher- and again, the sliding-down-the-hill scene in 'Carola' has me in stitches every time! Then again, as a historian, I'm pretty much bound to like her.

Re OGs in general- in terms of subjects, the only two who don't surprise me are Mary Burnett and Grizel Cochrane. I don't remember anything about Peggy Burnett and Games, or Rosalind Yolland and Art.. there's the Nancy & Maths one mentioned above..

#19: Author: Pado, Location: Connecticut, USA

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 12:40 am
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The Old Girls coming back is comfort food to young girls who can't imagine a life outside of their own very familiar school setting, much in the same way that a small child expects to live with parents even after getting married.

That said, as a child I attended a sleepaway summer camp that I - and several of my cohort - chose to come back and work at for several summers as a young woman. (please don't let Miss Annersley see that sentence!) Even today, I'd go back in an instant - and I imagine I'd have an even stronger attachment if I'd been there 9 months of the year rather than just the one.

#20: Author: Hannah-Lou, Location: Glasgow

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 10:04 am
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I think that's a good point, Pado. In those days people would have stayed at home longer, not leaving until they were married, unlike today. If you lived at school for 9 months of the year, and were from a family who needed you to get a job, their old school would have seemed a logical place.

Perhaps the school was lucky in that all the old girls who return are good teachers. I imagine a lot of people went into teaching simply because there wasn't much choice, but they can't all have made good teachers, surely. Maybe we just don't hear about all the old girls who wrote to Miss Annersley asking for a job, who she (politely, of course!) turned down because she thought they'd be rubbish!

#21: Author: Tan, Location: London via Newcastle Australia

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 10:39 am
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Hmm. Potential drabble there with that idea ...

#22: Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 11:30 am
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I'd love to see her turn Len Maynard down! Len just seemed to assume that there'd be a job for her there when she wanted it (although Reg probably wouldn't let her out of the house to teach after they were married, even if she wanted to Rolling Eyes

). Joey would probably have tried to force Sally Denny to retire to leave a vacancy for a languages mistress.

#23: Author: Clare, Location: Liverpool

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 11:48 am
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I'm with you on that one Tan! *shoves bunnies away* I'm half way through a Scrubs/CS crossover, with a pile of marking and prep for next week...

*Down Flopsy!*

#24: Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 6:05 pm
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Application letter,

Dare Miss Anersly,

Im writting to apply for th post of Englisch Lang...Lanag...Englisch Teacher at the chalet scool. as Im an Old Girl Im sure this will be a grate deal and that you weill be rallly pleased to have me.Plese let me no when i can start

Ypurs sincerly

prudence Deawbarn

(What do you think? Has she got the job? Wink

)

#25: Author: claire, Location: South Wales

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 6:16 pm
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Out of interest isElsie Carr the only old girl teacher not to return to the school?

#26: Author: Lisa_T, Location: Belfast

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 7:20 pm
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The point about the fact that the CS is a boarding school is a good one. There's no denying that boarding school life is very different from day, and in many way it's a more intense experience, whether for good or ill. Two of my teachers at Mary Hare were ex-pupils; when I was a pupil there, a number of us (including myself) talked quite openly about coming back to teach there when qualified. My history teacher used to joke that I was after her job- in fact, there were several of us after her job! Very Happy

So I never found the number of OGs coming back to teach terribly startling.

And boarding schools are idiosyncratic little universes unto themselves, much more so than day schools. I returned to MH for a week's experience before I started PGCE, and I remember one of the staff commenting that it was so nice to have a student teacher in who understood the place and how it operated. There's also the fact that even now- I can walk into the Manor front hall at MHGS and feel instantly at home, a decade after I left school. For someone who went through CS (or MHGS, for that matter) from near babyhood, that feeling would be even stronger.

#27: Author: Tiffany, Location: Is this a duck I see behind me?

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 9:11 pm
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I think it's a shame that we don't see more from the mistresses' points of view. There's New Mistress, I know, but otherwise you generally only get fairly banal staff meetings shown in the books. It would be interesting to see a book focussing on an old girl who came back to teach - what was the selection process? How did her peers react? How did the older pupils, who might have been at school with her, react, and how did she react to them?

The CS prefects and seniors are given a lot of powers and responsibilities over the younger girls, and the point is made a few times in the books that being a prefect is good preparation for being on the staff. Possibly this is one reason to favour Old Girls - they have already proven themselves in a similar position in that environment.

#28: Author: KB, Location: Melbourne, Australia

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 11:35 pm
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claire wrote:

Out of interest isElsie Carr the only old girl teacher not to return to the school?

Actually, the question of Elsie being a teacher is a bit iffy. She joins the Wrens in Goes To It and is still in them (or similar) in Lavender. It's almost impossible that she would be released from this to simply become a PT teacher. The ref to Elsie's teaching career is in one of the three long short-stories, so it's more than likely an EBDism of the highest order! Laughing

#29: Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire

Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2007 11:43 pm
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Lisa T wrote:

BUT I don't agree about Biddy. In many ways Biddy (even her name!) is caricature of a 'wild Irish girl' who reforms and becomes anglicised.

