20 things my secondary school now does which would have freaked me out had they happened when I went
• The school day still starts at the same time but now finishes 25 minutes earlier (that's two hours less school per week, or 500 hours education I wouldn't have had)
• Every year group is now 50% larger than it was in my day (and I thought the school was plenty big enough back then)
• You're not allowed to leave the school premises during the day until you reach the Sixth Form (in my day you were allowed out to the ice cream van, or up to the park, or even into town to go shopping)
• Lessons are now one hour long (which means the weekly PE lesson lasts 60 minutes, and I used to think 35 minutes was hell on earth)
• The school now has a fully-equipped gym which can be used at reduced rates by former pupils after hours (not just a bleak hall with wallbars, ropes and a vaulting horse stashed in the corner)
• Every pupil is expected to have a gum shield for rugby (I told you it was dangerous)
• Free porridge is provided in the canteen from 8am (if it wasn't Coco Pops I'd not have been interested)
• The canteen's gone cashless, based on a system which requires your fingerprint (it's also used for taking books out of the library)
• Everything you buy in the canteen is digitally recorded so your parents can see what you're eating (shudder)
• School letters are now sent by email (rather than folded up at the bottom of a briefcase and hopefully tugged out when you get home)
• School reports are now digital, and for each subject include “behaviour”, “attitude to learning” and “progress against target” (I'm pleased to say I got through school without ever being subjected to targets)
• Lockers are available but students are expected to supply their own padlock (I left everything in a wooden desk with a flip-up lid and hoped it would all be there at the end of the day - it invariably was)
• No knives are permitted in school (understood, but there's also now a 7cm limit on the length of scissors)
• Detentions can only be given with 24 hours' notice (whereas we got "sorry I'm late home Mum, the whole class was kept in")
• We never needed a 'Corridor Code' (actually, thinking back, maybe we did)
• A strict mobile phone policy exists, with no phones to be used inside the building and nothing 'smart' in your first year (I think I rang my best friend at home once in seven years)
• Departments which didn't exist in my day include Computer Science (we had one terminal connected to a mainframe 10 miles away) and Food Technology (I never learned to cook anything)
• You can't pick the modern language you learn in your first year, they randomly allocate your class either German, Spanish or French (the very idea it might not have been French would have horrified 11 year-old me)
• The school uniform policy looks like it hasn't changed in 40 years (although there is now a haircut policy, which is particularly hot on 'contrasting' lengths and styles)
• Full beards are now permitted in the Sixth Form (admittedly this would never have troubled me, but how very modern)
