What an extraordinary coincidence that the best person to be on the anti-sleaze watchdog just happened to be an old chum of Johnsons from his Bullingdon Club days.
However, I remember some Corbyn fans on here defending McDonnell employing Corbyn's son in a taxpayer-funded role. By an astonishing coincidence, the son of his best bud was the best candidate for the job.
(Hint, he wasn't.)
If we want to stop people hiring friends, family and chums to roles, especially to taxpayer-funded roles, then it needs to apply equally to all.
I don't think I have ever defended cronyism in the Labour Party either.
The nepotism and Chumocracy does show how illusory "taking back control" was.
Jobs for the sons and daughters of friends is as old as jobs themselves. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't; sometimes it's not the best way of hiring someone but sometimes it can work. Rather depends on how how up the chain the job is.
That's the Indy. And there seems to be not a shred of actual evidence of malpractice.
Has anyone provided any evidence that Johnson had a corrupt role in the process, or how the process worked such that Johnson could manipulate it? Or that the member appointed is unfit to be on the Committee or is corrupt?
Or is this just Hoof-in-Mouth Rayner howling at the moon because it is Tuesday and she still does not have anything to say?
"You were in a student club with him 35 years ago" is some way beyond farfetched.
The only possible chink I can see is if the PM is supplied with say 50 names, from which he then gets to choose who he wants, and that would still require a lot more evidence that we have.
It's quite a dangerous argument to make because it shrinks the pool of acceptable candidates - 'No, you went to the same school when you were six!" - and undermines the expectation of personal integrity.
At this level it looks bad, though. However, I agree that we've not seen evidence that, for example, Johnson looked at the shortlist and said 'He's the one. Know him. Good chap' or similar. Nor have we seen any suggestion, AFAIK, that a selection committee produced three names in order of preference, and the Good Chap was third.
I think what we may get here at some time is similar to what happened to selection of Bishops, where the process was that the PM got 2 names and a theoretical convention that they could choose either - which has only been used once in 100-200 appointments.
That has now been replaced with the second name being a "reserve" if eg the first one dies.
Quite concerning, though, is the dire quality of opposition a reliance on painting this stuff in poster paints indicates.
Despite your archaeology you haven’t really found a good reason why Boris should be picking an old school friend to head the Boris-monitoring committee, have you?
I don't need one.
I was pointing out that this particular outrage bus is fuelled by BS and hot air.
Yes. What we need is a tape with Johnson saying, "Ah, Fergie! He was in the old Bullers with me. Sound as a pound. Hired."
Short of that, as Charles would stress, nothing to see and unfair to insinuate.
And the Lord that drew up the shortlist was enabled by David Cameron, who was in the same dissolute dining club.
It's almost like a self replicating oligarchy.
Gets my goat it really does. Private schools have to go. It's the only way imo.
Cutting the head off a hydra, mate. Everywhere has oligarchies, nowhere else has public schools (except in the sense of actually public actual schools). If you strike them down, they will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.
I think that is making the perfect the enemy of the good. Elitism can be reduced but not eradicated. In fact you shouldn't even try to eradicate it. That leads to totalitarianism and - yes - elites. Worse ones. I'm just thinking about what's realistic in England 2021. This could be possible one day. But not this day, I'm fully aware of that. It's electoral poison. People who can't afford this privilege still support it. Until this changes, no chance of reform, I'll be talking to the hand.
I can promise you there's also people who can and do afford it who'd be secretly not wholly disgruntled if the option were denied them, and they had to spend the money on horses and yachts instead, dammit.
For sure. It's kind of a tax cut for the rich. In fact that's how I'd sell it in the drawing rooms and boardrooms of England.
They are still not going to send their kids to the average or below average local comp.
They will make sure they live in the most expensive postcodes and thus the locals schools their kids attend will still be those mainly attended by the offspring of the wealthy.
So you would have to ban expensive detached houses too and make everyone live in a 2 bed semi or council flat
That's just the old "if we can't totally deal with an issue let's not deal with it at all" shtick.
No - it's about not letting the state decide everything and accepting that individuals and indeed parents have the right to make choices - and that those choices have consequences which no amount of state engineering can, or should negate.
The whole rationale of the state is to prevent people's choices from harming other people. Otherwise we wouldn't need it, we could all just do whatever we want. I want the state to do its best to create a level playing field so that (a) everyone gets a fair shot in life and (b) the best people end up in top positions. It should be fairly evident that that's not happening right now, and private schools play a big part in that failure.
The best instrument we had for getting people from average or below average income backgrounds into top positions was of course the grammar schools.
