Reflections on Geography at Bedford College (and then Royal Holloway) in the 1980s

The Geography Department at Royal Holloway, University of London, is hosting an alumni event focusing on the 1980s to be held on 16th July.  As one of the last ‘surviving’ members of staff to have worked at Bedford College, I was asked by Klaus Dodds to write a few words about my recollections, so that they could be included on a poster in the Department.  Just thought that it might be interesting also to post them here, together with some imagery from 20-30 years ago!

“The Department 30 years ago was so much smaller than today – fewer staff, fewer undergraduates, and fewer postgraduates.  It was a world largely without computers.  No e-mails!  One could think, and write, and teach students who were genuinely interested in learning.  It was brilliant!

I distinctly remember being appointed, and joining in 1981.  There were but a handful of jobs advertised in human geography that year.  I had been interviewed for a job at Exeter, but couldn’t hear properly what the panel chair was mumbling!  Needless to say I did not get that job!  My girlfriend was working in London, while I was still living in Durham and working at the Geography Department there.  Then this job came up at Bedford – amazingly the College where my mother had studied mathematics many years previously!  I remember being asked at the interview what it would mean for my personal life if I got the job, and responding that of course it would mean that Pam and I could get married. Imagine being asked such a thing in interviews today!

I was appointed to teach historical geography – and loved it!  I diligently used to write out my lecture notes in full – and read them to my students!!  Scarcely something that new lecturers would do now, in a world of PowerPoint!  But I did use slides on the old projector. I was very little older than the students were, and they forgave me for my nervousness.  I think my enthusiasm must have made up for a lot – medieval taxation documents, field systems, and prehistoric monuments!

One highlight was when the new electronic typewriter with a memory arrived; the precursor for word processors and personal computers.  One day, I was using it when the Departmental Secretary came in and threw me off, saying that she had something important to write.  Suppressing my fury, I left the dark room where it lived, and hit the wall outside with my fist.  My hand crumpled….  I then spent all afternoon running “The Green Revolution Game” with my students; my hand bent in pain.  Only in the early evening did I go to St Thomas’s – and of course they diagnosed a broken hand!

Then there were the great students doing the Master’s course in Third World development.  The course was led by Alan Mountjoy, and attracted bright people from all over the world – some of my favourite teaching ever; if only I was still in touch with some of them – particularly the Egyptian journalist who gave me a photograph of Jürgen Habermas.

And there was the IRA bombing in 1982.  I heard the first blast in Hyde Park whilst I was working at the RGS, and then got back to Bedford to see the debris remaining from the other blast that had taken place at the bandstand just nearby in Regent’s Park.  A sad day.

But the early 1980s was the time of mergers across London.  I became deeply involved in planning for the merger with King’s, and remember being saddened when it was announced that this had fallen through.  Going to Egham did, though, have one advantage in that we did not have to negotiate with another Geography Department already there; we could instead build our own identity from within.  On a personal level, we also decided to move from our rented flat in Kennington out to a newly built house in Englefield Green, on the Larksfield estate.  I remember this being a huge risk, since I had not been made permanent and we bought before it had definitely been confirmed that the merger would go through.

The move meant that we could reorganise our courses, and I recall working with Chris Green and others on a new teaching structure that would mean that our third year courses would become much more research oriented and also applied.  This provided the opportunity for me to launch my new course on the historical geography of viticulture and the wine trade.  At first, this was rejected by the University Geography board as being far too esoteric – but I resubmitted it again pointing out that if there was a course at SOAS on the geography of oil, surely we could teach about viticulture and wine.  After all, the wine trade has been in existence for millennia.  This course also provided an opportunity to work more closely with those in the wine trade, and highlights definitely included the wine tastings and the field trips to Burgundy and Champagne.  Imagine being allowed today to ‘race’ in minibuses across France from vineyard to vineyard and campsite to campsite.  How generous were the winemakers who shared their time and their wines with us!!

But I recall other field trips too: the day excursions to Northamptonshire and Bedfordshire for my second year students, exploring field systems and deserted medieval villages, more often than not in the snow; and then the second year trip to Portugal, again with generous hospitality from friends in the port wine trade.

There were great characters in the Department: Ron Halfhide, who became Departmental Superintendent, and was always the life and soul of the party, helping to arrange wonderful Geographical Society events; David Hilling, the ‘uncle’ figure, who cared for students (and rugby) in ways that we are no longer permitted to do; John Thornes, who as Head of Department told me that I should really make myself the specialist in one area of the discipline, such as the geography of Portugal.  John certainly taught me some lessons!  On his recommendation, I drafted two chapters of ‘the’ book on Portugal, and sent them to a publisher.  The academic referees liked them, but the publisher said that there was no market for a book on agricultural innovation in Portugal.  Never again have I written anything for a book publisher without a contract!

Above all, I remember those days as ones of amazing freedom – when we could craft new knowledge in the innocent ways we believed were right, when we could treat students as friends and not numbers, when collegiality rather than individual selfish career progression mattered.  They were good times”.

