Nick Clegg - do as I say, not as I do!
Discussion
The Don of Croy said:
VoziKaoFangio said:
The Don of Croy said:
VoziKaoFangio said:
The Don of Croy said:
his less than impressive pledge on student fees.
To be fulfilled in the event of a Lib Dem Government being elected. It wasn't, a coalition was formed, all bets were off. You can not expect a party in coalition to deliver all of its manifesto. It's impossible.Schoolboy error.
Twincam16 said:
lockhart flawse said:
I think everyone would agree that "it is a good thing to make things fairer" but does this actually mean? The majority of people that need things making fairer are those who would not be in a position to take advantage of that opportunity if it were there for them. Not all of them but most of them. These are the same people that can't ever move for a job because they can't leave their home communities and the standard comprehensive doesn't offer any help at all. The standards and methods that people demand from schools that they pay for are the exact opposite of those generally offered by the state apparently in the pursuit of fairness. Which only serves to prolong the perceived unfairness. The answer might be to make state schools like public schools except they're said to be elitist and so that's no good - can't have an elite can we.
I was interested in Ed Milliband's father's view (an ex-communist) who thought that in fact true equality of opportunity was not actually a good thing because it left no excuses for those who would inevitably fail. You can ban private schools but the elite would just find some other way to reinforce their position; they're not successful by chance. Nick Clegg can send his child where he likes whilst saying whatever he wants about education. I don't see it as hypocrisy.
I think we've slid slightly O/T here so i'll mark it as such. However, I think part of the problem with our education system lies in snobbery aimed at the jobs people get at the end of it.I was interested in Ed Milliband's father's view (an ex-communist) who thought that in fact true equality of opportunity was not actually a good thing because it left no excuses for those who would inevitably fail. You can ban private schools but the elite would just find some other way to reinforce their position; they're not successful by chance. Nick Clegg can send his child where he likes whilst saying whatever he wants about education. I don't see it as hypocrisy.
In many other countries, being in engineering and other skilled manual professions is held in high regard. In Germany and Italy they even have the title 'Ing.' in the same way we have 'Dr.', 'Prof.' and 'Rev.' - it marks you out as a different kind of elite, and it's respected.
In this country, for centuries engineering was seen as something unintellectual that lower-class people busied themselves with. Robert Stephenson, a thoroughly working-class Geordie engineer, was brought to Parliament where his accent and manners were mocked and pillioried, then denied his initial opportunity to build his new invention and had to acquire the funds through other sources. That invention was of course the steam locomotive, which led to the creation of railways and the furthering of the industrial revolution. We've run into this trap time and again.
So, rather than having a hierarchy of schools with the grammars at the top and some ill-defined seconary-moderns underneath, we need to work out where kids' skillsets lie (rather than presenting them with an 11-plus exam at an early age that they will pass or fail and run the risk of being branded a failure at an early age), and send them to the right school in accordance with this. ALL skillsets should be treated equally.
Unfortunately, because of the focus on academia within public schools, and the pressure applied by public school masters on postwar education acts to ensure that the state sector couldn't compete, we've never really had the education system a modern western democracy and economy really merits.
As it is we have far too many academically bright kids unstretched in state schools which lack the resources to teach them properly, and far too many kids who would make superb engineers effectively rendered directionless because their skills aren't fostered at a young enough age, while they are made to feel they're bad at schoolwork because they're no good at analysing Shakespeare.
IMO what's needed is this:
- Extend primary school education to 13. Studies show a significant drop-off in educational achievement in many pupils at the age of 11/12 as they transfer to the single-subject approach of secondary school at the same time they start learning more subjects and go from being the oldest, most responsible kids in the school to the youngest and least responsible. Extending primary school education to 13 would mean they can be taught and assessed on broader skillset areas rather than specific subjects that they may be variable on, or may just not get on well with the teacher.
- Introduce a non-judgemental, non-exam-based teacher-led assessment at 13. NOT an 11-plus, but rather a series of exercises that determine where the pupil's best abilities lie.
- The kids then get allocated places at a school geared around their dominant skillsets. There would be either traditional academia (let's call them Grammar schools for the sake of argument), which I'd propose would be converted public schools and ex-Grammars, or scientific and technical colleges, which could be converted from the existing secondary moderns/comprehensives. There would be a place on the curricula of either type of school for arts and sports, and would include a minimum of three hours of sport per child per week. As with the work skillsets, assessments would be carried out to make sure kids ended up playing an area of sport they were physically suited to in order to maintain their interest in it.
