Wisps of Snow

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 2Visiting a place in real life gave one a different impression than seeing pictures, videos, maps or reading reports about it. John had done all of these but now he was actually in the village of Tuckett he found that already his thoughts about everything had changed. As usual on trips away from his home base in Wellington, he made a point of spending the night before any appointment in the same town or close to the school he was visiting.

Last night, he had stayed at the local youth hostel that was in the now closed Tuckett Primary School buildings. It had been a pleasant night and had met some interesting travellers, most of whom were young men or woman from overseas. Also, most had arrived by bicycle, having stopped the night in the middle of riding the Otago Rail Trail that followed the bed of a closed Central Otago railway line. His overnight stay was disappointing in one aspect for he had had no contact with locals for even the proprietors were a couple from Britain who had recently immigrated to New Zealand.

It was now eight in the morning and he had found a delightful little place that offered cooked breakfasts. He was the last customer as he sat sipping his coffee, for the cyclists had all departed on the next leg of their journeys. An elderly lady came out of the kitchen and began wiping down the tables.

She caught John's eyes. "We don't often see gentlemen in a suit and tie here at this time of the morning. You must be the school inspector coming to straighten them out over at the school?" she said as she placed a tray of dishes on an adjacent table.

"We don't call them inspectors now-a-days but yes I am from the Ministry of Education."

She nodded. "Something needs to be done," she said. "Pity really but I guess with falling rolls and such like, it was inevitable. Your lot in Wellington were a bit ruthless though."

"And why do you say that Mrs…?" John hesitated.

"MacCùga, Nancy MacCùga," She laughed. "Means cook. Bit ironic really for that is how I spend much of my time here in this little restaurant. Lived in the district all my life, went right through the local schools and now have five grandkids at Tuckett Area School." She nodded at a chair across John's table. "You don't mind?"

"Not at all." He watched while she sat down and grinned to himself. Here was a chance to get local information. "John Cosgrove. You were saying the government was a bit ruthless?"

"Yes. We had a primary school, high school and two small schools down the road. They closed them all five years back and said an area school was the answer." She grimaced. "Wasn't though."

"Why?" John prompted.

She shrugged. "A bit of everything. The outlying districts never got on but now they have to send their children to the same school, the secondary roll has plummeted from well over two hundred to about thirty and is much lower than the amalgamation when it was over a hundred…"

John nodded. The high school section now had forty children compared with a hundred and twenty, five years before and the whole area school had a roll of a hundred and fifty compared with over three hundred a few years back. Often when schools were having problems, many parents said little but just moved their children away. This, along with a normal decline of rural families was the trouble here.

"But you don't want to hear me moaning on…" Nancy said.

"No, it's interesting. You were saying it was a bit of everything?"

"The teachers are great, most young and enthusiastic. Brandi Shellard is a delight."

"The associate principal?"

"That's her. The new entrant classes are the only ones taught well. Don Trow was quite good as principal of the high school but never should have been appointed to the area school job… has no idea about how to treat younger kids and … but I guess you know all that." She sighed. "The rumour about the two deputy principals is not worth repeating but don't close us down, Mr Cosgrove. We're having troubles but if the school goes, what's left of Tuckett will follow."

"Oh I don't intend to recommend that, Nancy," John said. "My job is to help schools, not close them."

"Then get Don to retire and throw the two DPs out." She grimaced. "Sorry, but that's what three quarters of the locals want." She stood up and smiled. "Like another coffee? We have free top-ups, you know."

"Love one," John replied. "And one of those delightful cranberry muffins as well, please."

*

"I didn't expect you so early," Don Trow muttered as he waved John into a seat across from his desk. "Stay at the local motel, did you?"

"No, the youth hostel," John replied with a certain satisfaction in his voice.

His first impression of Tuckett Area School's principal was about what he expected. He saw a pompous little man in his mid-fifties who, somewhere along the way had failed to move up the promotional ladder. Even before the Tuckett High School had been disestablished there had rumblings about his leadership. Nobody back in Wellington had expected him to stay on at the area school but the woman primary principal at the time had not even applied for the position, preferring instead to take a sideways movement to another country town. He had heard that the conservative locals had told her they wanted a male, hence Trow's appointment.

