DJ

I'm really lucky in what I do in the sense that I get out and about around the country and see what's going on in lots of different schools.

Being a typical Scot, the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.

My transient work pattern means that relationships, while broad, aren't always deep.

So, I miss that satisfaction, which is the real job satisfaction in teaching, about changing young people's lives for the better.

Today I was in Greenfaulds HS, Cumbernauld, at the invitation of a guy I'll call DJ. I now know this is what the kids at the school call him, so, if its good enough for them :-)

DJ organised a Higher Modern Studies conference today. There were teachers and pupils, 349 in total, from schools all over North Lanarkshire, in a cracking theatre within Greenfaulds HS.

Several things were notable about the conference.

The first thing was how focused the pupils were. I mean, I wasn't exactly Robbie Williams onstage. I did my contractual slot and talked about the main issues concerning wealth and health inequalities in the UK, and Glasgow in particular.

So, entertainment I wasn't.

I was on for about 40 minutes, on all sorts of dead serious issues. The previous two speakers were the same. The pupils were just fantastic; asking questions, taking notes and concentrating in a way that really makes you realise that the generalisations which many people make about young people are way wide of the mark.

Another was the school itself. I spoke with the heidie and he was exasperated about the infrastructure of the school and the need for investment. Fair point.

But, and this leads on to point three; it is obvious to anyone who enters Greenfaulds HS that there is the most extraordinary vitality about the place.

Everyone smiles. I don't think I came across anyone who was scowling, who didn't have somewhere to go, something to do, some activity that wasn't important.

I'm a massive believer that, just as you can tell within a minute of interviewing a person for a job whether they've got what it takes or not, you can suss out more about a school by walking around it than you can through endless, tedious, examinations of "quality assurance" folders.

Which brings me on to DJ.

DJ has a CBE for his work at Greenfaulds HS. He is extremely bashful about this and I know he had his reservations about the whole process. But someone, or a group of people within the community, wanted to recognise his amazing contribution. Right now, getting a gong from the Queen is a really powerful way that acknowledgement can be made.

I've known DJ for a few years now, but never seen him within his school environment before. It was amazing. He was organising a conference for 349 pupils, involving ten schools. He had a programme to organise, guests to see to, car parking, photocopying, the lot.

He delegated to key pupils. I saw the fun DJ had here; the banter with pupils, the mutual respect. He probably taught these pupils' mums and dads. DJ could hardly speak in fact as he had been up more or less all night, all week, organising a school theatre event.

DJ's school trips abroad are the stuff of legend. He does one every year, which has no trouble and is remembered for life by everyone who is lucky enough to get a place on it. DJ has an opt-in supported study class with 50 pupils attending, after school. I met DJ's colleague, Joyce, and she was just as full of life as DJ.

In short, what I saw today was the kind of educational environment which never makes the news. Why should it? There is no scandal. It is positive. It is caring, it is motivating, it is the kind of place I would dearly love to send my own son to.

DJ is a one-off, as the kids say, "a legend".

But, as DJ would be the first to admit, there are teachers like DJ, but different in their own way, all over the country.

And, brilliant pupils all over the country too.

Haiti: Too Difficult to Watch but Very Easy to Help

Don't know if you're like me but I just can't bear to watch anything about the earthquake.

Watching it on tv isn't going to save anybody. All it's going to do is make me upset, so I switch over and watch the football instead.

Honest, that's what I've been doing and maybe you've been the same.

You might think, I'll raise some money or I'll donate some money. But will the money really reach the injured, the homeless and the sick?

You read a bit of background about Haiti and you wonder.

While Haiti was the only country in the Western Hemisphere to have undergone a successful slave rebellion, its recent history hasn't been glorious.

Francois Duvalier ("Papa Doc") and his son Jean-Claude Duvalier ("Baby Doc") were textbook 3rd world dictators, murdering and terrorising their people.

