Fran was a Newton Park Teacher Training College student from 1971 until 1974. She spent her three years between lectures at The Dairy and fun adventures in Bath. Here are her memories.

"We wore loon trousers (you will have to Google those!) and smock tops. There was a small students’ Union and a refectory."

Fran Hamilton, June 2022

I was at Newton Park from 1971 to 1974. My main subject was Mathematics, and my secondary subject was PE for my Cert Ed. I was a day student travelling from Bristol, and when I acquired a small car, I gave lifts to students up the drive. Unfortunately, there was no bus service!

Maths lectures were in The Dairy block. One of my Maths tutors was Miss Nevil; she was an excellent cook and had her Maths tutees to an evening soirée at the end of every term. Education lectures were mainly in The Stable block. A subsidiary subject was Rural Science, and we did a study of Newton Park village at some point. We had open book exams every so often.

Lectures were interesting and engaging, and we were expected to attend all of them. We had a book list to read before starting the course. We had personal tutors for any pastoral issues. 

We wore loon trousers (you will have to Google those!) and smock tops. There was a small students’ Union and a refectory. Fun? Skipping lectures to go into Bath. Climbing in and out of bedroom windows. General shenanigans but very innocent and low level compared to today!

Newton Park campus is stunning, and as I still live in Bristol, I still come to walk around the lakes.

The Alumni Oral Histories project aimed to gather individual voices and views from the University's teaching alumni community and publish these stories in people's own words. Any views or opinions represented in individual posts are personal, belonging solely to the author of that post, and do not represent the views of other Bath Spa staff, or Bath Spa University as an institution.