"So what are you going to recommend, John?" the principal's tone was almost condescending.

John felt annoyed. "The ERO team made all the recommendations, Don."

This was the Education Review Office that reviewed every school in the country on a triennial basis. "Four years ago they made eight recommendations on improvements that they saw as necessary. Last year on their return visit, they noted that only one had been incorporated in your school's operations, three had made minor improvements and the other half, ignored. I am from the Ministry, not the Review Office and am directly answerable to the Minister of Education." He took a document from his brief case and handed it to Trow. "I am here out of ministry courtesy to tell you what is happening. The time of making negotiations is over, Don. Read this directive. To put it in simple language, we are pulling rank over you."

There was silence for several moments as the principal read the six-page document. His hands shook slightly by the time he turned over the third page and his lips tightened. He read the rest and shut the document before he glanced up.

"The government's new policy aimed at improving education throughout the country, no doubt?" he whispered. "Why don't they just sack me?"

"Out aim is to improve the quality of education in Tuckett, we do not go out on personal vendettas. A senior principal or as the Ministry of Education calls it a Change Principal will be coming here to oversee the improvements. She will be completely hands on and make whatever changes she finds necessary. You will remain as principal but be directly answerable to her in the everyday running of the school. Your board of trustees will be informed of the changes. "

"You said 'she'?"

"I did. Most of our schools now have female principals. If the lady we have in mind accepts the appointment she will be placed here for probably a year but the length of time will depend on the improvements made. If all goes well, she may leave earlier. Alternatively, if you or the Tuckett Board of Trustees fail to cooperate that last clause in the document will be actioned upon."

"The high school will be disestablished, we will revert to a primary school and all senior positions including my own will be re-advertised at a lower grade?"

"Correct. All the teachers in your senior school will also become redundant and the specialist rooms such as the science laboratory, cooking and woodwork rooms will be closed." John purposely used the old names for the positions to emphasise his point. "The whole block will be shifted out."

"So is she a retired principal from some girls' high school, a Miss So-and-So who has done nothing except teach for fifty years?" Trow's tone was bitter.

John suppressed a grin of delight. "No, she is twenty years younger than you, is married and has an infant daughter. Her husband runs an electronics business and will probably be moving here with her. I believe the Tuckett Board of Trustees has furnished one of the schoolhouses here, with the original idea of attracting an overseas high school teacher. That fell through so the house will be perfect for her or any other Change Principal we appoint."

"A woman in her thirties?" Trow gasped. "The senior pupils will eat her alive."

"I doubt it," John retorted. "She may appear as a petite blonde, but I would not even consider showing disrespect to her or her position. She will be your boss; co-operate and you will come out the other end with a well-run school that you can be proud of, resist and your career comes to an end. It's as simple as that." He stood up. "I will be meeting your board of trustees this afternoon. In the meanwhile, I wish to see your senior school in operation. Don't worry, I am no teaching expert and will make no recommendations. That will be the new Change Principal's job."

*

Karla stared at John sitting across the Tui Park office from her. "Okay, you've hinted at a falling roll, parental problems, a principal who has passed his use-by date and a couple of DPs doing something unmentionable…"

"They're having an affair."

Karla raised her eyebrows. "Two women?"

John grinned. "No, a him and a her but he's married, his wife has left and she's moved into a schoolhouse with him."

"The other DP?"

John nodded. "He's in the secondary part and she practically runs the primary part by herself. Don Trow fills his time up with administration."

Karla pouted. "Easy to do. So there are no drugs, pregnant students or board members stealing a hundred grand?"

"Not as far as I know."

"And you expect me to leave my cushy job here, not mention my husband and daughter to go into one of the most isolated places in the country to where a principal won't want me and probably everyone else is apathetic?"

