Although Sutherland Technical School was much admired in the early decades of its existence our research shows that by the mid twentieth century the approach and methods were not working as well as they had:

 

“I think you’d be definitely better to have the school as it is now, there’s absolutely no doubt about that. I mean, people used to run away from the Tech. They’d take off into the hills just to run away to get home. And how they got captured was – the boys that were left were rounded up and told to go up the hill and capture this poor sod, it was just too much for him. And march him back and that was it and we kept an eye on them so they wouldn’t run away again.”

 

‘…the whole school was run by pupils..’

 

“Well you did eleven plus. And you either went to Dornoch, well, the lassies had Dornoch or Golspie because there was MacLeod House in Golspie where the lassies’ hostel was and that’s at the Dunrobin end of Golspie. It became the boys’ hostel eventually when the Tech shut down because after the Tech finished and became an annexe of Golspie, it became the trades – a lot of pupils from along this coast and right round the coast would do their third and fourth year in Golspie to go on to do trade or whatever.

 

When I went there the Tech was where you went to, it was first year to fourth year. They didn’t do ‘O’ levels or anything like that; it was agricultural and tended to be for trades. If you wanted to do ‘O’ levels, you had to do them on night school. They did night school in the school and all so you had people, more mature students, coming into the school to do ‘O’ levels. So if we wanted to do ‘O’ levels – and they gave you some amount of encouragement and help within your normal class. It certainly wasn’t set up for doing anything academical, as I say, it was more to do with… the old Tech, the old building, there was an annexe out the back where they had painting and plumbing and all these different trades. They used to have tradesmen come in and do a day a week – they used to come in and do brickwork and subjects like that. But when you went away to school… I was still eleven when I left here to go to the first year and you went and stayed in the hostel and it would be about twenty odd of us in the class, first year, from Stoer, Inchnadamph, all the way round to Melvich. And there was a few from Caithness.

 

There was the farm. They used to have a lot of hens. When you were in first year, you’d be hauled out of class thinning turnips, ten acre park which supplied all the schools with turnips. So you’d be thinning turnips for a couple of days. Good education. Tattie lifting time you got all out of school to lift tatties, things like that. They had about twenty odd cows and a dairy, there were – we had (Poulag) cows, and they had a reasonably modern milking parlour at that time. So you sort of got involved with that.

The school was run, the whole of the school was run by the pupils and there was a pecking order. When I was there in my first year there would be about sixty pupils that lived in it, and that was in three dormitories. There was twenty odd in the lower dormitory and twenty odd and then twenty-four or something like that in the upper dormitory.

 

Discipline was by older looking after the young. Say you had about sixty pupils and if they were left to their own devices then … so the older guys looked to the discipline of the younger. Sometimes they could be a bit harsh. They meted out punishment as they thought fit. There was iron beds and he used to catch the bottom bar and stick your head below the bit that went over the top and you’d get six of the slipper around your arse. That was quite a common punishment. And when you came up he got the back of your head on the steel bar that went over the top. And you’d be going to sleep lying on your belly because your arse would be that hot. Just for any misdemeanour. Or sometimes people didn’t particularly like you, there was a bit of that.”

 

There was girls came in on days and they were all to do with secretarial work. But they were completely separated from us, we never got near them. They had their breaks at different times, they had their lunch at different times so you just did not get near the lassies at all. But they did shorthand and typing and that type of thing.

 

We used to get up at seven in the morning and there was four houses and one house was on kitchen duty and that revolved once a week. So every fourth week you were on kitchen duty and the rest of the time you cleaned, from seven till eight you cleaned the whole school. You looked after the whole place and cleaned it. And then eight o’ clock was breakfast and then from half eight until quarter to nine you cleaned the dormitories and made your bed and did all that sort of carry on. Kitchen duty, when you were in first year, your whole hour before breakfast was peeling tatties. You had pans because that was for lunch and for all the day people, whatever, they got fed there and all and then we got fed again then at five o’ clock at night. So a lot of tatties to peel. Good job by second year you started the porridge. That was quite a good job because you were right in the kitchen and a lot of time it could be freezing cold in the wee pantry where you peeled the tatties. But that’s what you did, and then you went to school at nine and you went through your normal school.

 

The school day finished at four. And you sort of kicked about, football or whatever from four till – five. I think we got fed. Half five. And then you had a bit of time then till seven, prep was seven till nine and then you got a cup of tea and piece made with jam at nine and a piece made with jam would be made at six o’ clock so the jam would be well through the bread by the time you got it! And then you got two slices of bread and a cup of tea. Then you went to bed. Half past nine you were in bed, half past nine until quarter to ten was for supposedly reading the Good Book and lights were out at quarter to ten.

 

You were allowed out on a Saturday afternoon, you could go down the village, Jimmy Millar’s café was the sort of favourite hang-out place. They used to have a picture house and they used to have the movies in it and you’d get a matinee on the Saturday, believe it or believe it not. Queuing up to go and see Summer Holiday with Cliff Richards, for goodness sake, when you think of it! But the café had a juke box and sometimes you’d go into KG5 and watch the football and then when Brora Rangers went into the Highland League at that time we’d thumb through to Brora but that was a bit of a hit or a miss because if you didn’t get a lift back and you weren’t home and back at the Tech in time for your supper then you’d be on detention.”