Another New-Labour UK educational triumph - Not!

Well it looks like practically speaking New-Labour have, by fiddling the difficulty/pass marks in order to improve their figures, successfully destroyed the A-Levels, the old ‘gold standard’, as a properly functioning exam.

It is something parents and probably employers, have been quietly discussing for years. It is effectively official now.

Universities not only now need to do interviews, they need to set their own tests to see if candidates with A-Levels are actually able to manage real subjects at degree level.

How long before New-Labour set their sights on making degree courses ‘fair’ – in educational terms newspeak for; any one can get one, no actual ability or work necessary.

Winston Churchill and Sherlock Holmes. Many voters don’t know who was real and who wasn’t

According to a survey 47% of those surveyed thought Richard I (the Lionheart), was a myth. Worryingly 33% thought the same about Sir Winston Churchill and Florence Nightingale.

Conversely 59% though Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson were real people.

Did the people conducting the survey especially look for thick people, or is it yet another indictment of State Education?

Possibly both - but more likely the latter, as even the those of the most modest mental ability, exposed to a half decent education would be more than likely to get such simple questions right.

More worrying, what else don’t the respondents have a clue about - and how does this affect important decisions they make in daily life, based apparently on completely mistaken information.

More worrying still ;-) These people can vote...

New Labour, New Threat - to Independant Schools

It seems that New Labour would like to be seen as heroically championing the downtrodden poor by forcing the wicked Independant Schools to provide places for poor people, to stop them being run as "exclusive clubs".

Hold on – Rewind! Many of the Independant schools were once Direct Grant Grammar Schools, providing places to anyone who merited them, those who could not afford to go were subsidised by the local authorities.

It was actually old Labour that put a stop to that on ideological grounds by abolishing direct grant schools. God forbid anyone might aspire to anything other than mediocrity under Labour.

The Conservatives later brought in the assisted places scheme to allow poorer pupils to attend them. Abolishing that scheme was one of New Labour’s top priorities on assuming office. God forbid anyone… etc. … under New Labour.

In an effort to ensure poorer pupils could still attend them the Independant Schools developed a scheme of sponsored bursaries. Clearly Independant schools do not particularly want to be exclusive. They actually want to be able to take in children who cant afford to pay the fees - that in many cases the schools were forced to charge by Labour, or go out of business.

It would in fact appear to be Labour and it’s FascistLite successor, New Labour, that have deliberately and consistently, over decades, excluded children from poorer homes from these schools.

But why have New Labour got a particular bee in their bonnet about it now, with all their talk of removing charitable status and unannounced inspections It might be more honest to provide their inspectors with natty leather uniforms and insignias. ;-) and complaints the poor are missing out?

Well clearly New Labour have actually engineered the ‘poor missing out bit themselves’, presumably largely for fossilised ideological reasons. One would like to hope it was unintended. But why now?

Well New Labour’s problem is the fact that they are incapable of providing an educational system fit for purpose, as they say. No one rational could seriously believe that state education is actually even adequate. It is failing pupils of all abilities and backgrounds.

The existence of the Independant Schools (Like Grammar Schools) and the desperation of parents who can only afford them by sacrificing virtually everything else is an indictment on the State and the state educational system - Not because of what they are but what the state schools are not.

If the state system were any use parents would not be so desperate for their children to attend them in such numbers - If the state system were any use New Labour Government ministers would not ensure their own children attended them in such numbers…

Independant Schools wouldn’t matter much at all if the State provided what these schools provide - a decent education.

The State would have out competed them, it is effectively an educational cartel all on it's own and they would have withered to a niche market. That they exist at all, despite New-Labour’s Herculean efforts to the contrary, is testament to New Labour’s utter incapability.

Imagine if BTs competitors got the sort of stick that the Independant Schools come in for. There would be an outcry.

So there is one answer. They attack the Independant Schools because they show up what can be done and just how bad the state system is. Otherwise the State could argue that it was not possible to provide and education to that standard in this modern age and people couldn’t point to these schools and put the lie to it.

But there is another reason. New Labour are desperate to distract from the continuous chain of PR disasters resulting from their apparently endemic incompetence and dishonesty (some of the currently prominent in that string being Northern Rock and Peter Hain), that is providing a metaphorical tower of political ash and pumice in the sky over them - like some latter day political Pompeii.