- Crucially, both types of school would issue qualifications with the same name (GCSEs/A-levels rather than the myriad diplomas and so on) regardless of the subject they're testing, so there would be no sense of one type of school producing 'better' qualifications than the other.
- The individual-subject-timetable curriculum would run from 13-16, with more specialised subjects narrowed down into A-levels for 16-18 year-olds. Crucially however, each A-level programme would also include work-experience placements.
- By the age of 18, each kid who'd been through this system would know what they're naturally good at, and had been good at for years and worked at to improve themselves. They'd also have a pretty good idea as to how their skills could be applied to the world of work, and would have found themselves in workplaces so they'd know what to expect when they went for a job.
- Finally, give apprenticeships the same status as degrees. How is putting three years of concentrated effort into learning a skill and gaining an internationally-recognised qualification in, say, plumbing, any different in spirit to spending three years scuttling in and out of libraries studying the works of Foucault?
At the moment, our education system just seems to set a lot of kids up to fail, doesn't equip them with many useful life skills, and seems skewed towards those whose parents have the biggest bank accounts, rather than those with the sharpest minds.
Firstly, engineering is not a manual profession (ignoring the oxymoron in that statement); it is one of the learned professions & you seem to fall into the common trap of thinking that the guy who fixes your dishwasher is some sort of 'engineer'. Its this sort of error that perpetrates the rather unfortunate view that society has of engineering.
Secondly, I presume that you've just emerged from some sort of coma as the grammar school system was substantially dismantled in this country nearly forty years ago in the mid-1970s
Thirdly, please point me in the direction of this mafia of public school masters who have so ruthlessly and effectively manipulated the education policy of 20 sucsessive Governments to their own ends
Fourthly, the documented drop off in educational focus at 12/13 is more commonly attributed to a little-known condition known as 'puberty' and a widening of children's range of interests and motivations at that time
Fifthly, there are hardly any grammar schools to convert and I doubt that many independent schools would have much interest in doing so
Sixthly, a learning a vocational trade is not the same as academic study; they require different skills, they are undertaken in different ways and they produce different outcomes; just about the only similarity is the time elapsed to compete
Seventhly, what are we going to do with all these engineers?
Finally and, by far, most importantly on what authority is this model of social engineering going to take place - I fear that the only way it could ever be implemented would be via a level of state control that would be entirely repugnant to any right-thinking person.
ClaphamGT3 said:
My word - where to start........
Firstly, engineering is not a manual profession (ignoring the oxymoron in that statement); it is one of the learned professions & you seem to fall into the common trap of thinking that the guy who fixes your dishwasher is some sort of 'engineer'. Its this sort of error that perpetrates the rather unfortunate view that society has of engineering.
Secondly, I presume that you've just emerged from some sort of coma as the grammar school system was substantially dismantled in this country nearly forty years ago in the mid-1970s
Thirdly, please point me in the direction of this mafia of public school masters who have so ruthlessly and effectively manipulated the education policy of 20 sucsessive Governments to their own ends
Fourthly, the documented drop off in educational focus at 12/13 is more commonly attributed to a little-known condition known as 'puberty' and a widening of children's range of interests and motivations at that time
Fifthly, there are hardly any grammar schools to convert and I doubt that many independent schools would have much interest in doing so
Sixthly, a learning a vocational trade is not the same as academic study; they require different skills, they are undertaken in different ways and they produce different outcomes; just about the only similarity is the time elapsed to compete
Seventhly, what are we going to do with all these engineers?
Finally and, by far, most importantly on what authority is this model of social engineering going to take place - I fear that the only way it could ever be implemented would be via a level of state control that would be entirely repugnant to any right-thinking person.
1. Yes, I know what you're getting at but you know what I mean. Point is, we're trying to force all manner of people down the academic, university route when many are not suited to it.Firstly, engineering is not a manual profession (ignoring the oxymoron in that statement); it is one of the learned professions & you seem to fall into the common trap of thinking that the guy who fixes your dishwasher is some sort of 'engineer'. Its this sort of error that perpetrates the rather unfortunate view that society has of engineering.
Secondly, I presume that you've just emerged from some sort of coma as the grammar school system was substantially dismantled in this country nearly forty years ago in the mid-1970s
Thirdly, please point me in the direction of this mafia of public school masters who have so ruthlessly and effectively manipulated the education policy of 20 sucsessive Governments to their own ends
Fourthly, the documented drop off in educational focus at 12/13 is more commonly attributed to a little-known condition known as 'puberty' and a widening of children's range of interests and motivations at that time
Fifthly, there are hardly any grammar schools to convert and I doubt that many independent schools would have much interest in doing so
Sixthly, a learning a vocational trade is not the same as academic study; they require different skills, they are undertaken in different ways and they produce different outcomes; just about the only similarity is the time elapsed to compete
Seventhly, what are we going to do with all these engineers?