Labour of course could not have that so abolished most of them, for socialists equality of outcome is more important than equality of opportunity
You keep saying this, despite the evidence that grammar schools get captured by the middle class via tutoring and prep schools. If grammar schools were these incredible engines of social mobility, then Kent (where they still exist) would be a classless society. Anyone who has spent more than a few minutes in Kent will know that the opposite is the case. Personally I am all for equality of opportunity - equality of outcome is impossible in education because some people are just smarter than others. The way to get equality of opportunity is to fund all schools better, rigorously enforce standards, pay teachers better to get good teachers to stay in the profession, and to make sure there are no kids too hungry to learn.
Private schools are a symptom not a cause. Take them away and parents will find a zillion ways to give their children a "better" start in life - for a start they will have £40k after tax to play with to do so.
So you've got to go back to the root cause and then you are either build a Communist state or become like Finland, which would mean a root and branch transformation of our schooling - and university - system.
Problem is, as the man said, I wouldn't have started from here. Today we have bog standard comprehensives, Eton, Winchester and Oxbridge. All that would need to be reformed to get to "free" education.
I imagine that the extra percentage of GDP to be spent plus the requirement for all teachers to have a masters degree might also cause some problems, politically, as an example.
We know that wealthy people think a lot of money should be spent on educating children, from revealed preference. They just don't want other people's kids to have that kind of money spent on them. You say that spending more on schools would cause political problems. Why is that? The problem we have is that the constituency for spending more money on schools is too small, because many of those who feel most passionately about education have taken matters into their own hands. In many cases they have become opponents of funding state schools more generously in the process.
Singapore spends far less than we do as a percentage of its gdp but is top of the PISA rankings now
That's incorrect. According to the World Bank, Singapore spent 21.6% of its GDP per capita on each secondary school pupil in the most recent year for which data are available (2017) while the UK spent 21.2% (2016). Since Singapore's GDP per capita is approximately 50% higher than ours, this means that they spent about 50% more per pupil than we did. Which I suppose could account for their higher PISA score. Incidentally, UK spending has gone down from a peak of 31.2% of per capita GDP in 2010, thanks to the Tories.
Are those stats right?
Roughly speaking Uk government spending is about 50% of GDP, so if we are spending 20% of gdp we are spending 40% of the government budget. Yes there will be extra around the edges for private sector etc but that analysis doesn’t pass the sniff test
Please read what I wrote again Charles old bean, you have completely misunderstood it. Must try harder!
You said the UK spent 21% of GDP per capita on education. I challenged that figure.
Perhaps you can provide your workings?
No I didn't. I said that spending per secondary pupil was 21% of GDP per capita. Eg if GDP per capita were £50k spending per pupil would be £10.5k. I have no workings to share with you as I took the number directly from the World Bank's World Development Indicators database, which is freely available online if you want to look it up.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
Collapsing fertility, declining religious faith, stagnant middle class wages and a dominant elite culture of progressivism seem to be the causes of US decline in his view
Declining religious faith would do a lot of America a lot of good, and I write that as a Christian.
It is a common feature in the world that areas with the lowest levels of religious faith, eg the Far East and much of Europe also have the lowest fertility and therefore inevitably will see decline once that falls below population replacement level. That will in turn feed into declining economic growth ultimately.
Areas which have the strongest levels of religious belief still such as Africa are also areas with the strongest population growth globally and the highest fertility rate.
That must make Bozo one of the most devout people in the country.
Interesting to see the UK Prime Minister treating the Scottish First Minister as though she were the Mayor of Manchester or the leader of Surrey County Council.
I'm not sure it's helpful but no doubt it plays well in some circles.
I don't see the disadvantage. It won't change many minds one way or another in Scotland I would imagine. And it winds up NS.
There has been a strong tendency in the UK government under both Cameron and May to pussy foot around Sturgeon and try to give her her way where possible in the slightly bizarre thought that this would keep her quiet. Under Boris that has changed. She is not invited to COP26 even although it is in Glasgow. He is not interested in giving her a photoshot with him at Bute House. She wanted to have a "greenport" instead of a freeport in Scotland. She was told to get lost. There is more UK government advertising on local Scottish radio. His response to a demand for a further referendum has so far been blunt.
Boris has worked out that playing nice with Nicola is playing on her terms. He isn't minded to.
Nevertheless, she was elected in Scotland. He wasn't.
He was elected in the United Kingdom - which Scotland voted to remain part of.
Whilst that is true, telling Scotland that they need to suck it up isn't a good way to promote the union. The challenge for Shagger is that he is trying to build a centralised control system where his magnificence will permeate into all things.
