My friend Ben Kerwood, who has died aged 77, taught history and was a housemaster for boarders at Lord Williams’s school in Thame, Oxfordshire, for many years; his head there described him as “a wonderful teacher, a vulnerable but brilliant Renaissance man”. On holiday in Cambodia in 1969, he contracted a virus that led to the gradual decline in the functioning of his legs but to no decline in his energy and enthusiasm.
In 1983-84 he had a year as deputy director of the Centre for the Study of Comprehensive Schools in York, where, according to his director, he was a fine working colleague with a challenging but powerful intellect and wide range of skills. After a time as deputy head at the John Mason school in Abingdon, he moved to Wiltshire, where he had 10 years as a secondary school adviser and later inspector for the county.
Continue reading...