John grinned. "There's a furnished schoolhouse and a crèche and preschool centre on the school grounds. Tell Ryan that the school has fast speed optic fibre installed and this includes the schoolhouse allocated to you. You're lucky for this house is adjacent to the school and was originally built for a school caretaker. The present one has his own home and doesn't need it. The other schoolhouses are spaced around the township and not all grouped together."

Karla nodded without smiling. "As well as that fifty grand you mentioned earlier?"

"That's right?"

"And what if I find the situation hopeless and can't do anything?"

"You can terminate the position any time and come back here."

"And what will happen if I do?"

"I doubt if you would be replaced. They'll probably close the secondary part and the school will revert to being just a primary school. It'll happen quickly, too." He stared her. "Between you and me I think that's what the ministry wants. After all, if the locals threaten to go to the high court they can say everything possible was done to keep the high school part open. It'll make it possible to make a clean sweep of the senior staff, too."

"So it's all political?"

John shrugged.

"And your personal thoughts," Karla said.

"I'm but a public servant who must remain neutral."

"John!" Karla retorted. "That is one thing you aren't. What do you think?"

"It's a lovely little village and it would be a pity if the million dollars they spent building a new classroom, administration and technology blocks was wasted." He grinned. "As I said at the beginning, it anybody can pull the place up, you can so give it a go, will you?"

"I'll need to talk to Ryan."

"Of course. You'll start in the new term."

"If I agree, that is. As well as my personal situation, I have to consider this school, you know."

"Gillian will make a fine acting principal and, knowing her, will follow your advice to the letter."

"You've thought of everything, haven't you?"

John shrugged and broke into another grin. "One can but try." He sipped his coffee and bit into the hot scone, Saryia had just brought in.

*

It was actually Ryan who persuaded Karla to think seriously about taking the position, so the following week she took Friday off and the three of them flew down to Dunedin. There, they hired a car and headed inland over a hundred kilometres. The weather was fine, Highway 85 was narrow and empty but with a good surface on a flat plateau with low hills in the far distance. By the time they arrived at Tuckett it was five and the place looked empty.

The township was entirely flat with wide streets and neat looking properties. Most of the houses were sixty or more years old, of brick or wooden construction and set on large sections, long forgotten in the city. Hedges and evergreen trees grew everywhere and, in the community centre there was a small supermarket, an old brick tavern and several cafes or coffee bars. Perhaps not unusual, being on the Otago Rail Trail, there was a bicycle shop that advertised bikes for hire and fast repairs. Most of the remaining stores were antique or second hand ones or were closed with iron sheets over the windows. One larger rural produce store had an attached petrol station. Next door was a bus depot with three white buses parked behind a security fence. As they watched, a small school bus drove in, a woman climbed out and walked over to a nearby car. She gave them a wave as they drove past.

Ryan turned off the main street to where there was a machinery repair garage that catered for farmers and a school. It wasn't the area school, though but a youth hostel in what was the original primary school. Next to it was the Tuckett Inn, the motel they had booked into. It looked modern and pleasant with a large sign showing a nineteenth century explorer with a bushy beard.

"He was an Otago explorer the place was named after," Ryan said. "According to what I looked up he never actually came through here. Want to go in?"

"Not yet. Let's drive around to the school," Karla glanced down at the map on her iPad. "Take the next left then right and we should see it."

Tuckett Area School looked exactly as it had on the Google map with a modern block of classrooms beside a new administration block and assembly hall or gymnasium. They parked, unloaded Alexis into a buggy and walked around the deserted playgrounds. It looked well cared for with tennis courts, a large climbing equipment area and fields surrounded by a neatly trimmed macrocarpa hedge. There was a small vegetable garden that again looked well cared for.

The buildings behind the new block adjacent to the road were older but again well painted and well maintained. There was another modern building that on closer inspection was a manual arts block with an art, cooking, woodwork rooms as well as science laboratory. Across from the car park was a block of older classrooms that looked empty and was fenced off from the playground. Adjacent to it she came to another building with the sign Little Hands - Tuckett's Pre-school for infants to five. It had a wonderful little playground of climbing equipment that appeared brand new.

