"...It was quite a change.

"But nothing to the change in more recent times. In 1992 the UK government introduced radical changes in the structure of 16-19 education. Sixth-form colleges were lumped into a single sector with general further education colleges. We were formally divorced from the Local Education Authority and, in essence, told to run our operation as a business - compete for students in the market place, manage our own finances, and increase the number of students able to take A-levels. I suppose what a visitor would notice most of all this, is that the buildings originally designed to serve the needs of some 600 boys aged 11-19 somehow now squeeze in 1150 16-19 year olds - and growing. The college has to continue to grow in size and in "customer-consciousness" in order to remain viable in a tough market environment with ever shrinking levels of resources The cosy solid safe sameness and reliability which I remember of the old HGS has changed (as inevitably it had to) to the more zappy style of the thrusting nineties and the new millenium!

"There are a few staff who have ex-HGS pedigrees, though I am the last full-time teacher who can claim that particular fame (- the others are semi-retired, part-time). I fear that when the time comes for reminiscing my way through a retirement speech (not for a while yet, DV) nobody else will have the slightest idea what I'm talking about - though they may just have to put up with that in deference to the history and soul of the place we still work in."

Steve concludes by drawing attention to these pages and expressed the hope that Clem would make contact, as indeed he did - see his reminiscences of the 1940s elsewhere. Looking back on my six years - and one term! - it seems hard to credit the changes that have taken place in that time. Then, we were still a local authority sixth form college, working a four and a half day week (recreation on Wednesday afternoons!). The grammar school roots derived from both Huish's and Bishop Fox's were still quite strongly in evidence, though I recall that some of the staff were keen to push ahead with distancing themselves and the college from the past. Someone said to me, "The trouble with this place is that half the people here want to forget the grammar school tradition and the other half think it still is!" Well, it is no business of mine to engage in controversy or to stir up trouble. The position of this page is "We are all Huishers; we respect the past and we look forward to the future". So, come on! Send me your news and write up your recollections and your literary efforts are guaranteed a warm welcome from our world-wide readership(!).

This concludes the Web edition of Huish's history. I hope to return to some periods with further chapters from time to time. In addition, there are still those volumes of the Magazine waiting to be 'mined' for the treasures they contain - BP