Finally and, by far, most importantly on what authority is this model of social engineering going to take place - I fear that the only way it could ever be implemented would be via a level of state control that would be entirely repugnant to any right-thinking person.
2. Where did I say there was still a 'grammar school system'? I'm suggesting it had its merits and we should look at reinstating it.
3. In order to pass the 1944 Butler Education Act, the original plans for a German-style tripartite system of state Grammars, Technical and Secondary Modern schools was heavily watered-down (the Technical schools in particular getting a kicking) by a panel heavily made up of public school headmasters who resented the idea of the state offering a level of education capable of rivalling theirs. We've suffered from it ever since, especially when the Grammars were largely dismantled.
4. Yes, but there are ways of counterbalancing that by giving the kids more responsibility.
5. I don't care whether the independent schools would want to 'convert' or not, to have the best education in the country reserved for the children of the most wealthy, rather than the most academically promising, is not only morally wrong, but also an economically stupid idea given the minds that go to waste elsewhere. Do we genuinely think that parental wealth is really the best indicator of future promise?
6. That's precisely my point. The skills are different but should be valued in the same way.
7. The engineering sector (in fact most of the science sector) is crying out for new blood at a time when the country is drowning in unemployed media studies graduates. Science, engineering and just plainly and simply making things to a very high standard is something we're rather good at in this country, and something we can make money out of.
Finally - define 'right-thinking person'. By that do you mean 'you', because I suspect you do. I find the notion of academic selection by parental income far more morally repugnant that the thought of a state education system that actually thought about what each and every student was actually good at. It works in Germany, and look how they're doing.
DJRC said:
Twincam16 said:
drivel.
What you know about engineering and engineers I could write on your dick. Most professions in the UK these days are treated equally, esp when there is substantial dosh on the table. Now take you ill-informed chip off your shoulder.
How are kids supposed to realise what they're good at if the quality of their education is dependent on parental income?
My point being that we don't have enough people in engineering, but too many people shoved down an academic/humanities route that has furthered their career prospects and economic potential by the square-root of sod-all.
Our state schools aren't working very well, but our private ones are. They select based on parental income. I was merely suggesting that ALL schools should select on particular areas of academic ability, which can broadly be split into traditional academia, and technical/scientific knowledge.
What's that got to do with the extent of what I do or don't know about engineering? I was talking about education.
Twincam16 said:
ClaphamGT3 said:
My word - where to start........
Firstly, engineering is not a manual profession (ignoring the oxymoron in that statement); it is one of the learned professions & you seem to fall into the common trap of thinking that the guy who fixes your dishwasher is some sort of 'engineer'. Its this sort of error that perpetrates the rather unfortunate view that society has of engineering.
Secondly, I presume that you've just emerged from some sort of coma as the grammar school system was substantially dismantled in this country nearly forty years ago in the mid-1970s
Thirdly, please point me in the direction of this mafia of public school masters who have so ruthlessly and effectively manipulated the education policy of 20 sucsessive Governments to their own ends
Fourthly, the documented drop off in educational focus at 12/13 is more commonly attributed to a little-known condition known as 'puberty' and a widening of children's range of interests and motivations at that time
Fifthly, there are hardly any grammar schools to convert and I doubt that many independent schools would have much interest in doing so
Sixthly, a learning a vocational trade is not the same as academic study; they require different skills, they are undertaken in different ways and they produce different outcomes; just about the only similarity is the time elapsed to compete
Seventhly, what are we going to do with all these engineers?
Finally and, by far, most importantly on what authority is this model of social engineering going to take place - I fear that the only way it could ever be implemented would be via a level of state control that would be entirely repugnant to any right-thinking person.
1. Yes, I know what you're getting at but you know what I mean. Point is, we're trying to force all manner of people down the academic, university route when many are not suited to it.Firstly, engineering is not a manual profession (ignoring the oxymoron in that statement); it is one of the learned professions & you seem to fall into the common trap of thinking that the guy who fixes your dishwasher is some sort of 'engineer'. Its this sort of error that perpetrates the rather unfortunate view that society has of engineering.
