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News > Alumni stories > Alex McGee reflects on the rewards of teaching in inner city Birmingham

Alex McGee reflects on the rewards of teaching in inner city Birmingham

Two years working with less privileged children had a dramatic impact on Alex.
8 Mar 2022
Alumni stories

Alex (Old Mole class of 2011) has been working for the Boston Consulting Group in London since November 2021 after taking a less traditional path into consulting.  Having graduated with a degree in Biological Sciences from Oxford University, he then spent two years in Birmingham on the Teach First Leadership Development Programme, teaching 11-18 year olds maths.   

I had a fantastic time during what will certainly be one of the most rewarding and insightful experiences in my life, even if it was slightly strange to teach virtually for six months throughout the pandemic. I certainly was drawing upon those experiences in my Moulsford maths lessons in Year 7 and 8, recalls Alex.

He taught maths in an inner city comprehensive school in Birmingham to a wide range of ages (11-18) and abilities. The school was ethnically and culturally very diverse while being a Teach First eligible school meant that over half the children were on Free School Meals.

Alex explained why he thought the programme worked so well for the pupils.

I think that the Teach First programme is a great initiative that puts people from a range of backgrounds and subjects straight into schools so that they can make a difference from day one, teaching topics that they are interested in. Although teacher turnaround is often an issue in some of the lowest performing schools, often a younger and fresher face can create relationships in a different way to more established teachers within a school. The combination of younger teachers and more experienced teachers gives, in my opinion, an interesting dynamic that pupils can learn and develop from in the classroom. As a younger teacher and having been through the exam system relatively more recently, Teach First trainees can provide an insight that is highly relevant of what it takes from the pupil perspective to do well at school. Having often come from good universities with strong grades so recently, the understanding of how to work to achieve this can be an important addition to the school, while also leaning on their previous learning experiences and the environment nurtured by their teachers for their own classroom. I definitely enjoyed trying to channel an active learning environment through whiteboards at points in every lesson, which definitely took inspiration from the high-intensity scientific competitiveness of a Mr English lesson.

Alex went on to expand on what he personally gained from the experience. 

For me, Teach First will be one of the most impactful experiences in my life, both personally and professionally. On a personal level I do think that the programme has given me a more well-rounded picture and view of the UK than perhaps a university education and a corporate role immediately after would have given me. There are certainly many transferable skills that I have gained that will be applicable to my life and career, particularly in communication, relationship building and management skills.

The experience has made me reflect on my own education a lot more while recognising the holistic and thorough grounding that I received. I feel that I have always been aware of the privilege of my Oxfordshire schooling; however, I do think that the contrasting environments have allowed me to reflect what special places schools like Moulsford are and have made me look back at my time in education even more fondly and appreciatively. Lastly and more broadly, the experience showed me: how much you can learn from others (the pupils) when you don’t necessarily expect to, the importance of understanding others to work well together, and the fun that you can have in very different environments (whether from a lower ability Y9 maths group or a Y13 Further Maths lesson all within the space of an hour).

We asked Alex to pick out the highlights from his teaching experience.

I wouldn’t say that I had one particular lightbulb moment that sums up my time in teaching. I think it was actually taking little wins and putting them into the bigger picture. For example, the pupils who didn’t engage at all in lessons and then a couple of months later we had developed a relationship where they were responding well to work and no longer disrupting a classroom. They even said they “might” miss my maths lessons when we had our last lesson.  Equally rewarding was helping a few outstanding maths students, who then went on to gain 9s in their GCSEs.  My lasting memory though is always one of positivity.  I often think back to my time there, and particularly an event in a classroom and it always elicits a smile, often to the bewilderment of whoever is near me with no idea why I had a slight chuckle.

Since completing his Teaching Programme, and moving into the world of consultancy, Alex has really enjoyed the dynamic side of projects at the Boston Consulting Group. His work there has taken him to the Middle East on a tourism initiative and put him in a team supporting a global bank to design its journey to Net Zero in just a few months.

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