Yes, she is and does but, significantly, you still love her, as do I. Wink

I'm very interested in your proposed article on stereotypes, I touched on the theme very, very briefly in my PhD thesis. I felt, in the end, that EBD certainly uses them, the wild Irish girl, identical to so many others down to the physical description; the princess; the Mamselle, but she subverts the stereotype because she transforms them all (Biddy, Elisaveta, Jeanne de Lachennais, Mlle Lepattre) into real people whom the reader cares about and identifies with.

#30: Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW

Posted: Sat Apr 14, 2007 1:47 am
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Which prompts the question did that happen despite or because of EBD? And would that be possible only because in a long series you have room to expand and develop character in a way which might not be possible in a single book?

#31: Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire

Posted: Sat Apr 14, 2007 10:11 pm
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I would definitely say 'because of'. The series element does help, of course, but I think she basically took them seriously as people. There are dozens of princesses in school literature (and Europe was liberally sprinkled with them in that era, EBD even had some at her own school), but Elisaveta is a very attractive and normal child and her adult life is traumatic, resulting in her losing everything and having to 'char' to support her children, with her daughter eventually attending the school as plain Jose Helston.
The non-English staff are treated with a seriousness which is very rare - they're usually either figures of fun (cf EB) or very isolated figures (their very title is generic). The presentation of them as cultured, effective , professional memebers of staff, even a Head, is strikingly unusual.
And Biddy ... well, I'm Welsh, not Irish, and I'm sure there must be elements which are really irritating to people who are, and the whole of her story needs sorting out, but she's a most engaging character both as a child and as an adult. I mind her getting married and leaving less than I otherwise might because it gives her roots. The school has always been the only home she's known, so to see her children in the cradle which has rocked generations of Courvoisiers is rather moving - IMO!

#32: Author: Lisa_T, Location: Belfast

Posted: Sat Apr 14, 2007 10:16 pm
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I agree absolutely. Coming from EB, it was EBD's sensitive treatment of European nationalities that really won me over. I haven't read EB for years, but looking at the MT/CS drabble reminded me of just how awful it could be. That, I think, is why EBD's portrayal of Irish characters (maybe Deira O'Hagan is a better example than Biddy, come to think of it) does grate a little. It contrasts so greatly with her depiction of Austrians/French etc...

#33: Author: Tamzin, Location: Edinburgh

Posted: Sun Apr 15, 2007 6:37 pm
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Alison H wrote:

Also, not everyone would have been suited to a job where you were expected to be trilingual: they all seem quite shocked when Pam Slater points that out, but how many people speak 3 languages well enough to teach in all of them?

I agree with the above point. I think that there would have been few teachers fluent enough in those three languages to teach in them both in the time of the CS and nowadays. However I think the problem would have been greater in the days of the CS than it would be now, especially as in that period the emphasis at school would have been on grammar and written work with very little conversation. Also few colloquialisms would have been taught - the language imparted would have been very formal and "classical". I'm not so sure how languages were taught at university in those days but I'd guess there was more time spent on studying literature and writing about it (in the language being learned) than in speaking the lingo. I don't even think that language undergraduates had to spend a year abroad learning how to speak a language "as she is spoke" among the native speakers before about the 1960's????

Anyway my point is that if the CS had really insisted on fluency for new staff then the old girls were probably the only ones qualified to join the staff.

#34: Author: Loryat,

Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2007 3:57 pm
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Lisa_T wrote:

I agree absolutely. Coming from EB, it was EBD's sensitive treatment of European nationalities that really won me over. I haven't read EB for years, but looking at the MT/CS drabble reminded me of just how awful it could be. That, I think, is why EBD's portrayal of Irish characters (maybe Deira O'Hagan is a better example than Biddy, come to think of it) does grate a little. It contrasts so greatly with her depiction of Austrians/French etc...

I totally agree with all said about EBD's sympathetic treatment of continental people: while still a bit stereotyped, so much more open minded than any other kids books of the period I've read. Her stereotpyes are annoying but despite the cliches they do live on the page.

I have always liked the fact that adult Biddy rejects strait-laced English and litters her speech with Irish turns of phrase. They are maybe a bit cliched but I like that she rebelled against constantly being told not to say this or that. And EBD let her do it.

I have always assumed that Nancy's wartime experiences bucked her up. Though that doesn't explain her transformation into a 'maths person'. Maybe she got hit on the head in an air raid and the maths part of the brain was jumped into gear? Confused

#35: Author: annah, Location: Liverpool UK

Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2007 7:03 pm
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[I have always assumed that Nancy's wartime experiences bucked her up. Though that doesn't explain her transformation into a 'maths person'. Maybe she got hit on the head in an air raid and the maths part of the brain was jumped into gear? Confused

[/quote]

I can empathise with Nancy entirely. I hated maths at school but have ended up a maths teacher! It comes from thinking that I couldn't possibly be as bad a teacher as the one I had. I believe that (particularly with maths) if you have struggled with a subject, rather than found it easy, you will be better able to understand the difficulties of others and to explain things to them. Maybe Nancy thought the same. Smile

Anna

#36: Author: Clare, Location: Liverpool

Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2007 9:46 pm
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annah wrote:

I believe that (particularly with maths) if you have struggled with a subject, rather than found it easy, you will be better able to understand the difficulties of others and to explain things to them. Maybe Nancy thought the same. Smile

Anna

I think you've hit the nail on the head there. Maeve Bettany says something along the lines of "well if she's going to make a chap understand like that then she's got my vote."