Secondly, I presume that you've just emerged from some sort of coma as the grammar school system was substantially dismantled in this country nearly forty years ago in the mid-1970s
Thirdly, please point me in the direction of this mafia of public school masters who have so ruthlessly and effectively manipulated the education policy of 20 sucsessive Governments to their own ends
Fourthly, the documented drop off in educational focus at 12/13 is more commonly attributed to a little-known condition known as 'puberty' and a widening of children's range of interests and motivations at that time
Fifthly, there are hardly any grammar schools to convert and I doubt that many independent schools would have much interest in doing so
Sixthly, a learning a vocational trade is not the same as academic study; they require different skills, they are undertaken in different ways and they produce different outcomes; just about the only similarity is the time elapsed to compete
Seventhly, what are we going to do with all these engineers?
Finally and, by far, most importantly on what authority is this model of social engineering going to take place - I fear that the only way it could ever be implemented would be via a level of state control that would be entirely repugnant to any right-thinking person.
2. Where did I say there was still a 'grammar school system'? I'm suggesting it had its merits and we should look at reinstating it.
3. In order to pass the 1944 Butler Education Act, the original plans for a German-style tripartite system of state Grammars, Technical and Secondary Modern schools was heavily watered-down (the Technical schools in particular getting a kicking) by a panel heavily made up of public school headmasters who resented the idea of the state offering a level of education capable of rivalling theirs. We've suffered from it ever since, especially when the Grammars were largely dismantled.
4. Yes, but there are ways of counterbalancing that by giving the kids more responsibility.
5. I don't care whether the independent schools would want to 'convert' or not, to have the best education in the country reserved for the children of the most wealthy, rather than the most academically promising, is not only morally wrong, but also an economically stupid idea given the minds that go to waste elsewhere. Do we genuinely think that parental wealth is really the best indicator of future promise?
6. That's precisely my point. The skills are different but should be valued in the same way.
7. The engineering sector (in fact most of the science sector) is crying out for new blood at a time when the country is drowning in unemployed media studies graduates. Science, engineering and just plainly and simply making things to a very high standard is something we're rather good at in this country, and something we can make money out of.
Finally - define 'right-thinking person'. By that do you mean 'you', because I suspect you do. I find the notion of academic selection by parental income far more morally repugnant that the thought of a state education system that actually thought about what each and every student was actually good at. It works in Germany, and look how they're doing.
Frankly, your point about independent schools is over-argued; if they really were just repositories for the children of the rich, how come they consistently out-perform the maintained sector?
Twincam16 said:
Our state schools aren't working very well, but our private ones are. They select based on parental income.
That's an interesting point and worthy of further discussion. We live fairly close to a number of successful schools, there is a very good Grammar school nearby and a good private school. The thing that children at both schools have in common isn't rich parents, it's parents who are committed to their children and their children's education. Parent's of the Grammar school kids drive them hard because they realise the value of a first class, free, education.
Parent's of the private school kids care enough to pay over £1k per child per month to give them an education that's hopefully better than that they could get for free at the local state school.
I don't think it's necessarily parents income that matters (although it certainly helps...), more their attitude and support, and that's going to hard to extend to the state school sector.
And I have to echo what's been said before, engineering isn't a 'skilled manual' profession, and the Germans don't give the Ing title to plumbers or people who fix washing machines, it's reserved for professional engineers.
VoziKaoFangio said:
To be fulfilled in the event of a Lib Dem Government being elected. It wasn't, a coalition was formed, all bets were off. You can not expect a party in coalition to deliver all of its manifesto. It's impossible.
Indeed.Amazes me how many people fail to understand this.
(Not affiliated with any particular party)
Twincam16 said:
DJRC said:
Twincam16 said:
drivel.
What you know about engineering and engineers I could write on your dick. Most professions in the UK these days are treated equally, esp when there is substantial dosh on the table. Now take you ill-informed chip off your shoulder.
How are kids supposed to realise what they're good at if the quality of their education is dependent on parental income?
My point being that we don't have enough people in engineering, but too many people shoved down an academic/humanities route that has furthered their career prospects and economic potential by the square-root of sod-all.
Our state schools aren't working very well, but our private ones are. They select based on parental income. I was merely suggesting that ALL schools should select on particular areas of academic ability, which can broadly be split into traditional academia, and technical/scientific knowledge.
What's that got to do with the extent of what I do or don't know about engineering? I was talking about education.
But Im sure you knew all this. Honest. Really.
amirzed said:
VoziKaoFangio said:
To be fulfilled in the event of a Lib Dem Government being elected. It wasn't, a coalition was formed, all bets were off. You can not expect a party in coalition to deliver all of its manifesto. It's impossible.
