"Was South Lodge up to the job?"

A review of South Lodge by Victor Littlejohn written on Wednesday 13th of February 2008

I fear that my memories of South Lodge are not quite so benign as Sandra’s. The house most certainly was set in very pleasant surroundings but now that I am 63 years old, there are so many questions that I wish I could sit down and ask of Miss Freeman, the headmistress. I recall the some of the pupils had quite minimal sight deficiencies, such as myself, while others suffered from near blindness. The Leicester Board of Education saw fit to lump us all together affording us all the same educational opportunities, or more accurately, a lack thereof. Those of us who were capable were not given an opportunity to take any GCE O levels, let alone A levels. Perhaps others, like myself, had to wait until leaving South Lodge to begin their real education. Undoubtedly other South Lodge pupils have also managed to make up for those lost learning years. I personally emigrated to Canada and graduated as a mechanical engineer but it would have been so much easier if in those early years, a solid foundation had been made available at South Lodge for myself and others capable of benefiting from it. I lay no blame upon the teachers, Miss Freeman, Miss Notley, Miss Whitehead and Miss Geary etc. They had a difficult job to do and I’m sure did it to the best of their ability. But they simply were not qualified to teach all of the important subjects up to the O level or A level standard. Dr Elfed Thomas, whom I believe was then Director of the Leicester Board of Education, should, in my opinion, have made greater provision for mildly disabled but capable pupils at South Lodge instead of apparently assuming that none of us would amount to much in the world. I would certainly like to hear how others, such as Roger Power and Brian Hicks, who were bright and capable fellow pupils of mine, feel about their basic education at South Lodge. Not to worry. Far worse has happened and is happening to kids in the world so I try to look on the bright side of South Lodge. Yes, Sandra, it was set in the most pleasant surroundings..

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