Gordon Brown has been firing off a few contentious salvos of late, such as his plan to harvest organs without actual permission.

This is primarily to distract the citizens and to persuade the more gullible that New Labour actually give a damn about providing the opportunity for the poor to actually benefit themselves - instead of remaining state clients from cradle to organ harvest - and we know that is not so.

Education in the UK continues it’s inexorable slide under New Labour

At one time the British education system was one of the leading ones in the world and arguably helped pioneer the concept of universal education.

Sadly, this is no longer the case.

In the stewardship of the present government and confirming what many believe but has always been strenuously denied by New Labour it now seems our world standing has slipped out of the top ten.

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development produce an international study. The Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa). They assess the performance of 15 year olds and are published every 3 years. The UK’s marks are not good – a definite ‘could do better’.

The UK avoided participating in the 2003 round of tests and their chickens are coming home to roost now. The latest assessments now place the UK, previously in the top ten, 24th in maths and 17th in literacy.

According to the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study, the fact is the reading performance of 10 year olds in England has fallen to a world ranking of 19th.

Government ministers have tried to spin away the results, attempting to claim the rankings were not comparable with previous years. But a spokesperson for the OECD refuted this insisting the comparisons were "perfectly legitimate".

If the Government were actually serious, or even capable, of managing the education system they should look at scrapping all of the meddling changes and targets they have introduced over the last decade or more - Before them we were in the world top ten, now we are not. It speaks for it's self.

Teacher charged in Sudan inciting hatred and insulting Islam over naming of Teddy Bear

Many of us will now be aware of the plight of Gillian Gibbons, a teacher fairly recently arrived in the Sudan, who is in trouble because she didn’t prevent a pupil of her’s named Mohammed naming a teddy bear after himself. It has been posted about quite a bit on the net.

Teddy bears have a pretty positive image, so inciting hatred is difficult to see and if a president of the US did not find it insulting to have them generically named after him, then why should it be seen as an insult?

In any event, it was not Gillian Gibbons who named the Teddy.

Before this incident I had rightly, or wrongly, largely associated the place largely with the slaughter and beheading of General Charles Gordon, in Khartoum, by ‘mad’ Mahdi Mohammed Ahmed - Now I have something else to tuck into my mental ‘Sudan’ pigeonhole with that.

And before anyone says it - no I have not forgotten Darfur, or the Sudanese government’s semi official military arm the Janjaweed.

The Sudanese Embassy had previously claimed it was all "storm in a teacup" and she could be released soon, as the incident was based on a cultural misunderstanding.

It seems this is not the case and she has now been charged with insulting religion, inciting hatred and showing contempt for religious beliefs. This could result in a fine, prison, or 40 lashes. It’s just as well New Labour had the teeth pulled on a bill introducing similar legislation here - for the moment.

It is difficult to see what the Sudanese authorities are playing at, one presumes they are not actually trying to bring Mohammedism and Sharia Law into disrepute, or make the average Westerner more suspicious of their co-religionists, but they would have found it difficult to do a better job of it if they were.

Maybe they are hoping to use the affair as leverage...

New-Labs promises on education look empty ten years on

If you had ordered something ten years ago and paid through the nose for it you might have expected to have, at lest, had sight of it by now.

Lancaster University has conducted research into New-Lab’s specialist schools programme and it’s Excellence in Cities initiative. They have concluded that, despite billions being spent on them the government’s policies have provided "meagre" benefits.

Cambridge University have published an interim report from a wide-ranging, independent, two-year review of primary education pointing out that despite some £500m spent so far on literacy standards of reading have been "more or less static since the 1950s".

New-Lab’s ‘National Literacy Strategy’ had "a barely noticeable effect" on reading ability and has apparently managed to significantly reduce any actual enjoyment children get from reading – bound to make them want to read then – not.

Further the literacy levels of the poorest children have dropped even further behind their peers than anywhere else in Europe.

It is a damning indictment on the Government and it didn’t need the universities to find that out, as virtually any parent with school aged children will attest, though perhaps it does to provide concrete evidence of it that the government can’t ignore.

