A nearly new school 1

Rangitoto College 

Rangitoto College is now the largest secondary school in the country: a massive corporation of 3000 students. One of my great-nephews is a pupil there from 2014. 

But in the days when I was a teacher there, it was small and comfortable, in a rapidly growing suburb of the North Shore. 

I started in February of 1966 and was introduced to my close colleagues: the Principal, Frank Tucker, the Deputy Principal, Frank Mathieson, and my immediate boss, the HOD English, Frank Gee.  I was the fourth Frank in the line! The senior lady teacher was Hazel Pettit. 

The staff room at Rangitoto was a very friendly place; Frank Tucker made sure of that. All the tea-tables were set out in one long line down the middle and everyone sat together for tea breaks and lunch, as well as at staff meetings. Frank was in the chair, at the head of the table. 

Rangitoto College Staff before my time; Frank Tucker is centre front row.

Frank Gee also carried on a friendly leadership policy in the English Department. There were four main English teachers: Frank Gee, Hazel Pettit, a Welsh immigrant, “Taffy” Jones, and me. Hazel is in the photo, sitting to the left of Frank Tucker.

 

Also visible are Eddie Meijers, my closest friend in the following years, fifth from left at the back, and Glynis Sweeney, to his right.

I made several advances in my teaching skills at Rangitoto College. 

In the first place the English Department ran an experiment over the winter term to try to teach in smaller groups than the usual 35 pupil class. We put all the Sixth Form in the Hall for four periods a week, where they were lectured on a specific topic by one of the four teachers.  Meantime the fourth class was divided into three small groups for tutorial-style classes on student exercises.

My second new experience was learning to direct stage plays. Frank Gee was an old hand, and together we produced “Arsenic and Old Lace” in the middle of the first year. This is one of the classics of stage comedy; it is one of the few plays I know that cannot be cut at all without ruining the story. Later, I produced it again myself at Mt Roskill, but I think we probably did it better at Rangitoto. 

We had a fright the weekend before the week of the performances: the hero, who was also in the First Fifteen, had his nose broken in a rugby match on the Saturday, and we were worried he would not be able to go on stage on the Tuesday night, but the Rugby Union had good insurance arrangements and his nose was fixed and he was fine on the Tuesday night! I learned from that experience always to have understudies for school performances, and also even for voluntary workers in key positions. 

The second year we tried an experimental programme. Frank Gee, who had links with all sorts of useful people, obtained a sheaf of radio plays from Radio New Zealand – plays written by Aucklanders. We chose three, two short ones and a longer one. I produced the longer one, and he took on the two short ones.