Telling Tales out of School

Everyday Life (1968-72)

By the late 1960s, H.B. Beal Secondary School had more than doubled in size, which served to intimidate new students and even new teachers, and to emphasize the division between business/commerce on one side and technical subjects on the other, with the technical side itself further divided between art, shop subjects and Home Economics. The art students actually worked completely apart; in September 1967 the program moved outside school walls to a nearby church rectory, where it stayed for two years, before moving back to a separate wing of the school.

Each division organized its students by program, which meant they had the same classmates in each subject, and frequently year after year as well, until they were through. This whole pattern resulted in social separation: commercial students did not have much to do with students in Technical or Art courses, and vice versa.

It was sort of like we were almost in a completely separate world, encapsulated within Beal itself. ... I think there were a lot of little encapsulated groups moving around in that school (Heidenheim).

Gender divisions too were enshrined. For instance the commercial program sorted boys and girls into different specializations, while girls who wished to go into technical subjects (home economics or art), had to take grade 9 in business and commercial subjects, though boys could go straight to the shops in that grade.

On the technical side, students spent a great deal of their time in shop classes made up of about fifteen students. For boys, the first year of the course involved a general introduction to a variety of areas. In the second year students took a major shop group (three related subjects) and in third and fourth year, a major subject out of those studied in year 2. Those in the five-year program devoted their last year to theory and academic subjects.

Some of the more specialized programs comprised an introductory year at Grade 11, and an advanced year at Grade 12. Student spent two or three periods a day in these subjects, though many devoted extra time to their work. The two-year course in TV Arts, for example, introduced students to a range of areas within the field, including writing, producing, directing and performing.

Female students also had some special technical programs open to them. Those who chose either the dietary supervisor course or the nursing assistant course spent half their time on practical subjects, and half on academics. Students in the former group spent one day a week getting practical experience in one of two local hospitals. According to the newspaper "Their boyfriends are in favour of the course too- 'They think we're going to be good housewives'" (London Free Press [LFP], 24 Jan. 1966). Nursing assistants in training took two mornings or afternoons in a hospital each week in Grade 11; in Grade 12 it increased to three. On the wards they wore a nursing uniform, complete with cap.

In class we studied theory and then we put into practice what we studied and learned. We took turns being patients and nurses. The student nurses would bathe their classmate patient, feed her, give her the hot water bottle, ice pack, linseed poultice, mustard plaster etc. The nurse then would become the patient another time and the patient would take the part of the nurse (Anonymous, 1982).

The teachers in all these technical courses came with a background of practical experience in their field; this was especially true of the Art department, where many of the teachers were practising artists who had not gone to any teaching institution.

The teachers were allowed full latitude to do whatever he or she wanted to do. We never had meetings to say this is the way you had to do things and so on...For instance [one teacher] instituted a period for the senior students where they'd review all different types of motion pictures. He had a thousand pictures there or so. Just terrific, I used to attend it myself (Ariss).

This latitude extended to the students. Aside from a requirement that they take a certain amount of drawing a week, those in the special full-time course could choose how to spend their day, whether it was in wandering from class to class or, staying for hours in one area. Each student had a randomly-assigned teacher-tutor, who had a responsibility to advise the student, as well as contributing to the grading of that student, even in unfamiliar disciplines. The tutor also served as a resource in the negotiation of school routines. "The kid could come to [the tutor] if he was having trouble with a certain thing and the tutor could intercede with the teacher or whomever" (Ariss).