Charles Bannerman

Spot on! This isn't a pop at scottishhighlands but I sometimes wonder if some disabled people get sick to the teeth with some of the patronising, politically correct busybodies who make it their lives' mission to decide and pursue what they consider the disabled want and need.

With an away record like theirs.... are you surprised?

Spare a thought for East Kilbride and LT-HV being patronised to death by the west central Scottish media.

What do you mean "again"? Is that not being a bit hard on a new club in just their fourth Scottish Cup campaign?

If that is a Jones Goods then he did indeed drive one frequently, as would ex-Clach David Dowling's grandfather who was one of his fellow drivers, as was former player and Jags committee man "Butch" Sinclair who was a bit younger.

That is generally true because over the period in question, a lot more people just stay on and, in the case of Highers, I will not pull my punches and will say that more are doing these simply because, along with other qualifications, they are getting progressively easier. I have seen far too much pass in front of my eyes in recent years to be remotely persuaded otherwise - unless, of course, in the last days of my career, I and many of my colleagues suddenly became much better teachers.

That photo will have been taken round about 1970. I think second from the right, front, is Highland News columnist Colin Campbell who I seem to recollect is from somewhere Beauly way. It's quite remarkable that two future Presidents of the Camanachd Association are here in the same team and just a couple of years earlier another, Archie Robertson, played for the Royal Academy where a fourth future President - John Willie Campbell - taught Physics at the same time. I was at Kenny's wedding in the Drumossie a few years ago and, including himself, there were I think FIVE Camanachd presidents!

Regarding the IHS roll, that's low due to a combination of the population of the catchment area and a lot of parents exercising choice and sending their kids to Charleston or Millburn. And yes, Fortrose is consistently high in the ratings. Apart from whatever is happening within the school, the demographics are indeed a major factor, with a large middle class enclaves in the likes of North Kessock and Fortrose itself (although they do also have the Avochies and the Croms) You also tend to find that rural secondaries get fairly good stats although with small schools, small sample sizes often give unreliable and hugely variable outcomes. However I think Fortrose Academy is big enough to avoid that. It is also true that not everybody that attends Millburn is from a middle class background and over the years they have had not a few Army kids who can be notoriously problematic. However the Millburn catchment area does have a rather bigger middle class presence than any of the others so when you add in "free transfers" from other catchment areas and tutoring, there is a big advantage there. Indeed I remember some years ago, someone in the Royal Academy staffroom commented that Millburn's results appeared to be better than ours, to which a member of senior management retorted "What do you expect? I think we've done pretty well considering we've got bloody Hilton!" In response to Dougie's query, the High School's fate was sealed when Inverness's five catchment areas were fixed in the late 70s and parental choice of school was introduced in the early 80s. As a result, 30-35 years ago roughly corresponds to the early days of that current arrangement and hence the early days of the High School's demographic challenges. There would have been a few years in the mid 70s, pre-Charleston, when the High School was taking everyone from West Inverness/ Beauly/ Kiltarlity and parental choice didn't exist and the IHS would have done OK. Before 1971, it was the old selective arrangement when the "Tecky" took the middle ability slice for the entire area and the lower achiever from the West. Perhaps it's worth adding that over the last 40-50 years the demographic factor has polarised considerably with many of the middle classes moving out of council estates like Dalneigh and Hilton and into newly created private developments like Lochardil and Drakies. When I was a kid in the 60s, within a couple of hundred yards of my house we were mob handed with teachers including a head teacher, quite senior civil servants, senior firemen, managers and other professionals. By the same token, Dalneigh FPs figured pretty prominently when relatively large numbers of them went to the selective Royal Academy and the same could be said of Merkinch. Intervening demographic changes have correspondingly altered that situation.

When people use the words "formal" and "currently" like that, I do worry a bit but the forecast for Stirling says dry until midday, light rain until 2pm and then heavier. Hopefully that will be enough to keep the game on.

Since I'm now away from the job for more than 2 and a half years, I'm maybe not the best person to ask. In terms of results, over the last 20-30 years, Millburn has tended MOST of the time to get the biggest percentages and the High School the smallest, with Culloden, Charleston and the Royal Academy somewhere in the middle. However, as I said earlier, catchment area factors have tended to inflate the Millburn results and depress those at the High School so there's probably a lot less in it that at first sight. Indeed there have been years when I've looked at Millburn's statistics and wondered if, in view of the affluence and catchment advantages they have, and all that tutoring, these should in fact be a lot better. I have also probably heard more moans and complaints from Millburn parents than from anywhere else, but on the other hand this is just the kind of thing you might expect to be concocted by covens of ladies who have nothing else to do in life but to lunch. It's also a bad idea to judge any school as a single entity since some departments perform better than others and more or less every school will have one department at least which is giving senior management some concern. Then of course you can get some idiot of an inspector who comes into a school and creates a fuss because the school is not subscribing to the latest flavour of the month p!sh which is being peddled but in fact is probably doing a very good job. So there's no short answer to your question, although I think the picture in Inverness as a whole is not too bad at all.

Perhaps I should add that, by the same token, the High School gets a LESS good press than it deserves since its results tend to be evaluated without regard for its "difficult" catchment area and the fact that many of the aspirational middle classes of west Inverness, subscribing to that "silk purses out of sows' ears" delusion, send their kids across the river.

