A FORMER head teacher who introduced the sixth form and A-levels at Archers Court School at Dover, John Bates, has died. He was 75.

Mr Bates was a teacher who believed passionately in equal educational opportunities for all.

Cremation will take on Tuesday (September 5) at 2.30pm at Barham, followed by a service at The Beacon Church, London Road, Dover, at 3.30pm.

Mr Bates’ teaching career began in 1953 as a religious knowledge teacher at Portsea Modern School for Boys. It was during this time that he met his future wife, Marita, at the church youth club in Portchester.

The pair were married in 1959 and lived in Droxford, Hampshire. They had three daughters, Sarah, Rebekah and Judith, and three grandchildren, Varian, Izetta and Avery.

Mr Bates was appointed Second Master, with responsibility for religious education, at Herne Bay County Secondary School from 1968 until 1971.

He then spent four years as deputy head teacher of Dorothy Stringer Secondary School, Brighton, and was proud to have been appointed to the post of head teacher prior to the award of his Open University BA degree in December 1974.

Mr Bates was head of Archers Court School from 1975 until 1990. While there he changed the character of the school with the introduction of the sixth form and A-levels.

A former colleague described him as “a head teacher in the true sense of the word, proud of his school and vociferous in his support for its development”.

During his teaching career, all of his personally-taught candidates for public examinations achieved success.

From 1975, he and his family lived near Shepherdswell. He retired in 1990 and spent much of his time in his garden, growing vegetables and working with wood.