4.3 • 2.6K Ratings
🗓️ 9 March 2016
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Edit .Each year some of the poorest pupils in the country enter the hallowed corridors of Eton on full scholarships. Penny Marshall meets some of those applying for places and follows them and those they inspire as they prepare for exams that could change the course of their lives. Andrew Isama reflects on the move from one of Liverpool’s toughest comprehensives to the cobbled square, 15th century chapel and Olympic rowing lake at Eton. He says that preconceptions about the school get turned on their head when scholarship pupils like him arrive: far from being with boys who eat pate and listen to classical music he was surprised to find out just how normal his fellow pupils were: “People had the same interests as me.” The Headmaster at Eton, Simon Henderson, wants more bursaries for boys from disadvantaged backgrounds, so that anyone with the necessary talent can be financially supported at the £35,000-a-year school. Penny joins him and some of the pupils to find out what they hope to gain from the experience. The transition can be a difficult one and some struggle with the move to an institution which has educated 19 British prime ministers, including the present incumbent. But Andrew Isama believes that the influx of scholarship pupils like him also helps those who have come from privileged backgrounds - “A lot of them have never been exposed to anything else. They want to be successful but to do that they have to know how to get on with a range of people.”
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
0:00.0 | Thank you for downloading from the BBC. |
0:04.0 | For details of our complete range of podcasts and our terms of use, go to BBCworldservice.com slash podcasts. |
0:11.0 | I'm Penny Marshall and here on the BBC World Service I'll be reporting on |
0:19.5 | pupils applying for scholarship places at Britain's most famous fee-paying school. |
0:24.8 | This is an eaten experience. |
0:26.9 | The bell goes off about in houses, about 730 and then they get up and they have breakfast and most days then go to chapel and then the first |
0:36.6 | lesson will be at nine. |
0:39.6 | Lessons are called schools or dives. There's a lot of eaten jargon, a completely different vocabulary. |
0:47.0 | Is getting up in the morning a problem for any of these young men? |
0:51.0 | The bell is very loud. The dame or matron is very firm with her knock on the door, |
0:56.8 | and by hook or by crook the boys get up. |
0:59.8 | I'm joining the Eton throng watching the boys already here rush enthusiastically |
1:05.5 | from lesson to lessen way down by their books and speaking to those who aspire |
1:11.2 | to join them particularly those from poorer families, where the prospect |
1:16.5 | of a full scholarship might turn their aspirations into reality. |
1:21.4 | I am. |
1:22.4 | I am. |
1:23.0 | The Dame. |
1:24.0 | Very pretentious name, isn't it? |
1:26.0 | I'm pretty undame-like, I have to say. |
1:28.0 | Yes, I'm not. |
1:29.0 | The boys call her ma'am. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.