Like Thatcher before him, he can't stand the idea that in places people actively vote for the other option. So instead of accepting that the democratic will is different in places, like Thatcher he wants to abolish democracy. London votes against me? Scrap the GLC! Scotland votes against me, scrap devolution!
It is Hailsham's Elective Dictatorship, the tyranny of the masses.
That punchline works for anyone moaning about any government policy they don't like. Lockdowns were elective dictatorship - a majority are in favour of removing what would be unargued human rights so it's imposed on 100% of people. But that's not a line of argument which tends to make many converts.
To a point - and that is certainly what Mr Hogg was warning about. My specific point is about regions and nations where the vote is sharply against the government. Whilst the government is duly elected, in the region / nation in question they do not agree and have voted accordingly.
We either have elected and empowered regions and nations where Westminster respects their mandate and the will of the people, or we do not.
Hailshsm had many names during his life. At this point he was not “Mr Hogg”.
His name was Mr Quintin Hogg. The absurd titles aside his name was still Quintin Hogg.
Collapsing fertility, declining religious faith, stagnant middle class wages and a dominant elite culture of progressivism seem to be the causes of US decline in his view
Declining religious faith would do a lot of America a lot of good, and I write that as a Christian.
It is a common feature in the world that areas with the lowest levels of religious faith, eg the Far East and much of Europe also have the lowest fertility and therefore inevitably will see decline once that falls below population replacement level. That will in turn feed into declining economic growth ultimately.
Areas which have the strongest levels of religious belief still such as Africa are also areas with the strongest population growth globally and the highest fertility rate.
That must make Bozo one of the most devout people in the country.
The wealthy are the only people able to afford large families these days.
On private schools, this issue only seems to exist to a problematic extent in Britain. I think part of the fault is our binary approach to public and private sector.
Private schools are hugely expensive on the whole and only becoming more so. As a result they become ever more exclusive reserves of the upper middle classes and the gap between their outcomes and those of most other schools gets larger. There is pitifully little cross pollination, no intermediate or mixed models.
Where are the easyschools, or the state schools with privately funded sixth forms, or the state-private joint ventures? How about means tested school fees, or school fees regulated by government, as happens in telecoms and energy markets? The most we ever seem to manage is business sponsorships of the occasional academy school. I’m not saying these would all work (and we all remember the excesses of PFI), but there is little or no experimentation. Two systems living an almost mutually exclusive existence.
Isn't this entirely because state funding is all or nothing? I don't think there is any mechanism for places at private schools to be state funded, or for state funded schools to charge for any places.
I think the more I think about this issue, the less I care about it. We have this strange idea that money and power are all that matters. It really doesn't. I'm fairly sure I would be quite capable of doing some review of standards in public life, or whatever. I'd guess the gig probably pays four times what I earn now, plus expenses. I'm not even slightly bothered it's gone to some toff whose mates with Bozo. If he'd rung me up and offered me it, I'd have turned it down.
I earn enough to live on. I enjoy what I do. I'm pretty good at what I do. I work with a decent bunch of lads. What else exactly might I want?
At the end of the day, we can shuffle the pile however we like - only one person gers to be prime minister at a time. Complaining that modern prime ministers are drawn from a fairly small group of people (at least we aren't as bad as US presidents) is pretty pointless - even if we legislated to bar the public schooled from the office, we'd only be benifiting the one comprehensive educated bloke who got the job out of the maybe 40million comprehensively educated people in the county.
We might do better to try and make the lot of all those comprehensively educated types that but better - ideally by reducing the amount of their money which is taken from them as tax and (mostly) wasted, and by dispensing with about half the stupid rules and regulations imposed on them over the last 50 years.
Yeah people like us should know our place right? Leave the big jobs for our betters.
You're getting sucked into arguing with right wing people on the internet again. 🙂
I know, I know. I thought you might need a wingman, mate. Time for my scratcher now, anyway.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Given you have no control over systems overseas (in the thought experiment where you, terrifyingly, have control on this island) how much relative educational & economic performance are you willing to sacrifice for more egalitarianism? Or is it a panacea and closing the best schools will also improve the overall average?
It's not levelling down or up. It's levelling. But probably you'd see a net uplift since there'd be more potential realized.
Your idea won't work it will makes things worse it has been explained to you exactly why several times but you handwave it away and say that won't happen even though it already does.
