Ullswater in the English Lake District. The usual grand weather there….

About 200 years ago the poet William Wordsworth spent much time here, you can see why. A hundred years later Donald Campbell disrupted the creative peace by braking the world water speed record here, over 202mph.

When we visited Hawklad blew my mind, again. Randomly he started to list every top division football champions in both England and Italy. On the patchy internet I checked, every single year answer was correct. Staggeringly that went back to 1889 for England and 1898 for Italy. Even taking the time to fill in the key footballing history, managers and top goal scorers. How on earth does he do that, apparently I’m his Dad and I can’t even remember what I had for breakfast.

2019 – School gave up on him. I remember a Head of Year saying that ‘HE is low attainment with many special educational needs… there are plenty of alternatives for pupils who leave with no qualifications…. College isn’t everything’.

2023 – still on track for his goal – UNIVERSITY.

How many great kids are wrote off by the system when with the right support, THEY CAN FLY.

41 thoughts on “Lake one”

  2. I feel I got nothing out of school, nothing, but that I was captured and others tried to process me each day and as I didn’t fit into that processing (thankfully) was rejected into the hallway to ponder. I’m alright, honestly I am and I’m not what others would ever consider to be “normal” perhaps due to never being processed. As others have said recently “There really isn’t anyone like you!” and “They threw the mold away” and “You’re a breath of fresh air” and “Where do you get it from?” and …

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  5. I hope Hawklad achieves what he wants in life. I hope he is feeling good about himself for everything he has faced so far.

    I have a friend who is older than me and can reel off a lot of things, like to do with films for example and I am the same as you, I be lucky if I remember what ate yesterday. As much as I enjoy my films that my friend may also like along with talking about a particular actor. I for one cannot recall the stuff as he does. I wish I could recall half of it.

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  10. Wow. The lad will go far. The system only recognises the average who do as expected. Yes, how many fall victim to such a lack of imagination? Shameful. The Lake District is wonderful. Without Donald Campbell and his wretched machine!

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  12. Reading this today, I’m dismayed to see how the dull experience I had in the early years of school due to the inherent dullness in the system, is still there today. But I found university far more open – never got an ‘A’ until i reached university – I expect Hawklad will find university to be a doorway into learning and success, unlike what he’s in now. The only thing is that there are many doors there and one needs to pick one [or more] that fits.

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