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Pioneer in education
• I WAS very sorry to hear of the death of Jeffrey Gordon (Soap star leads tributes to teacher who inspired pupils, August 29).
Jeff Gordon, as he was universally known in his time at Holloway School, was one of the unacknowledged teaching stars of the 1970s and 1980s.
I knew Jeff from when I began teaching in 1980 until he left teaching at Holloway in 1987. He was one of the people who mentored me in my early teaching life. Jeff truly inspired respect both as a teacher and as a man.
Many students would state he was their “best teacher”, because he took a genuine interest in their lives and their academic qualifications.
Jeff was literally a pioneer in the use of work experience for those pupils who became disillusioned with school work and wanted to get out into the world a little more. Jeff pioneered the use of work experience diaries for pupils and the collection of work experience data that were used to inform the practice in future years. This practice has been copied by many teachers since then.
Jeff also pioneered a mode 3 CSE (Certificate of School Examination) – this was an O-level/ GCSE equivalent qualification – curriculum which he and his staff used in the late 1970s and early 1980s to gain for the boys at Holloway School exam qualifications they would probably not have achieved if it had been a mainstream examination course.
Jeff was a staunch member of the National Union of Teachers and a strong socialist.
He was a very mild-mannered person. He never once had a bad word to say about anyone, student or staff.
ROGER CARBERRY
Queens Road, N11
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