People who inspire...

Earlier today I caught a bit of the repeat of 'The Unteachables' - a programme that took a group of distruptive and, as the title suggests, apparently unteachable young people and brought in a hand- picked education team to work with them. This team included Phil Beadle - Secondary Teacher of the Year 2004 who I would have to place somewhere high up on my list of people who have inspired me. I'm not a teacher, and yet the way this man went about his job and went about working with and caring for these young people, had an affect on me and re-inspired me to be creative in my own job (where I do have the privilege of working with young people). The programme had an extra appeal for me in that I love to see the ones who everyone else has written off being told that they are worthwhile and that they have talents, even if those talents have been hidden under rather a lot of crap for a while!
I have read a variety of comments and reviews of this programme and the teaching methods involved, including from one teacher cynical remarks on the ability to transplant any success into a 'real' classroom environment. Well, I think it worth pointing out that Phil Beadle has been transforming the learning experience and enabling young people to start to fulfill their potential in a much broader and more 'normal' context than this television 'experiment' - click the link above to read a little of his achievement. I am inspired anyway.