Indeed.Amazes me how many people fail to understand this.
(Not affiliated with any particular party)
Just point out one other party leader in the last 25 years who has individually signed a pledge in front of the assembled media, then reneged on it after 'winning' election to government. Not manifesto items (covered by all the party etc) but numpty standing up to receive the plaudits as seen in the example of Clegg.
He is a stand-alone, 100%, through and through twonker, and deserves to be treated as such.
RYH64E said:
Twincam16 said:
Our state schools aren't working very well, but our private ones are. They select based on parental income.
That's an interesting point and worthy of further discussion. We live fairly close to a number of successful schools, there is a very good Grammar school nearby and a good private school. The thing that children at both schools have in common isn't rich parents, it's parents who are committed to their children and their children's education. Parent's of the Grammar school kids drive them hard because they realise the value of a first class, free, education.
Parent's of the private school kids care enough to pay over £1k per child per month to give them an education that's hopefully better than that they could get for free at the local state school.
I don't think it's necessarily parents income that matters (although it certainly helps...), more their attitude and support, and that's going to hard to extend to the state school sector.
Private tutors, I suspect, partly fill the gap. I fall into that category. My parents couldn't afford to send me to a private school (they didn't want to either as they wanted me to make friends with a broader social spectrum of people, which I thank them for), but they also recognised that the level of tuition at the school was variable. My history and English teachers were faultless and even today I consider them role-models. However, they paid for private home tutors for maths, chemistry, physics and German. These tutors were mainly local university students who'd charge a few quid a session.
That's the extent of the 'private education' I received, and I managed to get into an (academically) selective 6th Form college, a Russell Group university, and on to take professional qualifications that landed me my current job.
However, the point remains - why wasn't that level of tuition available at school? Why were my German, chemistry, physics and (especially) maths teachers crap?
And then, in a misguided and short-lived career move in the depths of recession, I trained as a teacher having worked for an exam board, and the reasons became screamingly obvious - in state schools, teachers can't 'teach' in the way they can not only in private schools, but in the way my English and history teachers taught me. Every last minute of their lessons are prescribed so they can't be sponteneous and pass on their knowledge in the ways they'd want. Every last thing the kids do is part of all manner of ongoing assessments, rather than a way to enthuse their interest in learning, so everything ends up 'taught to the test'. Kids come out of state schools knowing how to pass exams to make the schools look good in the league tables, but not much of use.
But worst of all, because of all these prescribed assessment hoops it's demanded kids jump through at every turn, no-one notices what they're actually good at.
I remember one lad from my bottom-set English class. Impossible to engage, first with the paper aeroplanes whenever my back was turned, didn't give a flying s
t about Shakespeare or adverbs or modern poetry.And you know what? Frankly I didn't blame him. He was characterised as 'the bad kid' by all the teachers, he was made to think he'd never amount to anything because he wasn't particularly good at the chip-cutter template of abilities forced on him by the school system, and he was forever on report, summoned to the headmaster's office for every slight infraction of the rules.
He liked to talk about motorbikes. His teaching assistant and all the (predominately female and middle-aged) teachers found his interest trivial and posturingly macho and dismissed it whenever he raised it. Get on with your work an analyse this soliloquy in Macbeth, won't you.
One detention period (which he found himself in regularly), I decided to chat to him to find some way of engaging with him in future. We talked about motorbikes.
Turns out that he had a supermoto he raced in trials at the weekends. He absolutely lived for it. However, more to the point, because he raced on an extremely straitened budget due to his family's circumstances, he did all the mechanical work on it himself.
We're talking about a 14-year-old boy here capable of rebuilding the gearbox on a Yamaha SM125, analysing suspension and damper rates for optimum off-road performance, setting valve clearances, rebuilding carburettors and so on.
I can't do this. I send my bike to a main stealer and hand over hundreds for well-paid experts to do this. And yet here we had a 14-year-old boy who wasn't predicted to get a single GCSE, effectively written off as an educational prospect, his frankly huge abilities in mechanics essentially belittled and ignored.
Now tell me, why had no-one at the school noticed this, and why were there no subjects at that school that harnessed and developed that ability with mechanical engineering? And if they were, why can't these abilities be equated with academia and awarded corresponding GCSEs following practical exams?
I hope for his own sake he's found some way to get into motorcycle mechanics as he'll have left the school by now. But if he hasn't, we'll be minus one promising mechanic, and paying for one more jobless person via our taxes.
