| Professor Gus John |
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 Gus was born in a village called Concorde on the Caribbean island of Grenada. His father was a farmer and a woodcutter and his mother also worked as a pheasant farmer. He attended the local primary schools. His parents were very proud and resourceful people despite being poor in monetary terms. His father went away to work in Aruba and Gus and his siblings were bought up by their mother and the community at large. When at Primary school he was an alter boy in the Catholic School and won a scholarship to go to the Presentation Boys College and was already part of the church structure. Although his parents wanted him to be a doctor the parish priest wanted him to become a priest. After completing his GCSE equivalents, he went to Trinidad to join a seminary. He came to the UK to study Theology in Oxford. At the time in the early 60s there was a lot of political activity. Gus became very involved in Community Politics in Oxford and supporting Caribbean parents. He eventually left the church and returned to London. Having applied for a job he was warned on his way out that if he got it, a bucket of concrete would be dropped on his head. He did not return and became a grave digger for a while. At Leicester he trained as a Youth and Community worker and became more interested in Education. He was later asked by the Runnymede Trust to undertake a study in Handsworth, Birmingham in response to the difficulties there at that time. He helped to establish a Supplementary School at Westminister Primary School and supported the development of the African Caribbean Self Help Organisation. Gus was an activist in the Campaign Against Racial Discrimination (CARD), an organisation whose work led directly to the enactment of anti-discrimination legislation, particularly the Race Relations Act 1968 and helped to establish the George Padmore (Archive and Library) Institute and the Community Empowerment Network. Working in local authority first in Manchester and then in London, he eventually became Director of Education for Hackney in the late 1980’s and has conducted government reviews and research relating to equity and social justice. Professor John is the CEO of the Gus John Partnership, a Visiting Professor of Education at the University of Strathclyde and a team member of their Equality and Discrimination Centre. He is also a Fellow of the Revans Institute, University of Salford. He recently published, Taking a Stand’, a collection of his writings. |
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