Have you had a letter telling you how to repay a student loan that you don’t have ? I’ve got one - and now I’ll have to take time out of busy work time to try and get to the Student Loan company on the phone to ask then what it’s all about! I’ve had my student loans and I’ve paid them all back yonks ago as well as having to ask for a refund as they took too much!

I’ve been on a teacher IB (International Baccalaureate) training course in Greece this week. Athens is a superb venue for a study week although hot and expensive. I couldn’t find much traditional Greek food and was shocked at the pot holed roads, pavements and graffiti! Our puffy ankles, dicey tum and mossie bites are recovering. It’s been a break from politics to study with five colleagues and almost 800 other teachers who are from and work in schools all over the world. The training course was superb and I’m full of ideas and new approaches as well as an international network of contacts for us to start organising trips and events with.

The highs were the teaching, ideas for next year, company, high winds of Greece which cooled our hillside classrooms and partly shielded us from the heat and a tour of ancient Athens (which cost me €50! but well worth it). The lows were the toilet facilities (holes in floor with cold water to wash with) and catering which caused many of us to be ill. Due to bad weather in Munich, our return flight connection was in doubt and we had minutes to get off one plane and run the concourse to our connection. Unfortunately many our colleagues didn’t make theirs to Milan, Birmingham and Colne and faced an overnight stay at the airport (Borris had been wishing that he hadn’t got to teach Fri morning but I don’t think he’d wished for this!). Back at Manchester we were amazed that in just twenty minutes from our plane landing, German efficiency had managed to transfer our luggage and we could take it away with us.