For Nicky

Right2Learn is a brilliant campaign for Lifelong Learning, which Nicky and I had both signed up to. Arranged at short notice before the summer recess, to influence policy and the agenda of the Shadow Equalities team ahead of conference season, they convened a conference in Parliament, on barriers to education and employment for women post-pandemic. I promised to update Nicky of the discussion.

The event was introduced by Margaret Greenwood MP with contributions from Emma Hardy MP, Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Oracy, Shadow Equalities Minister Yasmin Quereshi MP discussing the positive impact of flexible working and her bill (which has now had Royal Assent), Faiza Khan Director of Affairs at City & Guilds on learning routes, Rose Stephenson Director or Policy at HEPI on gender disparity and structural barriers and Naomi Clayton Deputy Director at Learning & Work Institute on the link between education and occupational success.

Research shared with us showed that women are more likely to be higher qualified and undertake job-related training, be more interested in green career paths and yet earn less at every age, be in insecure work and get stuck in low paid jobs. In short, solutions include improving access to high quality careers advice at all ages, addressing wide barriers such as finance and confidence, ensuring the benefits system does not create barriers and the provision of positive women role models.

Four days later I was devastated to learn that Nicky Turnbull, Director of Higher Education for NCG at Newcastle College University Centre and a pertinent influence on me, had so very sadly passed.

Nicky and I had discussed barriers to education so many times before and especially for women returning to education later in life. It was a shared interest from our professional practice, of recognising structural barriers of childcare, other caring responsibilities, work commitments, lack of space at home, unreliable public transport, financial barriers and the benefits system, poor educational experience, combining often and resulting in low esteem and a lack of confidence. Nicky’s research into compassion in pedagogy and learning environments for higher education delivered through a further education context was so interesting and so pertinent to what we do as educators.

When I learned of Nicky’s diagnosis I sent flowers, poetry and reiki; I wanted to give her beauty and healing. Rowan McCabe is a wonderful, gentle, local performance poet and educator with strong socialist principles. His Hopeless Romantic anthology, inspired from a residency with the National Trust, combines a joy of the outdoors, which Nicky loved, following in the footsteps of Wordsworth, wrapped in a leftwing, sparkling wit, and it seemed an appropriate gift. Nicky told me she read it one morning, before a treatment session at The Freeman Hospital. Her favourite poem, ironically she said, was “My Least Favourite Things”, quoting her favourite lines.

Strong, determined, clever, sharp, kind and aligning thoughts with socialist thinking, Nicky was a central role-model for me in different ways in work and in my community roles, encouraging me to learn, to grow and to keep moving.

Nicky had worked at Newcastle College for years, working up from Instructor through the teaching and management chain.  She was Acting Director in Construction some time ago when our paths started to cross.

As a trade union branch officer, I represented members in casework. When I learned that Nicky was the investigating manager I would inwardly groan; I knew I would be outwitted. Her investigations were thorough and fair – she always, always listened. Though members didn’t appear to “win’’ per se, she made recommendations that were tangible, effective and fair.

Nicky contacted me directly after UCU’s former general secretary, another strong woman modelling kindness and compassion, had attended an event on site in 2015, this visit being a first after a very difficult period between the trade union and the organisation. Unable to attend, she wanted to know everything, policy discussion, funding patterns, to glean as much information as possible. This was not superficial interest. She also gave me feedback on my presentation and instructed me to turn it into a written piece for publication. It wasn’t published – but she told me to keep going.

I have always written but not in a targeted way. Nicky encouraged me to write and to keep writing. She was always interested in my community roles and how they influenced or were influenced by education. She read everything that I wrote, she viewed all recordings of discussions I chaired, she contributed to consultations and always responded with comment. That time and that interest is invaluable, and I valued it.

In a recent message she told me “Keep going with your thinking, writing and organising. There is nowhere near enough Compassion in this world and the Tories are living proof!! So, we need to model it for our students and colleagues, so everyone feels they matter.”

Nicky’s research on compassion in education was exciting and it is so frustrating that at the moment that research is incomplete. I am sure she would wish for the Compassion-baton to be picked up but also for us, as her colleagues, to hold her values of kindness, empathy, curiosity whilst helping others to open doors and driving forward to bring out the best in ourselves and each other, reaching beyond, bringing those behind us through, and above all, sustaining hope.

“Hope is the thing with feathers.

That perches in the soul.

And sings the tune without the words,

And never stops at all.”

(Emily Dickinson)

Nicky Turnbull, Director of Higher Education