HBT
Thank you for this opportunity to talk to you, Catherine, and for sharing your insights with us. It is wonderful to welcome you to BRIDgE as a Visiting Professor. I wonder if you could start by filling us in regarding your background in Lincolnshire and how you came to be aware of what we do here at BGU?
CL
I grew up down the road just outside Worksop and I went to school at a massive comprehensive school in a mining village called Dinnington. We used to go into Lincoln on a Saturday for a family day out. We'd go and look in what my mum called the ‘posh shops’, and I have fond memories of it… although Steep Hill and that walk up to the Cathedral, I remember my little sister and me just moaning and groaning as we were dragged up there! Generally, though, I have happy, happy memories of Lincoln. Also, we’d go on from Lincoln to Skegness, and that was an absolute treat to go to the beach. I don't remember it ever being sunny, but I have seen pictures of back in the day and I know we absolutely loved to spend time on the beach, to be given some money to go around the amusements, and of course to take the iconic sky ride. You know, for somebody who had never been skiing or anything like that to go in that cable car out over the beach was just the most thrilling, thrilling ride ever. I loved it.
HBT
One of the things that I think would be interesting to get an insight into is what you would say have been your inspirations in life?
CL
Well, one thing that is very important is that I knew that I was gay from a young age, from probably my early to mid-teens, and I just knew that as my school friends started to get boyfriends, I didn't think and feel in the same way. But of course, back in the ‘70s and ‘80s there was no Internet, there were no mobile phones, so I had no frame of reference for my life. I didn't know a single gay person.
There were so many other limits back there too. I wanted to be like Kevin Keegan, but there was no girls’ football. If I think back to that little girl in her Umbro football kit, she could never have imagined that the lionesses would win the 2022 EUROs. I hated wearing skirts. I had to wear a skirt for school, and I looked around when it was time to start to think about a career and I looked at my PE teachers - who I really admired - and thought. “Oh look. I could do a job where I wear a tracksuit all day. How cool would that be?” I suspect that maybe one or two of those teachers were gay as well, but you know the saying: ‘You can't be what you can't see’…as we’ll come back to later.
So, I headed off to study teacher training. I did a BEd with PE and English. I thought, maybe, it was a way for me to find something where I could be my authentic self. Meanwhile, though, my best friend, Sue, went to BGU. So, although I didn't go myself, I've known about BGU for some time.
I went instead to Liverpool John Moores, which was at that time, a physical Education college for women. I remember going to visit the campus and there were two women in tracksuits with the bonnet of a car propped up, mending the engine. I had never seen women working on a car before, and it just blew my mind. I was always told that I wasn't ladylike enough, and so to just see that women could do things like that – it was amazing! And then I remember being taken into the Students’ Union bar and there were women playing pool. I'd never seen women play pool before and they were drinking pints! I remember coming away from that visit so fired up. I knew I absolutely had to be there.
HBT
That’s wonderful story, thank you. Moving on a little bit from there, were there any other educational instances that were stepping stones in education that really helped to shape you?
CL
I was lucky. My first teaching post was at school called St Julie’s High School in Liverpool. Its most famous alumna is Katarina Johnson-Thompson and quite a few famous hockey players went there, and it was really, strong on sport. I was lucky to get into a PE department with three other women. I think I was only four years older than the oldest students when I started there and was far closer to their age than to my colleagues’ ages, but it really gave me a superb grounding. I learned during that time. I learned one of the most valuable lessons which was that if you go into the stock cupboard, don't leave the keys on the outside! This was a school at the heart of Liverpool, and there were some funny, fantastic personalities there. I was lucky – I didn’t learn that lesson from actual experience – but locking the teacher in the in the store cupboard was just a daily occurrence at our schools.
HBT
Is it possible now to talk about a little bit when you moved away from PE teaching, what you do now and what you've been generating over the last couple of years?
CL
So, I stayed in teaching and spent the first part of my career as a PE teacher. Then, though, I got rheumatoid arthritis in my late 20s, early 30s, so I moved away from PE and got a job, initially, as a SENCO. The rest of my career was in what we called then ‘pastoral roles’. I was the safeguarding lead, I looked after ‘looked after’ children, and I supported children with special educational needs, disabilities and generally the most vulnerable children in school.
In 2010, I completed a master’s degree in education at Anglia Ruskin University and they asked me if I would be interested in doing some hourly paid lecturing. I absolutely loved it, so when a job came up to be the PGCE Lead for secondary and the MA Education Course Lead at Anglia at Ruskin University, I made the move into higher education. I have to say, there are days where I still really miss teaching and really miss the kids. I miss the funny stories and moments of joy that you get in school, but I have also really enjoyed living some of that through working with and developing the next generation of teachers. Most recently my role is as Pro Vice-Chancellor and Dean of a Faculty. That’s still got elements of education and teaching in it, but it's also Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences. My research passion is around EDI and inclusion, particularly inclusion in schools and moving into a career in higher education gave me the opportunity to have a bit more of a platform for this, and use my own experiences to help others which, as you know, is an element that I thoroughly enjoy.