This one-size-fits-all academic template DOESN'T WORK. We need to be working out where every kid's strengths lie and teaching them accordingly to make sure they leave school knowing full-well what they're good at. Instead, at the moment we're churning out thousands of kids who know what they're bad at from schools who bang on about their 'excellent' Ofsted status and 95% GCSE pass rates.
I'm not going all bleeding-heart-liberal about this. There are hard economic facts to chew on here. At a time when the jobless total is falling quite rapidly and many firms are hiring, youth unemployment is soaring. A record rise in overall employment last month masked an 11,000 rise in youth unemployment at the same time. It's over a million now.
Thing is, this hasn't been a sudden shock as a result of the recent recession, but rather a tide that has been steadily rising since Blair's education 'reforms' really started to bite. Blair added all these layers of bureaucracy, all the initiatives, the angles of assessment, the 'child-centred learning' that binds state school teachers to a particular teaching style.
All the while, the private schools continue to teach as they've always done, and funnily enough how I was taught back in the early '90s under Major.
If we want to close the attainment gap between state and private schools, free teachers to teach the way they see fit and remove the bureaucracy.
However, there is another absolutely essential point that needs making here - plenty of kids' abilities, that could be vital for the world of work, are going unnoticed and unnurtured.
Twincam16 said:
teachers can't 'teach' in the way they can not only in private schools, but in the way my English and history teachers taught me. Every last minute of their lessons are prescribed so they can't be sponteneous and pass on their knowledge in the ways they'd want. Every last thing the kids do is part of all manner of ongoing assessments, rather than a way to enthuse their interest in learning, so everything ends up 'taught to the test'. Kids come out of state schools knowing how to pass exams to make the schools look good in the league tables, but not much of use.
Awesome post there, thanks. That bit I've quoted in particular mirrors my own feelings about school and those of my mother (a retired teacher). The best teachers led me to discovering things for myself because I became interested. My best grades may have been in other subjects, but I have a career and desire for learning from those teachers who did not stick to the script. It seems like nowadays that sort of teaching is rare.I'm now having to think about education for my son and things like this scare me. The constant academic assessment just seems to be geared toward turning off kids like the boy you mention. Which often leads to disruption for all.
aizvara said:
Twincam16 said:
teachers can't 'teach' in the way they can not only in private schools, but in the way my English and history teachers taught me. Every last minute of their lessons are prescribed so they can't be sponteneous and pass on their knowledge in the ways they'd want. Every last thing the kids do is part of all manner of ongoing assessments, rather than a way to enthuse their interest in learning, so everything ends up 'taught to the test'. Kids come out of state schools knowing how to pass exams to make the schools look good in the league tables, but not much of use.
Awesome post there, thanks. That bit I've quoted in particular mirrors my own feelings about school and those of my mother (a retired teacher). The best teachers led me to discovering things for myself because I became interested. My best grades may have been in other subjects, but I have a career and desire for learning from those teachers who did not stick to the script. It seems like nowadays that sort of teaching is rare.I'm now having to think about education for my son and things like this scare me. The constant academic assessment just seems to be geared toward turning off kids like the boy you mention. Which often leads to disruption for all.
Blair absolutely ruined state education in this country. Under Thatcher and Major the state/private attainment gap (ie what those kids actually went on to achieve once they'd left school) was closing quite rapidly, but under Blair it regressed dramatically. Just around about the same time that much-trumpeted 'Outstanding' Ofsted ratings and unfeasibly high GCSE pass rates started to become the norm. Gove has many, many faults, but they're minor quibbles compared to the likes of Estelle Morris.
The Don of Croy said:
No, I disagree (still).
Just point out one other party leader in the last 25 years who has individually signed a pledge in front of the assembled media, then reneged on it after 'winning' election to government. Not manifesto items (covered by all the party etc) but numpty standing up to receive the plaudits as seen in the example of Clegg.
He is a stand-alone, 100%, through and through twonker, and deserves to be treated as such.
But the thing is, he didn't win. The Lib Dems are the minority in a coalition government.Just point out one other party leader in the last 25 years who has individually signed a pledge in front of the assembled media, then reneged on it after 'winning' election to government. Not manifesto items (covered by all the party etc) but numpty standing up to receive the plaudits as seen in the example of Clegg.
He is a stand-alone, 100%, through and through twonker, and deserves to be treated as such.
Or is that you think the Lib Dems should not have accepted to be in a coalition unless their pledge was honoured?
