Exam results
We've had 2 weeks of A level/AS level and then GCSE results. Again the results improve year upon year. BBC news have two different stories that paint an interesting picture about education:
one is that private school candidates are more likely to get an A at A level. This is 47.9% which compares to the national average of 24.1%
the other is that 64,000 children leave school with no qualifications because they have been in care which resulted in them being shifted around, moved to different foster carers and generally not encouraged in their studies.
Maybe the money pumped into private education would be better placed elsewhere? Maybe these are two stories that describe different ends of the same spectrum. It just means according to the lottery of birth, your fate is decided. Be born to wealthy parents and you can succeed, be born into a more dysfunctional family and you will fail. What a shame...
posted by Helsalata @ 7:41 am
9 comments
9 Comments:
how would you do that?
Is this another left-before-brain scenario?
`lottery before birth` is a fundimental aspect of the multi-social class sytem that we live in. Inequality is essential for not living in....
... Red Britain ffs!
I would do that by convincing the parents that the milllions of pounds spent on school fees could make a significant difference to the state system. Either that or say for every £ spent on your own child's education you had to spend some on someone else's. Sure, there'd be grumbling but what is more difficult than making a rich person spend money they don't want to?
But why?
That's like saying for every bus fare you buy, you should give a sympathy fare to a rival company.
Inequality is different to injustice. I was bought up in the state system, so was La so was my brother... Laura was accepted into St. Andrews university, and my brother is studying his last year for an advanced masters in further mathematics at Reading university!
I know what the problem is with the state school and it's anything but money. I consider myself a contributer to this problem, because it's apathetic lethargic undisciplined pupils. I was too lazy to study at any level and I didn't respect authority and I saw it all too common in my peers.
So it's very easy to say `oh what a terrible government` or `the advanced system should account for the deficit in education`, but money isn't the problem here.
The reason private schools perform better is because generally they are party to more disciplined upbringings and they respect the institution of the school. It's not the fact that they have the zilgian cymbols in their music rooms instead of the el-crappo brand employed by the state system.
I think it should be a greater injustice to make the priveleged students and sponsors account for the short comings in what is in all reality, a lower breed of academics
I have no problem with the state system, hence my children attend. I have a problem with a private system of schooling.
And why should it be "tough" for the children who no fault of their own wind up in the care system? If a child has problems but mummy and daddy are rich, they will receive out of hours tuition, access to horizon broadening opportunities (wall climbing, holidays abroad, state of the art equipment) and everything that money can buy in order for thier child to reach their full potential. To even get to where you are Ben, a child in care would have to be even more enterprising and focused. It isn't impossible but it is unlikely. In my opinion, that child has been failed because it hasn't had opportunity to realise it's potential. That's what parents are for and as the articles describe, the State isn't meant to be a(or makes a good) parent.
What does this have to do with the rich? Everything! They should put their confidence in an equal system, paying to iron out inadequacies, or if the problem lies in other areas, helping the school out physically. If they had a vested interest in it, you can be sure that the problems would be sorted out pretty darned quickly. Then no matter what the background, children could be on an equal footing for learning and succeed according to ability.
It's in my experience that under-achieving and less disciplined students are given mor opportunities than those who work hard.
This in't about money, it's about having a stable home life and disciplining children to work hard and not mess around.
Unless you're planning on paying teachers to go beyond their duty and parent their under achieving pupils, money isn't going to solve the problem of inequality in the grades people get.
The problem is exactly what Ben said - 'apathetic lethargic undisciplined pupils' - people who can't be bothered to work for their grades, which, surprise surprise, equals low grades.
'Be born to wealthy parents and you can succeed, be born into a more dysfunctional family and you will fail'
- is very untrue, I wasn't born into a wealthy or particularly functional family and I did okay. there are probably hundreds of exceptions to that maxim.
Obviously what needs sorted here is not the state school system but the care system.
We could debate these points until the cows come home. You describe your own experiences which are your own. I'm glad you feel you have triumphed against adversity but you were never deprived in the way that some kids are. I work with children/young people who have never had a birthday card, who have never had a bed time and who live in a place where beating the shit out of someone is justice. I realise that you and Ben have been through hard times but life is like that.
I believe in an "assets" system in the lives of children. The more assets that they have in their lives, however much adversity they endure, they are able to cope adequately. So if you live in a house, go to a church, have access to fruit and veg, have grandparents, go to Brownies, have a birthday party, read books, roller skate, have conversations with someone down the road and a zillion other things that people take for granted, these things help you to endure the horrible things that happen (like having an alcoholic parent, a messy divorce or the death of a sibling). Those things are not nice but with other things in place, you have the proper mental capacity to be able to process the horrible stuff. If you used to be a traveller and you don't talk to your extended family and you've never visited a library and your parents can't read and don't appreciate books, if you live on junk food, if there are no boundaries, if you call the police "pigs", if your brother is in prison, you are not on a good footing from the outset. School is then an alien place you go to which doesn't make sense where people try to get you to conform to alsorts of rules that you've never encountered previously.
Now luckily, rich people can seperate themselves from "that sort of person" because they have the money to do so. If they had no choice but to send their kids to the school that has that dysfunctional kid then they would make sure that that was taken care of, whether it was extra money for a different style of tuition or getting involved physically to ensure proper integration.
Remember, the more assets that kid has, the more likely it is to be able to cope. So if it learns to read, it might need to "learn" how to join a library, how to take care of books, how to accept responsibility.
These are all lessons you learned via your families.
Kids in care don't have families. It isn't their fault. Something should be done about it because they are being failed twice: by their parents and then the state. Just because this isn't your experience of the world doesn't mean it isn't so. Maybe money isn't the answer but I know that the lack of money is stunting kids in care at the very least. They deserve better.
What would you do?
I haven’t got a clue what to do, but it’s very helpful to read the thoughtful discussion above….. It’s all to easy to ignore the intractable and burry oneself in the tractable problems (At least that’s a fault of mine).
We may have an example here of typical “trade-off” conditions. At the one extreme we have the liaise-faire society where the rich get richer and accrue advantage upon advantage without control and at the other extreme the implementation of strong controls on the rich requiring the existence of an unhealthily strong government who would by default become the new autocratic rich. Hence, there is a conflict here that can only be resolved with a trade off: Given human nature, a certain amount of freedom for people to order their own lives will entail that some will fall by the way side. I am not saying that we simply acquiesce and just say of the poor “That’s life”. The plight of the poor must be constantly made public and they need advocates in strategic places, and this has a dampening effect on the swing toward ruthless liaise-faire.
Marx, I have always felt, successfully critiqued the liaise-faire society, but never really came up with a prescription for the fair society – I was never convinced by remedial notions such as: “revolution redistributing the means of production”, “removal of interest conflicts”, “the dictatorship of the proletariat” etc. Moreover, Marxism had a very low view of personal responsibility and no view at all on the subject of human nature.
Why gee shucks, Tim - you said I was going to in that last paragraph!
(other than I'd have started it with:)
`Nuts to it, let's all throw our chastity bands on and roll on by Minipeace for the two minute hate`
Post a Comment
<< Home