Nancy would always help the "duffers" and clarify problems without making the pupils feel stupid or make them resentful. Not like Pam Slater, but then she always found maths easy and expected other to do so too.

#37: Author: Kate, Location: Ireland

Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2007 10:24 pm
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Clare wrote:

annah wrote:

Anna

I think you've hit the nail on the head there. Maeve Bettany says something along the lines of "well if she's going to make a chap understand like that then she's got my vote."

I agree totally. It applies to me, I think... I've always found computers very easy but I am utterly incapable of teaching other people how to do things on the computer, just because things seem so obvious to me. Yet I can teach other things (I hope...!)

#38: Author: Caroline, Location: Manchester

Posted: Tue Apr 17, 2007 7:55 am
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Tiffany wrote:

I think it's a shame that we don't see more from the mistresses' points of view. There's New Mistress, I know, but otherwise you generally only get fairly banal staff meetings shown in the books. It would be interesting to see a book focussing on an old girl who came back to teach - what was the selection process? How did her peers react? How did the older pupils, who might have been at school with her, react, and how did she react to them?

It'd be interesting for us (personally, I'd love to read it!), but I'm not sure how much it would have appealed to EBD's publishers or target audience at the time. Compared to other school story writers of her era, her use of the staff perspective and inclusion of the staff as "real" characters rather than just two dimensional background people for the girls to rebel against / play tricks on / go to in times of crisis, is quite unusual / remarkable. It's one of the things that really makes her stand out (that and the sheer length of the series Laughing

).

You could argue that sections of Jo Returns where Joey is drafted in to teach do tackle some of these issues. Jo struggles with teaching, struggles with trying to deal with the staff as her peers rather than 'the staff', struggles with the whole "Miss Bettany" thing, where she feels uncomfortable being referred to as such by girls who were in form with her the year before, and struggles with being the youngest of the staff (and thus having no say in anything) when she has been the respected Head Girl for the past four terms.

#39: Author: Loryat,

Posted: Tue Apr 17, 2007 10:17 am
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Jo Returns is one of my favourites of the series. I love all the staff insights and also the insights into Joey's writing process which I found hilarious.

#40: Author: Lisa A., Location: North Yorkshire

Posted: Sat Apr 21, 2007 4:43 pm
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[quote="Tamzin"]

Alison H wrote:

vif the CS had really insisted on fluency for new staff then the old girls were probably the only ones qualified to join the staff.

I agree - you might almost expect that they would actively encourage girls to consider returning to teach, and have some sort of incentive or procedure for doing so. Maybe there was an unofficial understanding that if a girl had the aptitude and desire to teach there, it could probably be arranged, especially if there were not really that many genuine candidates. Are any girls ever encouraged by staff to consider returning to teach (other than as emergency stand-ins)?

I quite like the returning OGs as a continuity feature that allows old characters to develop and saves introducing too many new ones.

#41: Author: champagnedrinker,

Posted: Sat Apr 21, 2007 9:22 pm
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Caroline wrote:

Following on from Caroline's comments, does anyone know how the % of girls going to University in the UK in the 20s & 30s compared to continental girls (and boys for that matter). Perhaps one of the reason that even fewer of them went than British Girls was simply because they didn't.

#42: Author: Róisín, Location: Ireland

Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 11:30 am
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Was reading New Mistress over the weekend and there are a number of things in that that reminded me of this discussion. Particularly the ways in which the lives of the staff weren't so different from the lives of the students. They have small bedrooms that have been decorated by somebody else, with single divan beds. They are bound to a strict bathroom rota. They are under the control of Matron as regards their health and teeth - she still even makes their dental appointments for them.

#43: Author: Loryat,

Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 11:36 am
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I suppose that is partly cos they all work to a rota and the dentist is miles from the CS. Matey probably arranges it so that they go down with the girls and a minimum of disruption to the timetable ensues. The bathroom thing - well I have no idea what things are like in boarding schools nowadays but in those days I think en suite bathrooms would have been seen as an unnecessary luxury and since there are so many of them they would have needed a rota.

Hopefully they would have been allowed to add their own decorations to their rooms if they wanted? (Posters of Clark Gable - maybe not).

#44: Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England

Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 12:40 pm
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Lisa A. wrote:

Are any girls ever encouraged by staff to consider returning to teach (other than as emergency stand-ins)?

I imagine Juliet and Grizel were, when the Annexe was started up. It was possibly assumed that, with Mademoiselle as headmistress, Simone would come back to the school to teach after the Sorbonne.

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