1) The very rich will send their kids to private schools abroad 2) The medium rich will buy up property surrounding good schools and push out the poor who currently might have a chance to live there 3) The slightly rich will pay for additional tutoring 4) The poor will end up in the failing schools as all the good school areas have now been priced beyond their means
Left wing ideology always fails simple as that because its an ideology of spite and envy that cares more about hurting those you see in the lead than helping those that are left behind.
Points 1 to 3 already happen so don't even bother replying if your only answer is "Oh that won't happen because reasons"
And when all these things come to pass you will then move onto your next bugbear.....possibly its unfair parents use money to buy books for their kids and gives them an unfair advantage lets make them all be restricted to public libraries....oh rich people are buying internet access for their kids and good pc's and failing families can't afford them we should ban that too
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Unless, of course, they go to an actual comp as my two did. You see, round here it is the comp or private. There is no choice of State schools. So we have middle classes and working classes together in the same classrooms. Which is what a comp is meant to be. It is very, very good. For both.
Yes, I benefited greatly from being at Comprehensive schools. The social mix there is a much better preparation for life.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
Yes that's a big point that should be in the mix. The more the 'powers that be' are personally invested in something the more they'll be motivated to make it better.
Exactly. It is that opting out from looking after the broader population that drove the sense of alienation behind Brexit.
HYUFD shows why the Tories will fail on the levelling up agenda. They don't really believe in it.
We don't believe in the levelling down agenda of high tax and no parental choice no.
That is why we are Tories after all.
It was lost national sovereignty and uncontrolled immigration that drove Brexit
But you voted to Remain like the socialist you truly are!
Brexit was nothing to do with socialism or capitalism
A lot of people seem to genuinely prefer a school system based on ability to afford a house in a good catchment area compared to one based on aptitude/intelligence/ability, etc.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
Yes that's a big point that should be in the mix. The more the 'powers that be' are personally invested in something the more they'll be motivated to make it better.
Exactly. It is that opting out from looking after the broader population that drove the sense of alienation behind Brexit.
HYUFD shows why the Tories will fail on the levelling up agenda. They don't really believe in it.
We don't believe in the levelling down agenda of high tax and no parental choice no.
That is why we are Tories after all.
It was lost national sovereignty and uncontrolled immigration that drove Brexit
You voted Remain. You wanted lost sovereignty and uncontrolled immigration. You're lucky that Bozo hasn't expelled you from the party with that attitude.
Collapsing fertility, declining religious faith, stagnant middle class wages and a dominant elite culture of progressivism seem to be the causes of US decline in his view
Declining religious faith would do a lot of America a lot of good, and I write that as a Christian.
It is a common feature in the world that areas with the lowest levels of religious faith, eg the Far East and much of Europe also have the lowest fertility and therefore inevitably will see decline once that falls below population replacement level. That will in turn feed into declining economic growth ultimately.
Areas which have the strongest levels of religious belief still such as Africa are also areas with the strongest population growth globally and the highest fertility rate.
Not universally true though, Iran has had a major drop in fertility rate, from what used to be one of the world's highest. Much more than religion fertility correlates to secondary and tertiary education of females, though of course there is some confounding. Religious communities often oppose female education.
I do think that 16 and 17 year olds are old enough to decide themselves, and if lots of them do that may help in the fight COVID. but this artical is not a report on the government changing policy, its seems more like speculation based on what a limited number of people have hinted at.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Unless, of course, they go to an actual comp as my two did. You see, round here it is the comp or private. There is no choice of State schools. So we have middle classes and working classes together in the same classrooms. Which is what a comp is meant to be. It is very, very good. For both.
Yes, I benefited greatly from being at Comprehensive schools. The social mix there is a much better preparation for life.
I bet you werent at a failing school though were you. There are good comprehensives and bad ones.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Very well put. I find it bewildering that anyone would object to this argument, although I guess the privileged will always seek to maintain their privilege.
If you find it bewildering, perhaps you should have got a better education. (runs for cover)
Try not to trip over your silver spoon while you're running, old chap.
LOL. I rather think you're off aim there. I prescribe attendance at a CCF course.
But your comments hint that it's not outcomes you are interested in, but class hatred.
Study the mote in your own eye. There is FAR more contempt from the upper pole of the English apartheid system towards the lower pole than there is in the other direction. It's built in to the culture. Neither knows what life is like at the other pole, but the uppers think they do. Which isn't to say they dwell on it much, but they think they know one or two things. (It's called "confidence".) A plate of baked beans on a tray in front of the television, stuff like that. Most of the lowers don't even begin to think they know anything about what it's like on the other side. If you've no experience of boarding school, for example, and nor have any of your family members, you simply won't appreciate the connotations of a term such as "bedwetter". (Edit: well OK, perhaps you've been to borstal...)
