Barrhead, It Was All Down to a Tweet.
Barrhead High School and GAU.
Some weeks before Christmas my attention was drawn by a friend to a tweet. The tweet was about Barrhead High School and a project the RMPS class had been working on. Two students had chosen Global Acts of Unity as their topic for the project. Included in the tweet was a couple of photographs of their work. It was superb and so very well put together. I replied to the tweet and found out the tweeter (if that is the correct expression) was a teacher at the school. A Twitter conversation took place between us which culminated in an invitation to the school and my acceptance.
Our Visit.
Forward to 9th January and a rather cold wet morning as my wife Vanessa and I were in the car heading to Barrhead. Vanessa had volunteered to be my assistant for the day, no way was I going to turn that offer down.
Barrhead to someone who doesn’t know the town has a rough reputation however from all we saw it was a well kept and friendly place. We arrived at this ultra-modern School and were greeted by Mrs Drewell and treated to refreshments whilst the tech was set up for the two presentations.
The Presentations.
The first group of students arrived with the normal hustle and bustle but soon settled down as I was introduced. GAU is often blessed with very high attention rates however this group were engaged 100% right from the start. You could see the emotional journey they were taking as David’s story unfolded. There were many tears being shed by both male and female students. When the presentation finished there was silence and no questions. I try to make time for students to talk to me by themselves and there were certainly many students who wanted to make use of this time to ask a question or have a discussion.
The second group of students like the first settled down and blessed GAU again with 100% attention. The two students Rhian and James, who were the root cause of us being at Barrhead were present and you could see they were both emotional at our visit. I managed to cause them both a bit of embarrassment by telling the audience of their excellent work and why GAU was visiting. Right the way through my talk the students were enthralled and after the presentation there were many questions both in the Q&A session and afterwards on a 1-2-1 basis.
A Surprise for GAU.
At the end of the second presentation the Headteacher very kindly gave a nice donation to GAU funds. This was and is so appreciated. It costs quite a lot of money each year to give our presentations and as everyone knows money is tight these days. GAU would like to thank all at Barrhead High for your donation it will ensure that work of GAU continues.
Last Thoughts.
This school everywhere we went was spotless, you could see the obvious pride from staff, teachers and students in their school. I know that Barrhead has an excellent reputation and is highly regarded in the academic world. The students were both a credit to themselves and their school. I know that Barrhead will be fondly remembered, and I hope revisited.
