Thread by @Suchmo83

As a teenager, I went to a rough comprehensive. Social status - the thing we all craved - was determined by a few things: wealth, toughness, looks and, by far the most important, the willingness to challenge authority. Being seen to work hard had a massive social penalty. 1/5

I was thus incredibly grateful for the few teachers who enforced the rules and imposed sanctions. It gave me cover to actually learn without the social stigma that was present when the sanctions were not enforced. My mum was a lab tech... 2/5

...at my school, and not disappointing her meant everything to me, so I worked fairly hard with every teacher, but I took a lot of crap for being a "geek", "boff", etc. The majority of students, on the other hand, opted to protect their social status whenever a lack of... 3/5

...sanctions forced them into a public decision on whether to learn or not. Under other circumstances, I would've done the same.

The argument that sanctions only serve to decrease pupil autonomy seems to lack any grasp of the conditions under which teenagers often operate. 4/5

For many, sanctions are the only thing that allow them to operate free from the much more burdensome constraints of the social hierarchy. Removing sanctions wouldn't have given me and my classmates more autonomy. Quite the opposite, in fact.

5/5

@petergates3 makes an interesting point. I'd be really interested to hear from more people who, like
@ShakinthatChalk, have been to comprehensive schools from deprived areas where the children pushed each other to learn, rather than the opposite.

https://twitter.com/petergates3/status/1226081268577771537?s=19

For perspective, this was my school:

news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/h…

I attended from 1995 to 2002. I'm happy to answer any questions if anyone else feels like I have "imagined a narrative" of what occurred there in my seven years as a student.