We can only hope that the government pay more attention to what actually really works and less to educational and political theory, though one fears it is unlikely given that government interference is so often the kiss of death to anything they take an interest in with their regulations, policies and omnipresent measurements and targets.

“Schools ‘n’ Hospitals”, “14 Days to save the NHS” - but only if you are actually com-pet-ent. It all rings rather hollowly now but the spin goes on.
It seems that the official reaction to the reports were right in the river with the Egyptian crocodiles :-)

UK Teachers becoming reluctant to teach theory of evolution

It seems that teaches in the UK are becoming more and more reluctant to include the theory of evolution in science classes.

Not as you might initially imagine because of fundamentalist Christian objections.

No. Apparently it is much more because teachers are worried about Moslem objections.

Accoring to a Professor at the Institute of Education, London, Moslems are less likely to accommodate the theory of evolution within their belief structure than Christians. A much greater percentage are Creationists than amongst Christians. The large increase in Moslems in the UK means that there are many more pupils and parents with more extreme creationist views.

One can’t help wondering if teachers would be quite so concerned about the views of, say Christians for example - and if the real driver behind their concerns is not political correctness and fear of being unjustly accused of being institutionally prejudiced, culturally insensitive, or racist, in some way, if objections are raised to their covering the subject.

Are we becoming increasingly ignorant of and divorced from what we eat?

A poll for ‘British Food Fortnight’ (whatever) billed as; ‘An annual mass movement to excite and educate young people about British food.’ apparently demonstrates a woeful lack of knowledge about regional foods amongst the said ‘young people’.

It seems many were under the impression cheddar cheese comes from the midlands for instance.

This is hardly surprising when a recent survey by the 'Linking Environment And Farming' (LEAF) indicated 22% of adults didn’t know that bacon and the meat in sausages originated on farms. Also 23% didn’t know the main ingredient of bread (wheat) was grown on farms. A staggering 47% hadn’t a clue the main ingredient of porridge (oats) came from farms.

Whether this is down to surveying particularly thick people, or the effects of long term urbanisation on the population, only ever seeing pre packaged and processed supermarket food, or just a narrow and poor education, is difficult to say. Certainly a lack of the most basic knowledge about the geography of the UK.

This is the basic stuff of living, we are not talking logarithms here.

Things like that used to be covered in primary school, mine was not unusual and we visited farms, but that was a while back now. Probably banned on the grounds of health and safety now.

What is really worrying, when you think about it, is that these people are armed (and dangerous) with the vote.

How can they vote sensibly on policies such as farming and the environment, when they have no idea what the actual likely impact and ramifications of those policies may be and lack the basic knowledge to work it out.

We could all end up with no bread, or milk - and more ‘turkey twizzlers’ than you could shake a stick at.

Kids avoiding healthy School meals

The Fib Lib-Dems are saying the number of pupils eating school meals has dropped by 428,000 in the last two years and they are concerned.

They are complaining that that the healthy eating campaign has put kids off eating school dinners and are demanding Nu-Lab take fresh action to stop pupils stuffing themselves on fatty food until they explode.

When I was at school many of us would have happily gone hungry, rather than eat the school meals on offer, ‘School Dinners’, as they were known.

Unfortunately we did not have that option. We had little old ladies who had apparently been unable to secure posts as women prison guards, on the grounds that they were just too scary.

They had a gimlet eye and the infallible ability to detect untruth. They would not let us out of the dining hall until they were satisfied that we had eaten ‘enough’.

Perhaps David Laws, their schools spokesman, should suggest recruiting some scary old ladies, (preferably the kids own grannies) instead of complaining about ‘meltdowns’ and 'balls ups’. This lot would probably need ninja training first, as they did not go through ‘the war’.

Still he probably does have a point. Anything the Government has a hand in these days is bound to be a cock up of some sort, even something simple. As he said: “This is a classic example of a Government policy”

Trying to persuade a bunch of finicky kids to eat something decent, who have never seen ‘real’ food and whose parents’ culinary skills are limited to microwaving the virtually unidentifiable contents of a ‘value pack’ was never going to be easy.

