Young Plato

Ever since my children started attending school, I really began to appreciate how education can influence the development of a child and shape their path into adulthood. While making the documentary In Loco Parentis (School Life), I witnessed first-hand the transformative effect inspirational teachers could have on their young wards’ lives. The headmaster of Headfort was an avid proponent of critical thinking and the Socratic method of teaching.
Watching him give children the space to discuss and argue different points of view, on a variety of subjects, was riveting. But if there was a fly in the ointment, it was that this was a private school with children from wealthy backgrounds, and there was the danger that this approach to education was a privilege for a selected few.

When Declan introduced me to Holy Cross Boys school, and told me that philosophy was being taught there, I was hooked. Holy Cross Boys School was everything Headfort wasn’t: a state school, in one of Belfast’s toughest neighbourhoods, an area still scarred by sectarian struggle. Everywhere was walled, fenced and gated, amplifying the notion of ‘turf, dividing and containing people with opposing political loyalties and perceptions.

Nationalist Ardoyne did not benefit from any significant ‘peace money’ that poured into Belfast after the Good Friday agreement in 1998. As a community they were largely left to fend for themselves. Poverty, drugs, suicide and dissident paramilitarism continued to gnaw at the families in Ardoyne, posing a serious threat to the future of their young children.

But inside Holy Cross Boys school, there was hope. Kevin McArevey, the maverick headmaster, fearless and steadfast in his belief in philosophy and critical thinking, was a philosopher and a clown all at the same time. His passion was infectious and his charisma persuasive. Kevin didn’t like waiting around for Educational Boards to sanction his ideas. He went full steam ahead and showed what making philosophy a core subject in his school
could do. Around him the school staff had created an oasis, where the children, and often their parents, were supported by an incredibly dedicated team who were also determined to make a difference. From the caretaker to the kitchen staff, the classroom assistants to the teachers, all were genuinely doing everything possible to improve the lives of their students and ultimately their community.

This film is a testimony to that journey.

As an observational filmmaker, my process is always to try and join the circle, become part of the community, live in the world I’m trying to understand and not position myself as a voyeur but as one of the group. Luckily Kevin and his team afforded Declan and I that privilege and allowed us to completely immerse ourselves in the world of the school. We were really touched by how welcome the staff made us feel, regardless of how difficult life became, there was always a strong spirit of generosity served up with big dollops of humour. This openness to let a film crew in, even in the most challenging of times, (post Brexit and during the Covid pandemic), came, I believe from the team’s great sense of pride in what Holy Cross Boys School had achieved, both with and for its students.

Academically the school enjoys phenomenal success, but my interest lay with the children who were not so academically gifted. The head of Special Needs, Jan Marie Reel explained to me that often the kids who struggled with academia where the very kids who were targeted by the dissidents, the drug dealers and organised crime. In a community where unemployment is high and opportunities scarce, kids who can’t use education as a route to a
better future are often targeted by the unscrupulous. Making the right choices can easily become a matter of life and death in a community like Ardoyne. Learning to think for oneself, to reflect, analyse and plan, quickly becomes an essential life skill.

Watching Kevin taking the lofty ideas of philosophy and distilling them down into accessible lessons for 4 to 11 year olds was so inspiring. Giving children, especially young boys, the tools to recognise and cope with anxiety, anger, aggression, despair now seems incredibly obvious.

In western society indiscriminate violence amongst boys has become disturbingly prevalent, so by creating empathy for different points of view, maybe there could be less polarization
amongst communities and more tolerance of ‘the other’.
The importance of critical thinking in the age of fake news has become essential. We’ve seen first-hand how huge numbers of people can easily be manipulated to act against their own
interests, how they can be persuaded to put the wrong people in power.

If teaching philosophy and critical thinking to children from a young age became the norm and not the exception, then maybe the next generations would be well equipped to navigate
through life and make better choices.

With all the challenges the human race is now faced with, if we are to have any chance of survival, Kevin’s mantra ‘Think, think, Respond!’ seems like a pretty good first lesson to me.