Bringing down the ‘iron curtain’

IT is a proud history that spans more than 400 years: Hulme Grammar School opened in 1611 followed by Hulme Grammar School for Girls in 1895.

But now a new chapter is being written with the creation of Oldham Hulme Grammar Schools.

Karen Doherty found out more.

FOR generations of Hulme pupils it was known as the iron curtain. The closed door in the long corridor that firmly separated the boys’ and girls’ schools.

The boys had their side of the building, the girls had theirs and mixing carried the threat of punishment.

A curtain covered a window in the door and one former female pupil from the 1990s recalled: “I just remember not being allowed to go through the door. It was a big talking point.

“Occasionally, if we were having a big assembly we would have it in the boys’ hall. We used to get supervised to go through the door and the boys had to stay in their classrooms.

“We even had different lunch hours and different parts of the grounds. It was a raging mass of hormones. Home time was good because we could get the bus together.”

That changed when Dr Paul Neeson was appointed principal in September, 2006. He opened the door and began a process of bringing the two schools together socially while retaining single-sex lessons.

“When I came for my interview I was shown around the boys school by the deputy head then, a bit like Checkpoint Charlie, I was handed over to the head of the girls school to be shown around. It was very much two schools run by two heads,” he recalled.

“The governors had decided that they really wanted to operate a diamond school.”

The diamond structure teaches the youngest and oldest pupils together, with single-sex lessons for intervening ages.

At Hulme this translates into a mixed kindergarden, the separate Hulme Court (boys) and Estcourt (girls) prep schools, senior boys’ and girls’ schools and the mixed sixth form which had already been introduced in 2004.

There are many arguments to support single-sex lessons but crucially, Dr Neeson wanted boys and girls to mix socially in the senior school.

“When I arrived the boys were at one end of the building and the girls were at the other side of the building, that’s just not normal,” he explained.

“We are preparing young men and young women to go out into the world . . . to work with one another in the real world. After all, it seems obvious but the real world is co-ed.”

But while the dividing door opened quickly, the unification process is ongoing.

It is not simply allowing boys and girls to mix, but bringing together two schools which were used to doing things in their own — and sometimes quirky — ways.

Creating single departments, shared facilities and a single pool of staff teaching both girls and boys classes.

“At one stage I felt like Noah. There was two of everything,” joked Mr Neeson who also had to maintain the ethos of the schools and its academic standards.

“We had two heads of department for every department, an old boys’ association and an old girls’ association.

“I also inherited three parents’ associations, the boys the girls and kindergarten.

“The parents were great and recognised very quickly that they could come together. It took a little bit longer to get the Old Boys and Old Girls together.”

While some things have been evolutionary, others have been radical such as changing the staff structure.

Dr Neeson admitted diplomatically that some staff were more reserved than others about the changes, but said that they had been achieved without redundancies.

Finance was another important reason for change. Independent schools have been hit by the credit crunch and Hulme can now offer a wider range of courses and extracurricular activities.

Girls can do business studies or boys food technology. Dance had been introduced in the sixth-form to meet demand and the Combined Cadet Force is now open to girls.

Dr Neeson, who took the school’s first joint speech night in September, added: “The kids have been fantastic. As far as they are concerned we were still teaching them in single-sex groups.

“That will continue, there are no plans to change the current structure. We feel they are getting the best of both worlds.

“It has certainly changed the atmosphere in the school. It is a studious one, but socially it is far more relaxed.”