HBT
Brilliant. You've not mentioned, though, that you have had quite a successful year last year with the release of another influential piece of work: your book and the film. Would you like to explain any of that?
CL
Yes - so, as I've already stated, I'm gay and I taught every year that a law called Section 28 existed, which prevented teachers talking about sexual identity with young people in schools. It was a law that ran from 1988, right when I started teaching, to 2003. Throughout that time, I kept a diary of what was happening. I just recorded things, such as my recollections of the struggles that I was having at school being a gay teacher and having to keep my identity completely private. I was trying to negotiate that space in which the professional and the personal collide.
Then, in 2018, a film director got in touch with me and said that they'd seen my research online about Section 28 and asked whether I would be interested in talking to them. I met them and talked about Section 28 from an academic perspective regarding my research, and I asked about the film that was being proposed. Their response was that it was about a PE teacher in the north of England living and working under Section 28. At that point we started to talk on a completely different level. I remembered my diary and I asked if they would like to look at it if it would be of interest. I sent the diary off in 2018 and didn’t hear anything back. I remember thinking, “Who on Earth would want to watch a film about Section 28? It's a bit niche. They'll never get it made”.
However, they got back in touch with me in 2021 and said that my diaries had helped to inspire the screenplay of the film Blue Jean. They wondered if I be interested in being employed as an advisor on set … which was an opportunity I absolutely jumped at! I met with the costume department, sent them grainy photos of me and my 1980 shell suits and what I would be wearing on a Saturday night going out, and I had an absolute ball. The people involved in the film were super generous to me; I got to go to the Venice Film Festival for the world premiere and walk into the auditorium with the cast and crew. It's all been an absolute ‘pinch me’ experience.
But also, the experience of being back on set and transported back to that era had quite a profound effect on me. My book that you mentioned is called ‘Pretended Schools in Section 28’ and is based on the diaries that I shared for the film Blue Jean.
HBT
I have to say as somebody that has seen the film and has read the book from cover to cover, I found it quite hard. It was very emotionally driven, and it transported me, too, which I'm sure, it has too for many others.
CL
Yes - transported you back to some very difficult, dark places … but it is also quite cathartic, I think. Like you, I'm somebody now that can influence schools and trainee teachers daily, so that does give a bit of a light at the end of the tunnel, I think.
But I think one of the things I have regrets about most from that period is that I couldn’t be a role model for young LGBT people at that time. The writer and director of Blue Jean, Georgia Oakley, was one of those young people who went through their entire school career, never seeing anybody like them in the curriculum, not having support for their own identity through their adolescence. Since the release of the film, some of my own students from back in the day have got back in touch with me and other people that were at school during the time to say, “I thought you were gay, and you could see that I was really struggling. And you weren't there for me. But now I do understand why”. So, I think, you know what? What was a big regret that I couldn't be that role model and I couldn't be there for those young people, is now a hope for anybody who went to school between 1988 and 2003 and struggled with their own identity, that they understand a little more through the film and the book why those of us that were teachers and were gay just didn't give them that support. We, frankly, let them down … but not because we wanted to, but because we had no other choice. It was very much an environment of fear at that time.
HBT
And now, in our current educational context, can you talk a little about EDI, and what you've experienced in your different roles?
CL
Now that I am working in a university, I've got a platform to do research and to do professional development for teachers. One of the things that I have done is set up a number of LGBT specific leadership development programmes, such as Courageous Leaders that we launched with DfE funding in 2016. Courageous Leaders helped over 100 LGBT teachers to get promoted as their authentic selves. Whether that is as a Head Teacher or a Head of Department or a Head of Year, we've been able to support them. So, I feel as though even though I was not able to be a role model myself back then, I can ensure that schools are more inclusive places, more welcoming places, for LGBT staff, students, and other stakeholders now. I'm trying to create a sort of synergy between those kinds of experiences and empowering people to try and be as authentic as they can be.
I think we talk about ‘EDI’ often as though they are three distinct things, but for me, it is all about the ‘I’ EDI, that is the most important element. We're talking about inclusion, we're talking about belonging, we're talking about whoever you are being able to go to school, whether that's as a teacher, whether that's a student and whatever your background. Whatever your identity, you are included. You feel a part of something. You're welcomed into a community. We can sometimes get side tracked by the different protective characteristics and particularly because sometimes there are tensions between some elements, between faith and sexual and gender identity, for example, but I just don't think any of that is helpful. I think what we really need to do is to work on creating inclusive environments, to understand what inclusive behaviours are and think about how we can work together to provide a place where we create an education and institutions that are good for everybody. My entire mantra around EDI is ‘Better Together’!
HBT
Absolutely – and thank you so much for giving us your time to introduce yourself to us. We are really looking forward to working with you as BRIDgE moves forward, to building our ever more inclusive society and, yes, to being Better Together.