Today is Ada Lovelace Day and, along with many, many others, I have pledged to write a post about a woman in technology.
I have been thinking for a while about what subject I should cover, but really this is supposed to be about a woman I admire, one of the unsung heroines. Therefore I’m going to write about my mam.
My mam recently retired from her job as a deputy head in a large special school in rural Country Durham. Not an area known for it’s open-minded beliefs. Rural Durham is a strange, tribal place. Many of the villages were once home to pitmen and their families. Mostly now though, it’s home to those who lacked the nounce to move on when the pits closed. Those who refuse to commute 8 miles to the nearest city for a job, and whose kids have never been to the beach despite living this close to it. It’s also rather well known for it’s domestic violence, for the casual way in which women are demeaned and belittled. It’s a place where women are expected to stay at home, cooking and cleaning, ready to get a kicking when hubby gets in from the club.
- Imagine living in one of those villages and never having been to the beach
Of course I’m generalising, but having spent a significant part of my life living and working in rural Durham I know it well. It’s a beautiful place with some very decent people. Just not enough.
Into this environment came my mam. She, for those who have never met her, is short, petite and clever. Very caring, very compassionate, she is an ideal teacher. She is also incredibly determined. Woe betide anyone who gets in her way! There are any number of stories I could tell about her standing up to bullies, and not standing for unfairness. However they might embaress her, and I’m not going to do that.
As the deputy of a new school, with responsibility for ICT (the school jargon for IT) she must have felt a bit like Sam Tyler in Life on Mars. Without formal IT training, and without much support she implemented an impressive ICT programme in her school. In this, as well as other areas, she was a strong part of turning a brand new school into a ‘Beacon’ (Governement term for well performing schools). In doing so she passed on IT skills to students and teachers who had no previous experience, opening them up the information age.
By bringing the internet to staff and students, she showed them that there was a world outside the confines of the small villages and towns, that they could access this and revel in it. She enabled and persuaded teachers who had limited professional scope to access all of the training, advice and shared experience the net has to offer.
Doing this alone would be impressive enough, but doing it in an area where women were looked down on, and where a woman would never be expected to take the lead, especially with technology is doubly so. This is one reason why my wonderful mam is my heroine, both in, and out, of tech.
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Well done your mam. Took me back looking at the map; I visited familythere a lot; my nanna lived in Shadforth until her death; my father was born in Ludworth, down the road. He got out in the late 40s, but not before he’d worked at a colliery. My grandad had his back broken in the pit, and finished his days in a wheelchair.
Small world
My Dad’s family is from Seaham, I spent a lot of time in that area, and worked in Peterlee for quite a while.