St. Aloysius' College: A Review

Well, this week I’ve decided to do something a little different (I did say that I’d post about other stuff aside from TV and film, so, unfortunately, you have no legal case against me. Ha). I shall be reviewing my experience at St. Aloysius’ College. Otherwise known as; my school. Prepare for sentimentality...

I’ve decided to take a break from following, in my writings, such mainstream areas of criticism as film, TV, music and literature. All modern criticism seems to focus upon imaginative creations; fiction, conjured up by someone’s grey matter, with only the ambition to conjure separating them from any other person’s grey matter. The afore-mentioned sections of criticism covers this, and it includes theatre and opera, and even food criticism. This is what makes humanity uniquely wonderful; our potential to imagine, and to dream. And criticising these imaginative creations is what makes humanity hilariously sadistic. It’s just so much damn fun. However, this immensely restrictive idea that it is only suitable to review fantasy, to review dreams, is practically medieval. With contemporary society having access to, essentially, every experience man has encountered previously with the press of a button, why can’t we review reality? It’s already started to take hold. People have been, for a few years now, reviewing hotels, holidays, plane and train journeys, and even, through the most malicious of websites, Spillit, each other. Reviewing my school is not odd.

After 15 years as one of its pupils, I enter my final weeks at St. Aloysius’ College, and I find myself overwhelmed by heart-breaking nostalgia. After taking part in a photo with the remaining members of the Kindergarden class of ’99, along with the early departure from the school of a friend who I have known for 13 years, the realisation has finally hit me that my entire life is about to change. No longer will I wake up at half 6 on Monday morning, depressed at the prospect of yet another school week, before putting on that iconic green blazer and being driven into a dreary, smog-drenched Glasgow city centre. No more will I walk the RE Corridor to hear dialogue from Mean Girls blaring out of the classrooms unabashedly. For the last time I will barge into my English teacher’s room first thing to rant and rave about the football at the weekend. Never again will I write AMDG in the upper-left corner of my jotter. My childhood is over; my school days are slowly washing away to the confines of memory, forever.

St. Aloysius’ College has been the very definition of a home away from home for me. When I was sad, after a family tragedy for instance, the school, and more importantly, my friends, consoled me. When I was ambitious, the school made sure that I aspired to them with the best of my abilities. When I was hungry, the school fed me. With ridiculously over-priced food, but that doesn’t matter.

As an institution, St. Als is one of the best schools in the country, but the quality and consistency of its exam results is not what makes it so special. In order to find out just what differentiates St. Als from the rest, I’ve had to ask friends and acquaintances on their personal opinions of the school, as I, personally, have never been a pupil somewhere else. Their contentions confirmed my suspicions. They, and I, believe that St. Als is not so much a school, as it is a community.

As a Catholic Private School in Glasgow, we already have quite a distinct identity, one which is frequently, and unfairly, held under a negative light by many. Perhaps it’s an example of self-involved first-world problems, but I deem it unnecessarily cruel to be called a ‘posh, fenian w****r’ in Sauchiehall Street. I have seen first years physically threatened by random passers-by, purely because they are wearing that green blazer. Newspapers constantly single out St. Als when writing opinion articles about the negatives of private schools, as opposed to any of the other numerous ones which operate in the city, with one journalist even labelling our pupils ‘posh Sebastians and Julias’, showing, in the process, the grace and journalistic integrity of a doorknob. St. Als is, according to the West of Scotland media, an indirect link to both poverty and sectarianism, and that we have an evil, complex plan to brain-wash children into Catholicism, (which, in actuality, is what my aunt genuinely believes happens). Our school attracts an almost ludicrous amount of resentment.

This is a fundamental factor behind the community spirit of the school. The term ‘whatever doesn’t kill you, only makes you stronger’ is, although sometimes untrue, apt in this situation, regarding the school. As we are bombarded on all sides by hate and misunderstanding, it drives us closer together. Our identity defines us.

Beyond negativity, it is the completely open-minded attitude of the school and its ethics which is the single most important foundation in the community spirit. Regardless of race, religion or creed, you are just as welcome as everyone else.  The bursaries programme ensures that, if you are intelligent enough, you can join the school, no matter the financial situation. The pupils embody the Jesuit spirit through their attitude of helping the less fortunate than ourselves, with the almost peerlessly diverse range of charities and organisations. As one of my teachers says, it is what you learn about yourself and life in general which is the imperative, not the exam results. The teachers are (mostly) interested in helping you achieve your best, and enjoy yourself while doing it, and I hope to keep in contact with many of them after I leave. The school exerts itself to always maintain a friendly and welcoming atmosphere. Our ideals define us.

Lastly, the community nature is enhanced through the retreat programmes, especially the Kairos retreat. It is a soulful, eye-opening, and for some people, even life changing (as difficult as it may be to believe) experience. Kairos attempts to reinforce your faith, as well as your respect for yourself, and your friends and family. Even though I didn’t feel as though it immediately changed my life, it has certainly had a lasting impact upon me. On these retreats, you bond with people you’ve never spoken to before in ways best friends never do. By the time you reach 6^th year, all concepts of ‘cliques’ or exclusive social groups are non-existent; it is an inherently friendly relationship between everyone in the year. Our relationships define us.

Beyond the community feel of the school, St Als has had an incredibly personal effect on me. Here’s where it gets really sentimental. When I first came to senior school, I was incredibly shy and unconfident, nearly self-loathing. For many years, I retreated into fantasy via images on screen, words in books, or my own imagination. I have always been, and still am, a ‘loner’, or someone who prefers their own company much of the time, but back then my choice was more of complete isolation than simply just being by myself. I was also doing poorly in school. In hindsight, I must have been worrying those who cared about me. With no disrespect to my parents, who had just as big a part to play in my development, and to a certain extent, myself, St Als was one of my biggest helps to escape this. The teachers instilled the belief in me that I could do better in my studies, the retreats and numerous events, as well as the school’s focus on socialising, helped me realise the positive effect others had on me. The school’s morals encouraged me to be a better person and showed me that I had the potential to be live up to that person I aspired to be. I slowly left my own personal dream world and accepted reality, and myself. My appreciation for it helping me become the person I am today (I apologise for the arrogance) cannot be evoked through words. St Als moulded me.

If this entire article sounds overly soppy and sentimental, then that’s because it is. If it sounds unashamedly propagandist for the school’s sake, then that’s because it is. If it sounds like a personal eulogy to my past as a pupil at St Als, then that’s because it is. None of this masks the fact that everything I have written is completely true. I simply cannot thank the school enough. Despite its traditionalist doctrines (long skirts? How dare they!) St Als remains one of the most modern schools in its adoption of a welcoming and down-to-earth community spirit. Entire families are brought together through attending the school, generation by generation.  I know I will remain an Aloysian long after I leave the school, although, you never quite leave St Als, at least not in spirit (HA! There’s your cheesiness!) I will come back to see the old place again, and again; I’ve been institutionalised, just like so many others; Mr. Divers, Mr. Renton, and of course, one of the most consistent people in my life, Bertie Banyard, and I'm sure many of my current peers feel the same. Just as my grandfather went to St Als, I hope my children go, and my grand-children. It is a community. It is a family. I felt safe, well-looked after, and above all else, happy. My future uni days have a lot to live up to...