UK School wins right to ban Christian ‘purity’ ring

The Millais School in Horsham, West Sussex in the UK banned a pupil from wearing a ‘purity’ ring as it contravened the schools uniform policy.

She was one of a dozen girls who wore the ring, engraved with a verse from the Bible, as a sign of their intention to abstain from sex until they married.

She took the school to court on the grounds that it was as "unlawful interference" with her fundamental rights to express her Christian faith, but the court rejected this.

A school that banned a teenage girl from wearing a "purity" ring to symbolise her opposition to sex before marriage did not discriminate against her religious beliefs, the High Court ruled today.

The judge ruled, that the ring could not be regarded as ‘a proper Christian symbol’, and so the school had not breached the Human Rights Act. The decision does seem a little perverse and one wonders at how qualified he was to make the decision and what advice he may have taken.

This is the same school that had no problem allowing Moslem girls to wear headscarves. These scarves are clearly no more a (in the words of the court) ‘proper’ Moslem symbol, originating as they do with certain Middle Eastern ethnicities and not necessary to all Moslem women.

The Koran talks about modesty, but there is no specifically prescribed dress code for Muslim men and women.

The details regarding women's dress differ in various Muslim countries according to local cultural traditions. It ranges from any form of modest but not specifically Moslem dress to the extreme, all-covering chador, or burqa.

In fact the scarves when they are worn are worn to symbolise their ‘modesty and purity’ fulfilling much the same roll as the ring albeit far more overtly - and with just as much, or as little, ‘proper ness’ as the ring. Modesty might be regarded as a requirement but not the wearing of the scarf

Some in the Moslem world regard the headscarf and other more extreme versions of dress for Moslem women as an agenda being pushed by the more the ‘fundamentalist’ to assert a strict Middle Eastern homogenising control over Muslims in Europe.

Surely to be fare it should be one rule for all - and it does not look all that much like one rule for all at the moment.

Will the school, having won it’s argument on this basis, now be banning headscarves on the same basis? Or will they reconsider allowing the rings?

How likely is that?

UK Report suggests teacher’s gender not important

Alan Johnson, UK Education Secretary, prior to the cabinet reshuffle, had been concerned that there are not enough male primary teachers. Also suggesting that lessons should be fast, practical and factual in order to engage boys attention.

Aparently a report by Schools Department officials poo-poohs this. It seems they actually asked the children themselves, rather than do the sensible thing and check the matter objectively. Apparently the older pupils thought men were harsher on boys than women teachers. Translation – Didn’t let them get away with so much. one suspects.

Did they get them to vote for sweets, fizzy drinks and cake for school meals as well?

Researchers also found that two-thirds of pupils rejected the idea that the gender of their teachers mattered.

Is this reliable given that they have been bombarded with sex equality messages and have learnt the answers expected of them. Plus there is the probability that any actual difference would be a subliminal effect the pupils would not necessarily be aware of?

Kids that age are not known for being deeply self aware. Thinking about it - that goes for plenty of adults too.

One reason why there are not many men willing to teach at this level these days is probably the paedophile witch hunt. Evidence suggests pupils are not averse to making false accusations and paranoid parents can make unfounded accusations spurred on by some of the more ‘responsible’ tabloids.

I seem to recall after one witch hunt a paediatrician came in for some grief from some more of the intellectually challenged readers - well they liked the pictures anyway ;-).

What Guy in their right mind would put themselves in the way of that?

Teacher's say mobile phones are weapons

The National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers (NASUWT), a UK teaching union, is calling for mobile phones to be classified as ‘potentially offensive weapons.’

Chris Keates, their general secretary said that pupils were using them to bully their teachers and they should be banned from school premises on those grounds.

She had evidence of over 100 teachers being bullied by phone, email, or online and is worried that sites such as Ratemyteacher and Bebo which, provide a vehicle for false allegations and abuse by pupils which can damage teachers' self esteem and careers.

Stating: "These sites are fed by pupils' misuse of mobile phones. The time has come for mobiles in schools to be placed in the category of a potentially offensive weapon and action taken to prevent their use by pupils while on school premises.”.