No surprise that the German Nazis greatly admired the English elite private boarding schools and many friendly exchange programs were arranged with the "Napola" schools.
As for the CCF? Pah! Where are your duelling scars? Talk about doing things halfway!
I’ve never seen any contempt for people from the “lower pole” among those from the “upper pole” that I know.
The sneering tends to come from the middle classes/metropolitan set who have decided that they are the arbiters of all that is right and good in the world
Interesting to see the UK Prime Minister treating the Scottish First Minister as though she were the Mayor of Manchester or the leader of Surrey County Council.
I'm not sure it's helpful but no doubt it plays well in some circles.
I don't see the disadvantage. It won't change many minds one way or another in Scotland I would imagine. And it winds up NS.
There has been a strong tendency in the UK government under both Cameron and May to pussy foot around Sturgeon and try to give her her way where possible in the slightly bizarre thought that this would keep her quiet. Under Boris that has changed. She is not invited to COP26 even although it is in Glasgow. He is not interested in giving her a photoshot with him at Bute House. She wanted to have a "greenport" instead of a freeport in Scotland. She was told to get lost. There is more UK government advertising on local Scottish radio. His response to a demand for a further referendum has so far been blunt.
Boris has worked out that playing nice with Nicola is playing on her terms. He isn't minded to.
Nevertheless, she was elected in Scotland. He wasn't.
He was elected in the United Kingdom - which Scotland voted to remain part of.
Whilst that is true, telling Scotland that they need to suck it up isn't a good way to promote the union. The challenge for Shagger is that he is trying to build a centralised control system where his magnificence will permeate into all things.
Like Thatcher before him, he can't stand the idea that in places people actively vote for the other option. So instead of accepting that the democratic will is different in places, like Thatcher he wants to abolish democracy. London votes against me? Scrap the GLC! Scotland votes against me, scrap devolution!
It is Hailsham's Elective Dictatorship, the tyranny of the masses.
That punchline works for anyone moaning about any government policy they don't like. Lockdowns were elective dictatorship - a majority are in favour of removing what would be unargued human rights so it's imposed on 100% of people. But that's not a line of argument which tends to make many converts.
To a point - and that is certainly what Mr Hogg was warning about. My specific point is about regions and nations where the vote is sharply against the government. Whilst the government is duly elected, in the region / nation in question they do not agree and have voted accordingly.
We either have elected and empowered regions and nations where Westminster respects their mandate and the will of the people, or we do not.
Hailshsm had many names during his life. At this point he was not “Mr Hogg”.
His name was Mr Quintin Hogg. The absurd titles aside his name was still Quintin Hogg.
I’m not sure insisting that someone has to be known by their birth name despite their own wishes is a very good attitude to have.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
Yes that's a big point that should be in the mix. The more the 'powers that be' are personally invested in something the more they'll be motivated to make it better.
Exactly. It is that opting out from looking after the broader population that drove the sense of alienation behind Brexit.
HYUFD shows why the Tories will fail on the levelling up agenda. They don't really believe in it.
We don't believe in the levelling down agenda of high tax and no parental choice no.
That is why we are Tories after all.
It was lost national sovereignty and uncontrolled immigration that drove Brexit
You voted Remain. You wanted lost sovereignty and uncontrolled immigration. You're lucky that Bozo hasn't expelled you from the party with that attitude.
I would have voted Leave had the Euro been required. I also thought we should have used the transition controls Blair refused.
However I am happy with the points system Boris has introduced
A lot of people seem to genuinely prefer a school system based on ability to afford a house in a good catchment area compared to one based on aptitude/intelligence/ability, etc.
Except that Grammar school selection is very much not a level playing field (hence the low numbers on FSM) and almost always in the wealthier part of town.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Unless, of course, they go to an actual comp as my two did. You see, round here it is the comp or private. There is no choice of State schools. So we have middle classes and working classes together in the same classrooms. Which is what a comp is meant to be. It is very, very good. For both.
Nope, it is sanctimonious rubbish.
Was it an inadequate or requires improvement comp? Because that is what most of the poor are faced with as their only choice in much of the country.
At least with universal selection everyone had the opportunity of attending a grammar whether in a leafy suburb, fading seaside town or inner city
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
Yes that's a big point that should be in the mix. The more the 'powers that be' are personally invested in something the more they'll be motivated to make it better.
Exactly. It is that opting out from looking after the broader population that drove the sense of alienation behind Brexit.
HYUFD shows why the Tories will fail on the levelling up agenda. They don't really believe in it.