"A zoo"... interesting. At the time Sue was there - for two years before moving on to the still semi-selective Royal Academy - Millburn was in a process of transition from a Junior Secondary (with entry as described above) to a comprehensive. In fact it went through, I think, three different names - Millburn Junior Secondary, Millburn Secondary, Millburn Academy. I think they went into a bit of denial about the first two once they acquired the third, but in the early days of comprehensive education, I could imagine it being a bit of a "zoo" which it still partly was when I taught there in 1976-77. Sue goes on to suggest that Millburn is now a good school but the reality is that however good it is, it has been over rated. Ironically, Millburn underwent a transition from Junior Secondary to a comprehensive serving by far the most affluent catchment area in Inverness, with all the advantages that brings. Other schools have the Ferry, Hilton, Smithton etc in their areas. The "worst" Millburn has had is Raigmore and a few Army kids. (Hope these socioeconomic realities of Inverness don't offend.) Inevitably if you get clever, motivated kids through your door your exam results will be good and if these are good you will get the reputation of being a "good" school. The next stage after that is for aspirational parents to send their kids there by choice - but without realising that the superior results they seek for them are more a feature of the catchment area, of which they are not part, than the quality of education. It's the "silk purse out of a sow's ear" delusion, further fuelled by the snobbery of people wanting their kids to be educated alongside "a better class of child". The reality at Millburn for quite some time was that there were quite a few pretty weak departments, especially in the Sciences which were notorious. However if you get through your door kids of above average ability whose parents paper over the cracks in the teaching by employing tutors, then you will still get the kind of good results which make you a "magnet school" irrespective of the quality of education offered. With much of Millburn's catchment area lying in the highly affluent "G and T belt" (and within spitting distance of the Kingsmills and the Heathmount!!), the extent to which Millburn parents employ tutors to achieve results is a longstanding Inverness educational institution. So in summary, the best way to be regarded as a "good" school is to be in a catchment area where you get the clever progeny of rich parents through your door.

That's a pretty blurred photo so I can't make out if the statue of the soldier is at McAvoy's door.

You can't disguise sh*te by coating it in sugar.

Well don't expect IHE to confirm that since he will not have been a patron of what used to be MacDougall's TEMPERANCE Hotel!

Yup.... well familiar with that one. I drive over these cobble stones daily heading for breakfast in Morrisons café.... hence almost as frequently as my grandfather who was an engine driver for the Highland Railway and then British Railways.

I think you may well be right JB. I now remember Jan Milne and I also think there was a boy Rogerson whom I don't remember that well, but I think he had a sister called Bronwen who was a right cracker!

I will not argue with an expert!

Absolutely! Similarly, mine for the pro rata points at the end of the season are also taken to the nearer whole number which I actually might as well have done with the others. But whatever one's statistical conventions, it's inescapable that Dundee United are in ever-deepening poo!

Based on the pro rata final totals I worked out, that means that Celtic are currently on course to score five fewer points than the title winning average, despite having had Rangers to contend with up to 2012 but no longer. Aberdeen are on course for just three fewer than the average for the runners up, despite these runners up (always?) being the "losing" member of the OF until Rangers' demise. It's interesting that the current 8, 9 and 10 are scoring faster than average which probably reflects the tightness of the table in that area and also how far adrift Dundee United are. United are currently on target for ten points short of the average bottom total, twice as big a shortfall and the next biggest "failures" who are Celtic at five adrift.

Bother! I put a ring round the wrong number on my list. Apologies.

According to the tables, in the 15 seasons since the 12 team league came in, the average points score for the bottom team is 27.6. St Johnstone (2002) have the lowest total of 21 and ICT (2009) the highest of 37. The corresponding figures for second bottom are 35.6, 32 (Dundee Utd 2003) and 41 (Simmurn 2013). This means that no team scoring 42 or more has ever been in what has more recently become the playoff place, so maybe that's the enigmatic significance of this number. If teams continued to score points at the rate they have been doing so far, the final table would read - Celtic 87, Aberdeen 78, Hearts 67, St J 59, Ross County 52, ICT 51, Dundee 47, Motherwell 47, Partick 46, Hamilton 42, Killie 36, Dundee United 18. United, who have been scoring points at just half the rate of the next worst team, are therefore currently on track to be the 12 team top league's poorest team ever. Certainly the statistics stack up very poorly indeed for United and there is a real Everest there in front of them if they are to stay up. On the other hand, in the spring of 2010 I did a similar appraisal of ICT's chances of catching Dundee and getting back to the SPL and got that completely wrong. However it's easier for a tem that's not doing too badly to move up a notch than one which is struggling and the added factor in 2010 was Dundee completely bottling it. It's not just Sneckboy that sometimes has time on his hands.......

Apparently down the Merkinch they spoke a different Gaelic from the rest of Inverness.... which maybe explains why they now speak a different brand of English!

None of the men anyway although I do see Chunky Hamilton immediately behind him!!! Torquil, who was the school's first ever guidance teacher , set what I believe was a record in getting early retirement at the age of 48. I certainly remember him coming into my classroom on guidance business stinking so badly of drink of all vintages that I had to take several steps back.

Yes. Totally. If you happen to have been at Charleston, to where he moved possibly around 1980, this is something with which you may be familiar. I seem to recollect that he moved because he didn't want to teach in the "new" Culduthel building but in any case, Charleston was a fair bit closer to where he lived.