As a 9-year-old girl growing up in Brussels, Vicky Bingham would regularly visit the museum of fine art to look at the collection of Bruegel paintings.
She loved to stop and look at his famous artwork depicting , where the hapless protagonist鈥檚 flailing legs are shown poking up from the waves.
鈥淚 would spend at least 20 minutes looking at that painting,鈥 she says. 鈥淲hat intrigued me was how little Icarus featured, and the juxtaposition of a dramatic classical myth with a peaceful ordinary Flemish landscape.鈥
The overall message of the myth will still be in Bingham鈥檚 mind when North London Collegiate School (NLCS) opens its brand new this spring.
A centre for excellence in art, design and engineering education, it will also carry out educational research, development and innovation.
鈥淭he Icarus story is actually a perfect illustration of how you should balance tradition and innovation. If you go too fast, that’s going to lead to all sorts of unintended consequences. If you go too slow, you’re actually going to go backwards,鈥 she says.
The Ideas Hub鈥檚 first research project 鈥 launched to celebrate the school鈥檚 175th anniversary 鈥 will look at the concept of 鈥溾 and the contribution of the extra-curricular life of the school to a student鈥檚 academic confidence.
鈥淲e wanted to focus on quite specific things, such as whether the amount of activity has a positive or negative effect and also what type of activities have a positive effect,” says Bingham.
We鈥檙e not interested in producing lots of research journals that don’t get read.
A key aspect of the Ideas Hub will be its role in the professional development of teachers 鈥 who will be encouraged to carry out research aligned with the school鈥檚 strategic plan.
She says: 鈥淲hat we鈥檙e not interested in doing is just producing lots of research journals which sit on a website and probably not that many people read.
鈥淲e鈥檙e more interested in having a genuine impact in the classroom, I think it鈥檚 about picking fewer areas to research and doing them really well rather than just letting people do whatever they鈥檙e interested in 鈥 it鈥檚 got to be meaty.鈥
Like other leading schools with innovation centres 鈥 and 鈥 the Ideas Hub will be run , former co-principal of the innovative UCL Academy in London.
Other aims of the hub will be to improve partnerships with state schools, offering opportunities in engineering, art and robotics, and developing links with the worlds of business and technology.
But as the school embraces the future, what does Bingham 鈥 an Oxford classics graduate and classics teacher 鈥 really think of the way things are moving in education?
The rise of AI, ubiquitous technology use and growing dissatisfaction with current forms of assessment have all presented schools with big dilemmas in recent years.
She says: 鈥淚 think we鈥檝e lost sight of the good written examinations can do and it鈥檚 become very fashionable to knock them and to claim they have all sorts of deleterious impacts on students鈥 mental health.
Every reform you make has got some positive and some unintended consequences.
鈥淚鈥檝e watched cohort after cohort of GCSE students and I鈥檝e always been struck by how calm, how resilient they are as they approach these exams.鈥
The fairness of the traditional system is important too, she says. Rather than scrapping traditional exams, she says, it is important to ensure schools are not led by them completely.
鈥淪o often when you look at what people say about education they present exams and creativity as opposite poles on a spectrum and I just don鈥檛 think that鈥檚 actually true of what happens on the ground.
鈥淵ou鈥檝e got to get students ready for exams鈥f you鈥檙e a good teacher you鈥檙e going to do much more than that.鈥
Onscreen exams, she says, 鈥渇eel like a natural development鈥 although she is unsure of the benefits of sixth formers 鈥減assively taking notes on a laptop鈥 rather than writing.
She says: 鈥淚t’s not that I’m anti-online or anti-writing. I think the point is that everything, every reform you make, has got some positive consequences and some unintended consequences. If we were de facto to lose the art of handwriting because exams were always online, we would need to do that knowing what the long term effects on learning would be.鈥
The examiners are not given enough training by the exam boards.
One area where Bingham and many others are dissatisfied is exam marking, where she says 鈥渂etter systems鈥 need to be put in place.
鈥淲e know from plenty of research that the marking of examinations is not reliable, and it’s not okay to say that the grade a student got could have been one better or one worse. That鈥檚 really not good.鈥
The current system, she says 鈥渄oesn鈥檛 work鈥.
鈥淭he examiners are not given enough training by the exam boards. It鈥檚 a bit of a cottage industry. If you ask most teachers if they want to be examiners, they say they can’t take on the workload.鈥
Elsewhere in education, she would like to see 鈥渂roadening of the sixth form curriculum鈥 ensuring that students have mathematical skills alongside their other subject specialisms.
The majority of students at NLCS take A-levels, but a quarter to a third take the International Baccalaureate, which already enables this.
It鈥檚 perhaps unsurprising that Bingham is concerned that the march towards a technological future could mean humanities subjects are sidelined.
She acknowledges the huge popularity of maths at A-level and the decline of English literature A-level nationally.
We mustn’t lose sight of the beauty and the joy of education.
She says: 鈥淲e often talk about education in quite a utilitarian way. We talk about it being a passport to university, to employment, future skills. We mustn’t lose sight of the beauty and the joy of education – that you can鈥檛 easily measure or put into a spreadsheet.
鈥淚’m concerned about this, because a study of literature, a study of the humanities, it’s not just interesting, it’s actually really useful as well, because it helps, it expands your thought.鈥
Even in a hi-tech future workplace, the humanities will be more important than ever for promoting empathy, communication, analytical thought and the evaluation of truth, she says.
Skills taught by humanities subjects, such as understanding cause and effect, are vital for designing an algorithm or predicting the impact of a scientific innovation, she adds.
鈥淚f you don’t know how to communicate, how are you going to persuade government or venture capitalists to invest in your exciting new innovation?鈥 she says.
Beyond the workplace, the sheer joy of education and passing on knowledge is also key to Bingham鈥檚 thinking.
You can see how classics continues to inform so much of our culture.
Her father, who worked for the EU, and her teacher mother lit the spark, she says.
鈥淢y father gave me a love of Beethoven, my mother gave me a love of Jane Austen’s novels and many other things besides. And I had amazing teachers,鈥 she says.
Bruegel鈥檚 painting of Icarus, she says, illustrates this perfectly. While the painter was inspired by an ancient myth, the painting itself went on to inspire a poem by WH Auden.
鈥淵ou can see there how classics continues to inform so much of our culture,” she says.
While innovation and technology may be thriving at NLCS, it鈥檚 clear that Bingham won鈥檛 be letting go of the intellectual and academic tradition it is famous for any time soon.
Vicky Bingham – CV
Education:
European School of Brussels I
Oxford (Classics MA)
Cambridge (PGCE)
Work:
Teacher of Classics, Guildford High School
Head of Classics, St Catherine’s School, Bramley
Deputy Head, Guildford High School
Head, South Hampstead High School, GDST
Head, North London Collegiate School