I don’t imagine anyone reasonable would take issue with preventing their “use by pupils while on school premises”. Use of phones in class would not appear, at first sight, to be exactly conducive to learning.

However given the fact that the government is cracking down on cyber bullies and has given teachers the power to confiscate mobile phones, also one presumes individual schools could and should make use of the phones in class against the rules any way - why are the NASUWT raising the matter in this way?.

One also wonders what practical use this would all be anyway. How would it stop bullying outside of school hours? A site can probably be more easily be accessed from home than school?

As for ‘offensive weapons’. UK law already classifies anything that is used as an offensive weapon as an offensive weapon. Though in this case the phones are not actually really being used as a weapon in the normal sense at all, but then there is also the offence of ’Harassment’ that would be applicable.

Still, one can understand teachers might be reluctant to use the law to handle what they may see as a matter of discipline and one has some sympathy for the NASUWT. They always opposed the abolition of corporal discipline in schools.

From recollection, whatever your ‘moral’ stance on the subject, this was a teacher’s only actually effective means of control in their arsenal. Just knowing it was there was enough 99% of the time. Now pupils know teachers have no real sanctions, from their point of view.

Unfortunately for the NASUWT, after vigorous and vocal campaigning against corporal discipline by the ‘Fluffy Bunny Squad’ - particularly the teachers' pressure group STOPP (Society of Teachers Opposed to Physical Punishment), abetted by the National Council for Civil Liberties and around half of NUT (National Union of Teachers) branches, a ban was imposed in all UK state schools in 1986, it was extended to private schools in 1998.

A survey, carried out by FDS International for The Times Educational Supplement has found that a significant majority of parents believe pupil behaviour had declined since then and over half were in favour of the return of corporal discipline in schools.

It is worth noting, that the argument against corporal discipline, was largely along the lines that; if you treat children violently (and opponents classified corporal discipline as violent), it will produce a violent society.

Interestingly, though corporal discipline has not really been used in schools since 1987, violence and discipline problems appear to have become much worse since then and to a greater problem now than ever.

One has to wonder how still apocalyptically worse it might have become, had the cane not been banned…

No taxation without representation

Fiona Hyslop, Scotland's Nationalist education minister, is planning to spend Taxes raised from England on Scottish school children.

How? Because taxes raised in the UK go in a common pot and are then divided out unevenly in favour of Scotland.

The Scottish parliament can spend their own money on what they like - and if that goes to reduce infant class sizes, or student grants, then fine.

But did they ever hear of the phrase “No taxation without representation”?

Blair Gibbs, of the Taxpayers' Alliance pointed out:

"Sooner or later the Government is going to have to explain why it is OK for SNP ministers in Holyrood to make pledges on public spending with money raised from English taxpayers.

"Voters north of the border are within their rights to want more local control but fairness means not asking someone else to pay for it. English taxpayers once again see the SNP avoiding the logic of their own independence objective. You can't go your own way if you don't pay your own way."

Joel Barnet, who created the formula, is calling for it to be scrapped, as it comes under intense and increasing political scrutiny because the disparity between public spending in Scotland and England is now more than £1,500 per head. This is threatens to create a public backlash in England.

A YouGov opinion poll indicated 70% of English voters now believe Scotland is being "subsidised" by the rest of the UK and things should be balanced. By contrast, 74% of Scots want to keep the money rolling in just as it is. Why would you be surprised?

Defenders of the current system (the 74%?) say cutting Scotland's share of funds from central government could severely damage the country because there public spending forms a much larger part of the economy than in the rest of the UK – well it would form a larger part wouldn’t it, because they can afford it having an extra "subsidy of more than £11 billion a year.

The disparity is funding artificially inflated levels of Scottish public spending, among the highest in Europe.

On top of that there is also the minor matter of Scottish MPs being able to vote in Parliament on purely English matters - that will not impact on their own electorate.

In this respect they are effectively unelected and unaccountable by and to, those they govern - This is not democracy.

None so blind as those who think they already know...

Today the BBC trumpets “Wealth gap in learning by three”

Baaad selfish rich people! Taking all the education for themselves.

This is in relation to a report based on various studies by The Institute of Education research in the UK.

