19.5 intellectual

Had a ramble in the school grounds this dinner time with a few friends. There are two things that make the petty, bureaucratic childish regime of Thompson + henchmen bearable: my friends and the intellectual rewards I receive from learning. There must be some alternative to what we have, there really must! An ideal situation would be greater teacher-pupil equality, the introduction of personality-suitability tests for prospective teachers. The latter measure would ease all tensions in school by removing bastards like Chipps, Blythe, Latheron, Thompson.....etc., (Wouldn’t it be much quicker to list the masters you do like? - Ed). There would be less and less need for external discipline as self-discipline increased. Of course there has also to be the social motivation among pupils to either gain academic qualifications, or (being of lower intelligence) have plenty of chances to develop other (perhaps manual) skills.