Baby Doc was the Saddam of the 1980s. (The US could have invaded and established democracy, the way it does now, with some countries. Back then it arranged for Baby Doc to be exiled in France!)

Since democracy arrived the country has been badly mismanaged. 1% of the population owns 50% of the wealth. Most of the country lives on less than $2 a day. Half of the population cannot read or write.

The people who who were blown out of their beds on 12 January really are among the poorest and most vulnerable people on earth.

But, you can do something to help them. Glasgow the Caring City's Campaign means that if you text HELP to 88008 you will donate £1 (although it will cost you £1.50 plus your text charge)

There can't be too many people in work in Britain today who would actually miss £1.50

Its a cliche but those £1.50s really will make a difference to these people. GTCC are a NGO you really can trust to deliver.

You'll never personally be thanked by someone in Haiti for it and I'm not trying to make you feel guilty if you don't text or donate.

But I do know you'll feel better about yourself if you do.

Ken Loach. Genius.

I like all sorts of films.

Over the holidays I discovered that my mrs had never seen Back to the Future. Amazing!

So, I had the enormous pleasure of buying the triple DVD pack and even more fun watching BTTF1, hopefully see 2 next weekend. The films are even funnier now that they're so dated (on the subject of which, did you know Wall Street 2 is coming out this year?)

So, please don't accuse me of just liking serious political films, alright?!

But, I really, really love Ken Loach's films. Ken Loach is just one of those guys, and you don't have to be a Lefty or a Guardian reader to acknowledge this, that just has integrity and pride in his work.

He only does a film when he has something to say, usually about an underdog, that the mainstream film industry won't touch. He also gets actors from "normal" backgrounds who have talent but are, as yet, undiscovered. He doesn't care about making loads of money. He just does what he is good at; making films that entertain but also make the audience think.

Its hard to believe that this attitude is so unfashionable (I'll admit it, I watched the first night of Celebrity Big Brother last night, I always do, and I am proud to say I hardly knew any of them).

The first Ken Loach film I saw was Kes, when I was a lad. Forced to by my English teacher but loved it all the same. Then, when I became an adult I discovered Ken Loach for myself. A Question of Leadership was banned from C4 because it was too critical of the Thatcher Government. Whose Side are You On was also banned during the miners strike, it was seen as "too political".

Carla's Song and Hidden Agenda start off well enough (first part of Carla's song with Robert Carlyle taking a Glasgow double decker bus up to the Highlands is just magic)but lose their focus, which is a shame. Land and Freedom was also a bit of a missed opportunity and the great film about the Spanish civil war has yet to be made.

The Wind That Shakes the Barley is the film about the Irish civil war that Land and Freedom should have been about Spain. Painful to watch at times, but fantastic political film making. As is Bread and Roses about illegal immigration to the USA. Sweet Sixteen, set in Greenock, is well worth a watch too.

But, the best film he's ever made, IMHO, is My Name is Joe. That's why I'm not just delighted that the film is being shown as a special Modern Studies event at the Glasgow Youth Film Festival, I'm honoured to have the slightest, tiniest, connection with bringing this film to a wider audience.

I'll never forget when the film first came out in 1999. I took my Higher class from Boroughmuir High School in Edinburgh to see it. Higher pupils from Boroughmuir don't know very much about Glasgow and they don't know very much about housing estates or poverty. That's not their fault. They're lucky to have been born into comfortable backgrounds and everybody should. At the end of the film there wasn't one girl, and a few of the boys, who came out in tears. If I wasn't such a big hard guy myself I'd have been the same.

Gary Lewis, who's gone on to Gangs of New York and all sorts of other big films is coming along and Peter Mullan, who plays Joe might make it too. I hope you can make it.

There's still loads of other Ken Loach films I haven't seen. Aye Fond Kiss is one, for starts, Looking for Eric another. Check them out yourself, maybe not the film for a first date, but your mind and brain will be all the healthier.