Dear Athelstan
I am quite involved in educational matters and my training in industrial psychology and advertsiing has left me with the firm view that one should never talk down to children. Nor should one ever under estimate them. I could not draw until I was 35 yrs of age becuse my art teachers did not really know that the main impediment to anyone drawing is that they think they cannot. I can now teach folk to draw in 30 minutes.Whereas at Manchester Grammar I got 1 out of 100 for drawing it is now  a powerful start point for many of my deals.

When we had the Landscape Day Mike Steade set up a modern bit of computer kit so we could show the hundreds of pictures taken a few weeks before of Whitchurch. What we want to celebrate the output of the young (and older) is on-screen images.

I do like competitions ( is it old fashioned in school speak ?) Our millennium gates were th result of a competiton I think I have said this already .The winner is great but so much other good stuff is hidden in one file that no-one sees.

A sensible shop could have such a screen as part of their shop window, it would attract people and they would possibly become shoppers.

When it comes ot the landscape we are rooted in history so we should have very good examples of that, its value is perceptible to all age groups. Entertainment and recreational elements are subject to short-term fashion so it is more difficult to include them. There is the negative correllation that if one generates a high level of creativity and output one cannot express it in limited space.

Re your name I have just published a book on the real meaning of the letters in the English alphabet. Go to Lulu.com and in the section under alphabet page three you will find it. It is only �5.00 Why is the letter A at the beginning of the alphabet ?

The ancients said that if you were lucky you grew into your name so it was considered very unlucky and bad karma to hide your name or even shorten it.My book hints that the latter is definitely true.

I agree about those dead businesses. I have thought about re-opening a shop, I had one once where the kebab house is. Prince Charles was going on about a special window treatment so Itried it. For years you could have thrown a bucket of mud over the windows and it just fell off.

tangent.  Anyone interested in development shoud read Charles Landry.
Regards
Graham