Oli with his Teacher of the Year in a Secondary School silver award (Oli McVeigh/Pearson National Teaching Awards)
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After launching a mentorship programme empowering young boys to tackle crucial issues like masculinity and mental health, Oli McVeigh explained it was like a “weight’s been lifted” from his students.
McVeigh, 30, has been honoured as the winner of Teacher of the Year in a Secondary School at the Pearson National Teaching Awards, both for his work as a teacher and as the leader of a “vital” mentorship scheme.
The assistant headteacher and director of English, ethics and media at Ferndown Upper School in Dorset, McVeigh took on the boys’ mentorship programme over the past year, explaining that the aim of the scheme is to “create a culture by which boys feel supported”.
“Just speaking to the boys, you can see that difference in them,” McVeigh, who has been a teacher for seven years, told the Big Issue. “I think there’s been a lot of them that have been bottling up and repressing lots of different ideas, and I think the moment there is a safe space for them… they just feel lighter.”
The teacher said the mentorship scheme first took on “a cohort of around 21 boys”, though that number has expanded since its creation, linking the students with specific volunteers “that we feel would be good mentors for these boys” – whether it’s helping them with behaviour or next steps following education “if they’re feeling a bit lost”.
“We’ve managed to secure work experience for lots of our boys that have then led into employment in those industries that subsequently they wouldn’t have had,” he explained.
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“It’s been really beneficial, and we’re extending it out this year to include more mentors, and more boys, and more people who have wanted to come on board.”
The mentoring scheme, according to McVeigh, takes on board principles from the Ulster University research project Taking Boys Seriously, which aims to “increase opportunities for young males to succeed in education”. He explained that as well as supporting the boys academically and emotionally, the scheme helps to foster an understanding about what masculinity means to them, as well as creating a supportive environment.
“They feel part of something, they achieve success in whatever way that looks for them,” he explained, adding that as well as adopting the principles within Ferndown Upper School, they have presented them at national conferences. He explained that he hoped the scheme is something that can be “rolled out” across the UK, with many schools “crying out for” similar programmes.
Oli on a trip in Borneo (Oli McVeigh)
As well as the mentorship scheme, McVeigh also co-authored the Dorset Boys Impact Club, in collaboration with Arts University Bournemouth, which aims to provide critical support to boys who are eligible for free school meals during their GCSEs.
Describing mentorship for young boys as “vital”, McVeigh explained that starting “difficult conversations” with young boys on the topic of mental health, and “allowing the boys to feel like there are people that will listen to them” is crucial.
“We’ve had really powerful moments where we’ve brought in lots of external speakers that have engaged with our boys, talking about OCD, addiction, pornography, body image,” he explained. “We had boys that were putting their hands up in front of their entire peer group and saying, ‘When I look in the mirror, I hate myself.’”
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He continued: “Starting those conversations comes from… we talk about feeling ‘held’. By having that culture of them feeling ‘held’, they’re able to speak about their mental health. We’ve got a real issue on the south coast where our suicide rates are massive, and we really want to show them that there are people out there that are happy to talk about mental health, and that it’s accepted to talk about mental health because there’s such a stigma against it.”
He explained that the boys involved in the mentorship scheme are performing better from a data point of view – with their attendance levels up and behaviour issues down – but he can also notice the difference from a personal perspective, adding that this proves why similar schemes are so important for secondary school boys.
“There’s a lot of change that goes on in boys in that time biologically, but I think also there’s a lot of emotional change. You enter into different relationships, and you enter into different expectations, and then you layer on top of that academic stress, and there might be stuff at home, and then it starts to build, and then they kind of get this feeling of being much more lost,” McVeigh said, adding that if boys aren’t given the support they need from a young age they risk becoming “disenfranchised”.
“These boys need to feel like they can do whatever they want to do, and putting that in place now, and showing them that there isn’t one masculinity, there are many, and that whatever avenue they want to go down, we’re going to fully back and support, is refreshing for them,” he said.
“Even if they’re doom-scrolling on social media… Some of the stuff that might pop up there, if they’re not able to seek other sources and they’re not able to have those conversations with other people, that’s the only rhetoric that they’ve got.
“It’s important that that we allow them to see that there’s different rhetorics that they can look at as well. It’s a scary world for them, so providing some safety in that scary world, is vital.”
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Teaching is ‘more than a job – it’s a gift’
McVeigh explained that while you “don’t really go into teaching to get anything out of it”, winning the Teacher of the Year award had “validated” that the mentorship scheme had been a success.
“On a personal level, very flattering, amazing, completely overwhelming. On a more professional level, it’s validating,” he told the Big Issue.
“If you put something in place, even if it impacts one or two students, it’s worthwhile doing. And yes, it can broaden out into a broader national scheme… but even if it’s working at a local level, within your school context, and your students are turning up more, or they’re thanking you for something, or they’re engaging with something in a different way, it’s all worthwhile.”
McVeigh explained that the highlight of his career had been working with his students, and that he loved working as a form tutor.
“I think you can have the worst day possible and step into a classroom and suddenly feel better because a kid will say something that makes you laugh, or they’ll do something that makes you proud, or they’ll just say thank you, and you feel like it’s worthwhile.
