ABSTRACT
Rosa Marshall is one of the new breed of 'spinster schoolmistresses' who, with the aid of those married women against whom Angus Barr inveighs, are transforming the girls' private school scene. She is in her mid thirties, and a mathematics teacher at St Margaret's College, an institution for young ladies that caters to a clientele reasonably similar to Wellington's. Faced with massive resistance, given little support from the hierarchy, physically tired from the travel, totally frustrated professionally, Rosa Marshall quit-and the state system lost a dedicated teacher. Rosa Marshall has been caught up in this from the start-in fact she was doing it before the new headmistress arrived. Rosa Marshall the factory-town girl finds much of this distasteful: the ludicrous uniform, rigidly enforced; the la-de-dah manners and silly school rules, such as always wearing hats in the street and not eating in public; the general atmosphere of conservatism and conformity.
