N E W S L E T T E R - Radley College

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Making the Whole Man Some schools are obsessed with academic league tables; some worship at the shrine of sport; some pay lip-service to the spiritual traditions of their foundations. Radley aims to educate the whole person. One of the advantages of the boarding environment is that the dons and boys are living in a community. Thus the values and skills which are essential to build a successful and caring society can be nurtured in an effective and authentic manner. Successive governments have identified the erosion of social, moral and personal values as weakening the fabric of society. The response was to develop as a part of the National Curriculum subjects called PSHE (Personal, Social and Health Education) and Citizenship . More recently the National Healthy Schools Programme was established as a joint initiative by the Department of Health and the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) to reduce health inequalities. Healthy Schools, as envisaged for the maintained sector, advocates a whole school approach to PSHE, involving pupils, the leadership team, governors and the relevant parts of the local community. The most innovative method of delivering PSHE recommended by Healthy Schools is the ‘normative’ or social norms approach rather than the negative approach to such issues which polarizes attitudes and can even make illicit or unhealthy behaviour more appealing to a rebellious teenager. This model fits well with Radley’s ethos. To promote this normative approach, PSHE and Citizenship are integrated into all aspects of life at Radley; classroom teaching, tutor groups, socials, and games. The development of the whole person is central to Radley’s education. As Radley is also a religious and charitable institution its culture promotes a spirit of responsible and selfless giving in its staff and pupils. The more obvious aspects of PSHE: healthy diet, alcohol, smoking and drugs awareness, and sexual health are taught, in the main, within the Biology curriculum, but these are supported by talks from medical staff, external specialists and developed further in small Social-based discussion groups by boys’ form-masters. We have been very lucky to establish a large and reliable network of excellent guest speakers who have fully endorsed our approach. For example, the Shells receive very different talks from Alex Corkran and Kaz Ghalmi on issues of self-esteem, eating disorders and awareness of peer pressure. Alex Corkran comments that she finds Radleians a pleasure to speak to, as they listen intently. She is impressed greatly by the questions they ask and by their willingness to approach her afterwards with more questions, or just to say thank you. “What a fabulous group of young people they are!” she told me after giving her last talk. Kaz Ghalmi is a former drug addict and a specialist in professional drugs-awareness training. He was recommended to us by Thames Valley Police and, having lived in Radley village, he knows our situation well. He is a very amusing speaker who manages to get the boys in the Shells to think about their attitudes towards one another. He and another drugs worker run workshops with small groups in the Vth form. In these they address in more depth any questions about drugs and alcohol abuse. Another local specialist in this field is Mark Stevens, the clinical psychiatric nursing manager for Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Community Addiction Services. He comes in weekly for the first half of the Michaelmas Term to speak to a couple of form groups at a time about drugs and alcohol abuse. Both he and Kaz Ghalmi also give talks to Common Room and to parents to complement their work with the boys. These sessions have always proved very popular and are strategically important in keeping all those looking after boys fully informed. A number of Old Radleians have generously given talks to our boys. About eight years ago, I went to a dinner talk on Addiction given at Brooks’s Club by Lord Birdwood. He 10 THE RADLEY NEWSLETTER
gave such an entertaining and compelling insight into his own life experience as an alcoholic that I was delighted that he has been able to return to Radley each year to speak to the 6.1 year group. He comments, “The reaction of the audience of older boys is everything one could hope for. From the beginning, they are engaged, clearly identifying with the pitfalls which I am describing. There is real identification. Mind you, the topic - addiction in general, and alcohol in particular - is likely to ring bells as most families have a problem somewhere in their spread. I focus particularly on AA (Alcoholics Anonymous).” He reports that he received some feedback unexpectedly in Brooks’s one evening when a Radleian’s father said, out of the blue, that his son had raved about the talk and how much of an eye-opener it had been and stimulated discussion amongst his friends afterwards. Perhaps a few ORs have memories of watching scratchy black and white films on How babies are made, or The dangers of venereal disease. We have an old 16mm film reel sitting on the shelf in Biology entitled Human Reproduction but (un) fortunately no projector with which to view it. Things have advanced a lot. As well as excellent materials from Channel 4 and BBC Education, Prof Robert Winston’s acclaimed Human Body series provides a superb set of programmes covering puberty and pregnancy. Using models, condoms and other contraceptives, the Biology Department and Medical Centre provide guidance on contraception and sexually transmitted infections with special emphasis on Chlamydia: a particularly nasty, but often symptomless, bacterial infection which is currently spreading through the UK’s teenage population at an alarming rate. The context of all PSHE and Citizenship is always considered in light of Radley’s identity as a Christian school. Over their time here, boys need to develop a mature emotional and spiritual self-awareness to help them cope with the psychological and moral challenges which they will undoubtedly meet throughout their lives. An awareness of the effects of depression and anxiety on oneself, family and friends has been acutely brought to the Radleian consciousness through the work of the Charlie Waller Memorial Trust and Alex Corkran’s talks. Another remarkable expression of Radleians’ generosity of spirit is exemplified by the sustained and diverse range of fund-raising activities for so many different charities, often with very personal links to boys in the school. These activities range from individual endurance record attempts and sponsored long-distance cycle or rowing events, to whole-school charity dress-down days and selling special Radley-branded novelties such as pyjamas or boxer shorts. Many thousands of pounds are raised annually through the boys’ ingenuity and resourcefulness. It should not come as any surprise that the spiritual barometer of the school is the atmosphere in Chapel. The school chapel is a special place, a holy place: the generations of past pupils who return and visit to pray and reminisce in silence or at services are a testimony to its power. It forms and confirms Christians on their discipleship journey. For some it begins as a routine chore, for others it seems irrelevant at first, but it soon becomes a spiritual refuge and refectory. Very few schools still have a daily chapel service for the entire school, or even the principle of a weekly Sunday Eucharist. When I arrived at Radley in 1997, I was struck by Chapel’s peaceful atmosphere and the stillness maintained by the whole congregation in the five minutes before weekday Evensongs and during prayers and the taking of Communion. THE RADLEY NEWSLETTER 11 THE RADLEY NEWSLETTER 11
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N E W S L E T T E R - Radley College

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