Twincam16 said:
I see what you're getting at, although there's no getting around the fact that having £1k+ per child per month available to send your kids to private school is the preserve of the upper middle classes.
There are plenty of kids at our local private school whose parents appear to have modest means. You don't always get to know the backgrounds of the children but I know that the father of one of by son's friends drives a refuse truck for the council, so I'm guessing that whatever his mum earns pays the school fees. Other friends of ours re-mortgaged their house to pay their child's fees, and I know of cases where the parents are dirt poor so the grandparents pay.Twincam16 said:
If we want to close the attainment gap between state and private schools, free teachers to teach the way they see fit and remove the bureaucracy.
Our local state schools concentrate on getting at least a C at GCSE for as many pupils as possible, and at least a C means a C in many cases. Our local Private school concentrates on getting A and A* grades and last year sent 12 pupils to Oxford/Cambridge and 1 to Harvard, from a largely non-selective intake of 80 pupils (there is an entrance exam, but it's pretty basic). Raising expectations in the state sector would be a start, not making the exams easier, lowering the pass criteria, and aiming for Cs.Twincam16 said:
RYH64E said:
Twincam16 said:
Our state schools aren't working very well, but our private ones are. They select based on parental income.
That's an interesting point and worthy of further discussion. We live fairly close to a number of successful schools, there is a very good Grammar school nearby and a good private school. The thing that children at both schools have in common isn't rich parents, it's parents who are committed to their children and their children's education. Parent's of the Grammar school kids drive them hard because they realise the value of a first class, free, education.
Parent's of the private school kids care enough to pay over £1k per child per month to give them an education that's hopefully better than that they could get for free at the local state school.
I don't think it's necessarily parents income that matters (although it certainly helps...), more their attitude and support, and that's going to hard to extend to the state school sector.
Private tutors, I suspect, partly fill the gap. I fall into that category. My parents couldn't afford to send me to a private school (they didn't want to either as they wanted me to make friends with a broader social spectrum of people, which I thank them for), but they also recognised that the level of tuition at the school was variable. My history and English teachers were faultless and even today I consider them role-models. However, they paid for private home tutors for maths, chemistry, physics and German. These tutors were mainly local university students who'd charge a few quid a session.
That's the extent of the 'private education' I received, and I managed to get into an (academically) selective 6th Form college, a Russell Group university, and on to take professional qualifications that landed me my current job.
However, the point remains - why wasn't that level of tuition available at school? Why were my German, chemistry, physics and (especially) maths teachers crap?
And then, in a misguided and short-lived career move in the depths of recession, I trained as a teacher having worked for an exam board, and the reasons became screamingly obvious - in state schools, teachers can't 'teach' in the way they can not only in private schools, but in the way my English and history teachers taught me. Every last minute of their lessons are prescribed so they can't be sponteneous and pass on their knowledge in the ways they'd want. Every last thing the kids do is part of all manner of ongoing assessments, rather than a way to enthuse their interest in learning, so everything ends up 'taught to the test'. Kids come out of state schools knowing how to pass exams to make the schools look good in the league tables, but not much of use.
But worst of all, because of all these prescribed assessment hoops it's demanded kids jump through at every turn, no-one notices what they're actually good at.
I remember one lad from my bottom-set English class. Impossible to engage, first with the paper aeroplanes whenever my back was turned, didn't give a flying s
t about Shakespeare or adverbs or modern poetry.And you know what? Frankly I didn't blame him. He was characterised as 'the bad kid' by all the teachers, he was made to think he'd never amount to anything because he wasn't particularly good at the chip-cutter template of abilities forced on him by the school system, and he was forever on report, summoned to the headmaster's office for every slight infraction of the rules.
He liked to talk about motorbikes. His teaching assistant and all the (predominately female and middle-aged) teachers found his interest trivial and posturingly macho and dismissed it whenever he raised it. Get on with your work an analyse this soliloquy in Macbeth, won't you.
One detention period (which he found himself in regularly), I decided to chat to him to find some way of engaging with him in future. We talked about motorbikes.
Turns out that he had a supermoto he raced in trials at the weekends. He absolutely lived for it. However, more to the point, because he raced on an extremely straitened budget due to his family's circumstances, he did all the mechanical work on it himself.
We're talking about a 14-year-old boy here capable of rebuilding the gearbox on a Yamaha SM125, analysing suspension and damper rates for optimum off-road performance, setting valve clearances, rebuilding carburettors and so on.