We don't believe in the levelling down agenda of high tax and no parental choice no.
That is why we are Tories after all.
It was lost national sovereignty and uncontrolled immigration that drove Brexit
But you voted to Remain like the socialist you truly are!
Brexit was nothing to do with socialism or capitalism
Nonsense. Socialists voted for Brexit to escape the Capitalist hegemony.
A lot of people seem to genuinely prefer a school system based on ability to afford a house in a good catchment area compared to one based on aptitude/intelligence/ability, etc.
Except that Grammar school selection is very much not a level playing field (hence the low numbers on FSM) and almost always in the wealthier part of town.
Only because Labour started the process of abolishing them so the handful that are left tend to be in Tory local authority areas which tend to be wealthier than average
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
A lot of people seem to genuinely prefer a school system based on ability to afford a house in a good catchment area compared to one based on aptitude/intelligence/ability, etc.
Toby Young would probably call this Luxury Virtue Signalling (if I have the term right). It seems to be his latest finding - a PhD sociology student has come up with it.
In this case signalling your virtue by sending kids to state school, but also signalling luxury and wealth by using the state school no one more 'middling' can afford to get near because of leafy catchment.
Hopefully I have understood the concept. Toby Y was on about it being used by academics who could work from home imploring everyone else to do the same for the good of community covid, knowing many people could not because they didn't have high status uni job. Thereby indirectly signalling to the other monkeys that they had a top job they passed exams to get.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
Yes that's a big point that should be in the mix. The more the 'powers that be' are personally invested in something the more they'll be motivated to make it better.
Exactly. It is that opting out from looking after the broader population that drove the sense of alienation behind Brexit.
HYUFD shows why the Tories will fail on the levelling up agenda. They don't really believe in it.
We don't believe in the levelling down agenda of high tax and no parental choice no.
That is why we are Tories after all.
It was lost national sovereignty and uncontrolled immigration that drove Brexit
But you voted to Remain like the socialist you truly are!
Brexit was nothing to do with socialism or capitalism
A lot of people seem to genuinely prefer a school system based on ability to afford a house in a good catchment area compared to one based on aptitude/intelligence/ability, etc.
Except that Grammar school selection is very much not a level playing field (hence the low numbers on FSM) and almost always in the wealthier part of town.
Sorry but I suspect there is a correlation between kids who need FSM and kids with parents that frankly see no point in education and have chaotic home lives. I wouldn't expect the number of kids therefore that get into grammar schools to be representative of those on fsm vs those not.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
Yes that's a big point that should be in the mix. The more the 'powers that be' are personally invested in something the more they'll be motivated to make it better.
Exactly. It is that opting out from looking after the broader population that drove the sense of alienation behind Brexit.
HYUFD shows why the Tories will fail on the levelling up agenda. They don't really believe in it.
We don't believe in the levelling down agenda of high tax and no parental choice no.
That is why we are Tories after all.
It was lost national sovereignty and uncontrolled immigration that drove Brexit
But you voted to Remain like the socialist you truly are!
Brexit was nothing to do with socialism or capitalism
Nonsense. Socialists voted for Brexit to escape the Capitalist hegemony.
Capitalists voted for Brexit to escape EU regulation, Socialists to escape the single market and EU corporatism
On private schools, this issue only seems to exist to a problematic extent in Britain. I think part of the fault is our binary approach to public and private sector.
Private schools are hugely expensive on the whole and only becoming more so. As a result they become ever more exclusive reserves of the upper middle classes and the gap between their outcomes and those of most other schools gets larger. There is pitifully little cross pollination, no intermediate or mixed models.
Where are the easyschools, or the state schools with privately funded sixth forms, or the state-private joint ventures? How about means tested school fees, or school fees regulated by government, as happens in telecoms and energy markets? The most we ever seem to manage is business sponsorships of the occasional academy school. I’m not saying these would all work (and we all remember the excesses of PFI), but there is little or no experimentation. Two systems living an almost mutually exclusive existence.
Isn't this entirely because state funding is all or nothing? I don't think there is any mechanism for places at private schools to be state funded, or for state funded schools to charge for any places.
I think the more I think about this issue, the less I care about it. We have this strange idea that money and power are all that matters. It really doesn't. I'm fairly sure I would be quite capable of doing some review of standards in public life, or whatever. I'd guess the gig probably pays four times what I earn now, plus expenses. I'm not even slightly bothered it's gone to some toff whose mates with Bozo. If he'd rung me up and offered me it, I'd have turned it down.
