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What can the woman who reportedly said she is too selfish to have a pet, do for us?
Janet Street-Porter has made her name as one of the most outspoken women in television. She is currently
editor at large for the Independent on Sunday newspaper, writes a weekly column for the ‘Independent’,
spent time in the jungle-based reality TV show ‘I’m a Celebrity; Get Me Out of Here’, has developed
ground-breaking magazine style TV programmes for teenagers and has also famously been married four times.
So what motivates her?
We got a little closer to finding out when she visited the Reading Recovery Centre at the IOE on the 28th
April 2005.
Arriving with little time to spare before attending a celebrity book launch, she spoke with feeling about
her recent experiences as a teacher in a Cambridge primary school, for a television programme. Whilst
working as a teacher, she had quickly identified within the class the ‘four or five kids who ‘couldn’t do
anything’ and had begun to question the educational sense of not making literacy acquisition a political
priority. She talked of her respect for hard-working teachers who deal with the problems of low literacy
levels on a daily basis and was very supportive of the goals of Reading Recovery. She talked of her
disgust for a society, which endorses footballers’ ‘bad behaviour’ and allows so many negative role
models for young boys. She told us of her admiration for Jamie Oliver who has put so much effort into working for improvement in the diets of children in inner city schools. She spoke of the negative spiral that children enter as they begin to fail in school. She may do a lot of talking but none of it was about her. Selfish, she is not. Outspoken and opinionated, most definitely!
She talked animatedly for most of the half hour she was able to spend with us, but she listened too.
She was able to offer her support by opening Reading Recovery events, allowing us to use her photo on the RR website and writing a few words, also for the website. We also hope to feed her interest in children failing in school with some perspectives for her future articles and comments sections.
So in answer to my original question, what can the woman who reportedly said she is too selfish to have a
pet, do for us? Quite a bit! We hope this association and her support will get us the attention of news
and media coverage as we enter an exciting phase of Reading Recovery.
Sue Bodman
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