I can't do this. I send my bike to a main stealer and hand over hundreds for well-paid experts to do this. And yet here we had a 14-year-old boy who wasn't predicted to get a single GCSE, effectively written off as an educational prospect, his frankly huge abilities in mechanics essentially belittled and ignored.
Now tell me, why had no-one at the school noticed this, and why were there no subjects at that school that harnessed and developed that ability with mechanical engineering? And if they were, why can't these abilities be equated with academia and awarded corresponding GCSEs following practical exams?
I hope for his own sake he's found some way to get into motorcycle mechanics as he'll have left the school by now. But if he hasn't, we'll be minus one promising mechanic, and paying for one more jobless person via our taxes.
This one-size-fits-all academic template DOESN'T WORK. We need to be working out where every kid's strengths lie and teaching them accordingly to make sure they leave school knowing full-well what they're good at. Instead, at the moment we're churning out thousands of kids who know what they're bad at from schools who bang on about their 'excellent' Ofsted status and 95% GCSE pass rates.
I'm not going all bleeding-heart-liberal about this. There are hard economic facts to chew on here. At a time when the jobless total is falling quite rapidly and many firms are hiring, youth unemployment is soaring. A record rise in overall employment last month masked an 11,000 rise in youth unemployment at the same time. It's over a million now.
Thing is, this hasn't been a sudden shock as a result of the recent recession, but rather a tide that has been steadily rising since Blair's education 'reforms' really started to bite. Blair added all these layers of bureaucracy, all the initiatives, the angles of assessment, the 'child-centred learning' that binds state school teachers to a particular teaching style.
All the while, the private schools continue to teach as they've always done, and funnily enough how I was taught back in the early '90s under Major.
If we want to close the attainment gap between state and private schools, free teachers to teach the way they see fit and remove the bureaucracy.
However, there is another absolutely essential point that needs making here - plenty of kids' abilities, that could be vital for the world of work, are going unnoticed and unnurtured.
amirzed said:
But the thing is, he didn't win. The Lib Dems are the minority in a coalition government.
Or is that you think the Lib Dems should not have accepted to be in a coalition unless their pledge was honoured?
Indeed. And when the Coalition came into govt and were briefed by civil servants with the kind of detailed financial info that parties in Opposition simply don't get, they discovered that we were on the edge of a financial cliff and that this promise was simply not affordable.Or is that you think the Lib Dems should not have accepted to be in a coalition unless their pledge was honoured?
It's the same reason why the Conservatives, champions of strong defence and low taxes, are slashing the defence budget, keeping income tax where it is, and have raised VAT. Why is that not a similar betrayal?
otolith said:
I wonder what the effect of education vouchers would be?
LEAs will see education vouchers brought in over their cold, dead bones.Remember all the furore they kicked up over free schools? - it'll be 100 times worse.
Basically, their concern is that all the engaged, responsible, middle income parents who tend to produce the higher performing children will all scamper off to the independent sector leaving them with the bigger challenges to deal with
Twincam - good point well-brought out as my geography master used to say. I agree that one size does not fit all but at the moment the country is working through the fairness agenda and in education it means that one group cannot be treated differently to another group even though it is blindingly obvious that a large number of children are not suited to academic work for whatever reason. They used to go Secondary Moderns where they taught more practical subjects as well as English and Maths but they were binned because supposedly their life chances were ruined if they failed the 11+. So we now have a system that tries to group those that don't want to learn with those who are desperate to learn to the benefit of neither group. A friend of mine left the City to go into teaching about 5 years ago. He spent one year at an Academy in south London and then left to teach at a prep school. He said the academy had everything any school could ask for in terms of facilities but he spent as much time trying to be a social worker as a teacher when he was there.
By the way if you think that the independent sector doesn't contain pupils from a wide variety of backgrounds then you are 100% incorrect although I grant you they are unlikely to mix with the kids from a sink estate but frankly that's a big reason why they are sent there. It's the sink estate children that need the most help and the state sector is ill-equipped to provide it because it is governed by an ideology that is admirable but ultimately misguided. But I do think that this is becoming apparent to all and Gove will get to grips with some of the obvious problems.
By the way if you think that the independent sector doesn't contain pupils from a wide variety of backgrounds then you are 100% incorrect although I grant you they are unlikely to mix with the kids from a sink estate but frankly that's a big reason why they are sent there. It's the sink estate children that need the most help and the state sector is ill-equipped to provide it because it is governed by an ideology that is admirable but ultimately misguided. But I do think that this is becoming apparent to all and Gove will get to grips with some of the obvious problems.
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