I earn enough to live on. I enjoy what I do. I'm pretty good at what I do. I work with a decent bunch of lads. What else exactly might I want?
At the end of the day, we can shuffle the pile however we like - only one person gers to be prime minister at a time. Complaining that modern prime ministers are drawn from a fairly small group of people (at least we aren't as bad as US presidents) is pretty pointless - even if we legislated to bar the public schooled from the office, we'd only be benifiting the one comprehensive educated bloke who got the job out of the maybe 40million comprehensively educated people in the county.
We might do better to try and make the lot of all those comprehensively educated types that but better - ideally by reducing the amount of their money which is taken from them as tax and (mostly) wasted, and by dispensing with about half the stupid rules and regulations imposed on them over the last 50 years.
Yeah people like us should know our place right? Leave the big jobs for our betters.
I think the issue is that there is a disproportionate number of public school educated MPs. That could reflect interests or skills or contacts. But it’s better to seek to encourage the skills and interests that make people good MPs than to whine that there are lots of public school and Oxbridge educated PMs
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Unless, of course, they go to an actual comp as my two did. You see, round here it is the comp or private. There is no choice of State schools. So we have middle classes and working classes together in the same classrooms. Which is what a comp is meant to be. It is very, very good. For both.
Yes, I benefited greatly from being at Comprehensive schools. The social mix there is a much better preparation for life.
I bet you werent at a failing school though were you. There are good comprehensives and bad ones.
The Comprehensives* that I went to were former Secondary Moderns, and my own sons primary school covered a large council estate in Oadby, and was in special measures for a couple of years during his time there.
*I went to public (ie state) schools in America for 4 years too.
A lot of people seem to genuinely prefer a school system based on ability to afford a house in a good catchment area compared to one based on aptitude/intelligence/ability, etc.
Except that Grammar school selection is very much not a level playing field (hence the low numbers on FSM) and almost always in the wealthier part of town.
Are you really saying you would expect a similar number on FSM in Grammar Schools and Secondary Moderns?
What it means of course is that those Secondary Moderns that do still exist have a much higher funding per pupil than the Grammar schools due to the effects of Pupil Premium.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
London centric view...you had a choice of schools probably due to the density of london. For a lot of the country your choice of comprehensive to send your kids to amounts to a list of 1
I do think that 16 and 17 year olds are old enough to decide themselves, and if lots of them do that may help in the fight COVID. but this artical is not a report on the government changing policy, its seems more like speculation based on what a limited number of people have hinted at.
On private schools, this issue only seems to exist to a problematic extent in Britain. I think part of the fault is our binary approach to public and private sector.
Private schools are hugely expensive on the whole and only becoming more so. As a result they become ever more exclusive reserves of the upper middle classes and the gap between their outcomes and those of most other schools gets larger. There is pitifully little cross pollination, no intermediate or mixed models.
Where are the easyschools, or the state schools with privately funded sixth forms, or the state-private joint ventures? How about means tested school fees, or school fees regulated by government, as happens in telecoms and energy markets? The most we ever seem to manage is business sponsorships of the occasional academy school. I’m not saying these would all work (and we all remember the excesses of PFI), but there is little or no experimentation. Two systems living an almost mutually exclusive existence.
Isn't this entirely because state funding is all or nothing? I don't think there is any mechanism for places at private schools to be state funded, or for state funded schools to charge for any places.
I think the more I think about this issue, the less I care about it. We have this strange idea that money and power are all that matters. It really doesn't. I'm fairly sure I would be quite capable of doing some review of standards in public life, or whatever. I'd guess the gig probably pays four times what I earn now, plus expenses. I'm not even slightly bothered it's gone to some toff whose mates with Bozo. If he'd rung me up and offered me it, I'd have turned it down.
I earn enough to live on. I enjoy what I do. I'm pretty good at what I do. I work with a decent bunch of lads. What else exactly might I want?
At the end of the day, we can shuffle the pile however we like - only one person gers to be prime minister at a time. Complaining that modern prime ministers are drawn from a fairly small group of people (at least we aren't as bad as US presidents) is pretty pointless - even if we legislated to bar the public schooled from the office, we'd only be benifiting the one comprehensive educated bloke who got the job out of the maybe 40million comprehensively educated people in the county.
We might do better to try and make the lot of all those comprehensively educated types that but better - ideally by reducing the amount of their money which is taken from them as tax and (mostly) wasted, and by dispensing with about half the stupid rules and regulations imposed on them over the last 50 years.
Yeah people like us should know our place right? Leave the big jobs for our betters.