Ofsted report on declining Geography in England’s schools

In a press release, Ofsted comment on their report on school geography in the UK published today that ‘A polarised picture of school geography teaching has emerged … While geography was flourishing in a minority of the schools visited by inspectors, it was found to be under pressure in the rest.’   As the press release continues ‘The primary schools visited presented a sharp contrast between inadequate and outstanding practice. Half were characterised by a lack of expertise and awareness of what constituted good geography. In approximately one in 10 of the primary schools visited, geography was more or less disappearing. Just over half the primary and secondary schools visited did not use fieldwork adequately. In some of the secondary schools visited, there was a drop in the numbers studying geography GCSE. Uninspiring teaching and the lack of challenge discouraged many students from choosing geography at GCSE. The quality of provision was declining and the time allocated to the subject in the first critical years of secondary schools was being reduced’.

The study is based on observations of geography classes in 91 primary schools and 90 secondary schools between 2007 and 2010, and represents a depressing picture of the present state of teaching in the discipline.  Official figures show that the number of people taking GCSE in geography fell from 173,800 in 2008-9 to 169,800 in 2009-10, with the number of state schools not entering pupils for the subject increasing from 97 (out of more than 3000) in 2007 to 137 in 2009.

As a BBC report on the findings commented, ‘”Core knowledge for the majority of the students surveyed, but especially for those in the weaker schools, was poor,” it said. It found all but the best students were “spatially naive” and that they were unable to locate countries, key mountain ranges or other features with any degree of confidence.”For example, they understood about development issues in Kenya but had little or no idea of where Kenya was in Africa.”Many of them had studied Amazonia and could talk with some conviction about the exploitation of resources and environmental degradation but they knew nothing about the rest of South America.”‘

This is hugely damning, not only for those who care about geography as a discipline, but also for the futures of our young people. Geography is one of the most important and exciting subjects of all:

• it explores the place of people in the world – in both a conceptual and a physical sense;
• it is explicitly concerned with the interactions between people and the physical environment – which lie at the heart of so many contemporary global issues such as climate change, the impact of migration, resource allocation and distribution, and international development;
• it provides young people with an understanding of the importance of diversity and tolerance based on a detailed understanding of other cultures and people; and
• it is one of the most enjoyable and exciting subjects to study at school and university – reflected in the importance of field work and a practical understanding of places.

In a response to the Oftsed report, the Geographical Association (GA) notes, amongst other things, that:

• ‘This Report therefore sends a strong message to senior leaders in primary and secondary
  schools: it is unacceptable to tolerate geography that is weak, because this impoverishes the
  curriculum. If geography is weak it “is a key issue to be addressed by the leadership teams in
  these schools” (p5)’;
• ‘The Report shows many examples of schools in which geography has been encouraged and is
  flourishing. These are schools where the geography is driven by challenging questions about the
  contemporary world, where pupils’ knowledge of people, places and environments is extensive
  and where the teaching is lively, topical and well informed. One reason for good geography was
  found to be where “subject specific professional support had been sought out and utilized” (p6)’; and that
• ‘A strong theme is the polarized pattern of provision in terms of the quality of teaching and
  learning and the curriculum between schools. This is linked to the lack of subject specialist
  teachers and/or lack of subject specialist training. It is therefore a worry that training numbers
  are being cut in geography.’

As David Lambert, the GA’s Chief Executive notes, ‘It is a pity that Ofsted’s own press release designed to draw attention to this report is headlined ‘geography declining in schools’. Why? Because the report makes clear that the story is much more complicated than that. In some schools, if you suggested that geography were declining you’d be faced with puzzlement, for the subject is thriving. And yet, the national picture which has been taking shape for many years now, is unsatisfactory. The GA takes this very seriously. The decline in school geography means that there is less geography being taught in school and more children leaving school with an inadequate knowledge and understanding of their existence on planet earth’.

The report nevertheless represents systematic failings across the discipline, and far too much complacency amongst professional academic geographers. Whilst the GA has been valiantly trying to support secondary and primary geography over many years, the number of university academics involved in and willing to give their time to school geography (other than as part of their own selfish recruitment drives) has dwindled dramatically.  We need to provide a vision of the excitement of the discipline that inspires young people to engage in the discipline.  We also need to act much more strategically at a political level with Ministers, senior Civil Servants and leaders of the private sector to advocate for the value of geography.  If we do not, we will not only have failed a generation of school pupils, but will ultimately have helped to create a society with little understanding of the complex relationships that shape interactions between people and the physical environment.

Day 5 – taxi service and the Río de la Miel rally

On the last two days of the field course, students work in groups on their own research projects exploring aspects of the geography of the Nerja region – ranging from studies of Quaternary deposits to the architectural identity of villages transformed by tourism.  So, for much of the day I became a taxi driver, dropping off students measuring river morphology in the Chillar valley and others interviewing tourists and farmers in the picturesque village of Frigiliana.  The day ended, though, with experiencing the unique rally environment of the upper Río de la Miel valley (see video),  and then clambering up into the clouds to see the remains of the old fortress of Los Castillejos.  That was before the night began!

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Day 2 Nerja

The second day of our urban exploration of Nerja led by Alasdair Pinkerton and Sara Fregonese – traditional architectures, urban origins, and cultural understandings of place…

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Experiencing Nerja – Day 1

The Geography Department at Royal Holloway, University of London, has been taking first year students to the Andalucian town of Nerja and its surroundings since the late 1990s.  Below are just a few photos from the first day exemplifying

• that geography is about understanding the human interactions with the physical environment that shape places, and
• field trips should be about working hard and playing hard!

Video of panorama from Balcon de Europa

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