Children were given 'school readiness' tests and they apparently showed that by the age of three, children from ‘disadvantaged’ homes are up to a year behind in their learning than those from more privileged backgrounds.

Graduates' children were seen to be 12 months ahead of those of the least well educated in tests on their grasp of letters, numbers, colours and shapes.

One of the studies found large differences between children living in families above and below the poverty line.

Professor Heather Joshi stated the poorest children were 10 months behind their wealthier peers in tests of their grasp of shapes, numbers, letters and colours known as "school readiness" tests. She also stated in another study, girls were educationally three months ahead of boys on average.

So are girls on average more ‘advantaged’ than boys? Unlikely.

Take graduates. They are a group pre selected for their ability to – well – graduate.

If intelligence were in any respect even partly inherited then children of graduates would on average start of with a genetically loaded deck of cards.

Then add to that the likelihood of graduates being highly likely to try to ensure their children got a good start and that they would be likely to be exposing them to a more varied and comprehensive vocabulary. It is hardly surprising that their children would on average perform better that average.

Consider people living below the so-called poverty line. Whilst there are many reasons for someone to be in such circumstances it is not unreasonable to suppose, that people living below the poverty line, are on average, less likely to be highly educated. To some extent the reverse of what applied to graduates applies to them.

Now Consider children living below the poverty line. A significant number of those children live in single parent families. This means that there is only one parent who is quite probably likely to have less time to devote to preparing the child ‘educationally’.

So in fact being disadvantaged is by no means the whole story. Native intelligence and a stimulating environment provided by motivated engaged parents are probably responsible for the differences observed.

Advantage, or wealth, is more a by-product than a cause, more an indication of the previous generation’s drive, commitment, intelligence and educational attainment.

A gift for Dave the Chameleon?

Here is something that ought to play to Dave the Chameleon’s showdown with those in his party that advocate selective education. Will he be able to restrain his new News of the World "Alastair Campbell", or will we be seeing veiled accusations of racism trotted out against advocates of selection?

A report produced by a campaign group, the Runnymede Trust, suggests increased school choice does little to enhance the opportunities of black pupils saying: black ethnic minority parents find it difficult to exercise choice, this can lead to further segregation and that many found the complexities in applying to selective schools off-putting.

They say that because many parents find it difficult to exercise choice, they downgrade their options before selecting schools.

The campaign group also say that people with English as a second language tended to choose the school closest to them – except in the case when it came to those selecting single sex schools, there it was not a problem.

Parents trying to get their children into schools in local authority areas with a high number of schools that control their own admissions, found the process especially difficult, the report said.

Choice policies could also lead to young people from different ethnic groups being kept apart, the report argued.

It seems to be from the direction of the report that the problem isn’t so much with selective education, as some parents (and probably not just those with English as a second language) unwillingness to use it as it is meant to be. You can lead a horse to water…

You really can't tell the difference

It looks like Dave the Chameleon’s shadow education secretary David Willetts has stepped on a hornets nest, pushing the unpopular anti selective education/Grammar School line.

A YouGov poll has revealed that 49% of all voters and 71% Conservative voters support selective education. Apparently only 19% of all voters and just 13% of Conservative voters are actually against the idea of selective education of some sort.

After ‘private discussions’ with a number of Conservative MPs and a pretty rough ride from the 1922 committee. Mr Willetts in an attempt to placate his many critics he said he would be willing to do more to protect Grammar Schools.

He hasn’t actually gone back on it, mind you - just spun it differently. No you really can’t tell the difference…

You really can’t tell the difference...

At the risk of sounding like an advert…

“You really can’t tell the difference between Nu-Lab FascistLite ™ and Cameron’s, New Improved Soft and Gentle, Caring Conservatism – Kinder to Hoodies, kinder to your planet too.“.

Today the Conservative Party officially ditched academic selection, accusing grammar schools of entrenching social advantage.

Just when it’s finally dawning, that girls and boys do better academically in separate classes and children cope better with lessons specifically tailored to their abilities, the conservatives take a giant leap - backwards.

The shadow education secretary David Willetts, told grammar school supporters in the party that they cannot harp back to the past, saying: "We must break free from the belief that academic selection is any longer the way to transform the life chances of bright, poor kids,"