Now everything’s a little upside down, as a matter of fact the wheels have stopped (Bob Dylan)

Episode three of the BBC's stunning School series has just aired and the grim situation at Marlwood School continued.

I mentioned the show to a fellow Head Teacher at a sporting event yesterday and he told me he refused to watch the show because the idea of it (exposing the current state of state education) made him too angry.

I get what he means. 

The Head Teacher at Marlwood is presented as a football manager whose team is far too expensive to run so he needs to beat Premier League teams with players  from a five-a-side league. Crazy.

Needless to say, by the end of the episode the poor sod had decided to leave the school and find another team. 

As the credits rolled more staff went and, although the school appears to have stabilized since, it is still in 'special measures'.

The nameless, deathless, school inspector introduced at the start of the episode had indicated that 'special measures' was designed to be stimulus for a short term turnaround of a school's fortunes.  

Hmmmmm.

All that seems to have been achieved in this case is a sorry list of deflated human capital. 

Teachers are a precious commodity and I felt large dollops of sympathy for the humanities teacher getting his feedback from a lesson observation.

There was no respite for him and the underfire Head Teacher.

Episode four next week. I'll need a week to mentally prepare myself.

The head teacher of Marlwood School in Gloucestershire faces a perfect storm.

The BBC documentary (School) about three academies facing austerity measures with drastic budget cuts and declining student numbers with declining behaviour standards has been riveting viewing so far.

Being a Head Teacher myself makes for a grim fascination as my colleagues go through budget meetings, confrontational parent meetings, endless student discipline issues, and OFSTED inspections.

In the second episode, the Head Teacher at 'special measures' Marlwood School in Glouchestershire reads from a previous, dismal, OFSTED attack on the school's leadership. 

Phew. Heavy. 

I felt for him. He seems like a decent bloke, with a family of four children, doing an impossible job.

At one point he reckons that the school has become like his fifth child (albeit a black sheep). 

Yikes.

Made me wonder about the job and the reasons why we do it,  and I admired  the hell out of him as he battled the academy trust's chief number cruncher and bean counter who, I suspect, will close the school down in episode 3.

Like I said, grimly fascinating and rivetting.