"The school looks well cared for with no graffiti or litter," Karla commented.

"But lonely and so far from anywhere," Ryan added.

Karla grimaced. "I know. I wouldn't want to move here permanently but…" She stopped and swung around to view the grounds. "I don't know, Ryan. One part of me is all excited inside while the other is the conservative me coming out and I wonder if it is worth the major disruption to our lives."

Ryan tucked an arm around her. "I'll be okay if we come. That optic fibre means I can do anything here that I can do in Wellington so it's what you want."

"It's the people that make the difference," Karla said. "It's a pity we couldn't get here when the school was open. But come on; let's go to our motel now. There must be someone there who we can discretely ask about the school."

"Yeah. In these small towns everyone knows everything about the school, good or bad."

*

At the motel, Karla and Ryan had just put Alexis to bed and were relaxing in front of the television when there was a knock on the door. Karla grimaced and saw Ryan shrug. Who would want to visit them here? It was probably the proprietress with clean towels or something.

She opened the door and noticed a woman about her own age standing there. She was dressed in quite upmarket but casual clothes and looked almost apprehensive.

"Hello. Can I help you?"

"You're Karla Spicer, if I'm not mistaken."

"Why yes but how do you know me?"

The woman held out her hand that Karla shook. "I am sorry to interrupt your evening but couldn't let you just come and go. I am Sonya Bray from the Tuckett Area School's Board of Trustees."

"Hello Sonya. Come on in."

Karla stepped back and let the visitor in, introduced her to Ryan and invited her to sit, all the time wondering how she knew they were in town.

"Coffee of cup of tea?" Ryan asked.

"I'd love a cup of white coffee, thank you."

Sonya came across as being as upmarket as Karla's original impression, more like the pushy women back at Tui Park than say a dairy farmer's wife. She had a modern hairstyle, modest makeup, several rings on her fingers and a silk scarf tied neatly around her neck.

"And we thought we could just anonymously breeze in and have a look around," Ryan said from the tiny kitchen as he plugged the kettle in.

Sonya laughed. "That's a small town for you, Brenda, the proprietress here, recognised your name when you signed in and phoned me." She glanced up. "Your name was given to us by a Mr Cosgrove from the Ministry of Education. You know him, I believe?"

"Oh yes, we've known John for several years now," Karla replied.

"Since your days at Top Plateau School?"

Karla frowned. "True but how…."

"The internet, Karla," Sonya replied. "There are numerous news items about you and everything that has happened to you there and at Tui Park. I read about the little school burning down, the bikie gang and how you exposed that deviant principal. You certainly rose through the ranks quickly."

Karla grimaced and felt a little annoyed. This Sonya reminded her of Pauline the somewhat overbearing parent at Tui Park who had gradually become a good friend. She however, kept her opinions concealed but felt the slight squeeze on her arm. Ryan had just placed with three mugs of coffee on the table and had realised what she was thinking.

"Karla is an excellent principal," he defended. "It is more than just good luck. If she was not capable she wouldn't be principal of one of Wellington's top primary schools." He sat down. "Nor would she have been offered secondment to the position here."

"So you have come here to say thank you for your interest but we don't need an outsider coming into our community and telling us what to do?" Karla spoke in a quiet but quite formal tone, for it was time to be blunt.

Sonya sipped her coffee and said nothing for a moment before placing her mug down. "No Karla, you've got it entirely wrong. I'm afraid you will look around and think why should you bother to come to this remote corner of the country? " She smiled. "It is my home Karla, I went to Tuckett primary as it was then and came back to the high school. Got homesick after a few months at a girls' school in Dunedin but I digress. I have three children and also several nieces and nephews at the school here with Andrew, my fourteen year old in Year 10."

"One of the founding families?" Ryan cut in.

Sonya almost flushed but nodded. "Andrew is drifting, Karla and he is not the only one. Oh the junior school is great but with the dwindling roll, the high school part is the worry." She stared directly into Karla's eyes and reached out to grab both her hands. "I've come here this evening to ask you, no plead with you to come and help us out."

*