I think the issue is that there is a disproportionate number of public school educated MPs. That could reflect interests or skills or contacts. But it’s better to seek to encourage the skills and interests that make people good MPs than to whine that there are lots of public school and Oxbridge educated PMs
I don't mind the MPs, they've faced an electorate and won a fair contest. It's the endless jobs for the boys, the cushy sinecures for members of the Bullingdon Club, paid for by my taxes, that I object to. (yeah it's another of those irregular verbs, I object to, you whine etc).
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
From 1964 to 1997 we did not have a single private school educated PM, they were all grammar school educated. Since 1997 most of our PMs have been educated privately, May is our only PM to have been to a comp and that was a grammar when she joined.
The law, journalism, the city, medicine etc are also dominated by the privately educated, so great job comprehensive schools are doing in getting their products to the top!
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
London centric view...you had a choice of schools probably due to the density of london. For a lot of the country your choice of comprehensive to send your kids to amounts to a list of 1
Yeah I grew up in a small town with one comprehensive school and I attended it.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
From 1964 to 1997 we did not have a single private school educated PM, they were all grammar school educated. Since 1997 most of our PMs have been educated privately, May is our only PM to have been to a comp and that was a grammar when she joined.
The law, journalism, the city, medicine etc are also dominated by the privately educated, so great job comprehensive schools are doing in getting their products to the top!
It's not our fault there's a self-perpetuating clique who won't let us sit at the top table in these professions.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
London centric view...you had a choice of schools probably due to the density of london. For a lot of the country your choice of comprehensive to send your kids to amounts to a list of 1
Yeah I grew up in a small town with one comprehensive school and I attended it.
And if had been one of those really dire schools like mine was? Because that is what is going to happen if you abolish public schools, that 7% will have parents looking to purchase the property in the area's of good schools pushing those that rent outwards to make do with what is left
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
From 1964 to 1997 we did not have a single private school educated PM, they were all grammar school educated. Since 1997 most of our PMs have been educated privately, May is our only PM to have been to a comp and that was a grammar when she joined.
The law, journalism, the city, medicine etc are also dominated by the privately educated, so great job comprehensive schools are doing in getting their products to the top!
And they are dominated by white men, so pretty poor show by the brown chaps and the women.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
From 1964 to 1997 we did not have a single private school educated PM, they were all grammar school educated. Since 1997 most of our PMs have been educated privately, May is our only PM to have been to a comp and that was a grammar when she joined.
The law, journalism, the city, medicine etc are also dominated by the privately educated, so great job comprehensive schools are doing in getting their products to the top!
It's not our fault there's a self-perpetuating clique who won't let us sit at the top table in these professions.
The selection committee at my Medical School has actively altered its selection methods to favour those from State schools. This is based on performance in course assessments, where we find the students from state schools outperform those from private schools when the latter are no longer spoon fed.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
From 1964 to 1997 we did not have a single private school educated PM, they were all grammar school educated. Since 1997 most of our PMs have been educated privately, May is our only PM to have been to a comp and that was a grammar when she joined.
The law, journalism, the city, medicine etc are also dominated by the privately educated, so great job comprehensive schools are doing in getting their products to the top!
And they are dominated by white men, so pretty poor show by the brown chaps and the women.
Not medicine, where I as a state educated white male am in quite under represented demographic!
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
From 1964 to 1997 we did not have a single private school educated PM, they were all grammar school educated. Since 1997 most of our PMs have been educated privately, May is our only PM to have been to a comp and that was a grammar when she joined.
The law, journalism, the city, medicine etc are also dominated by the privately educated, so great job comprehensive schools are doing in getting their products to the top!
And they are dominated by white men, so pretty poor show by the brown chaps and the women.
There has been an increase in the proportion of black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) lawyers working in law firms, now one in five lawyers. This is up 7%, from 14% in 2014 to 21% in 2017. In 2015, 11% of the UK workforce were BAME.2
so 21% of lawyers are bame but only 11% of the workforce....perhaps we should have positive discrimination in favour of employing more white men instead?
Collapsing fertility, declining religious faith, stagnant middle class wages and a dominant elite culture of progressivism seem to be the causes of US decline in his view
Declining religious faith would do a lot of America a lot of good, and I write that as a Christian.
It is a common feature in the world that areas with the lowest levels of religious faith, eg the Far East and much of Europe also have the lowest fertility and therefore inevitably will see decline once that falls below population replacement level. That will in turn feed into declining economic growth ultimately.
Areas which have the strongest levels of religious belief still such as Africa are also areas with the strongest population growth globally and the highest fertility rate.
That must make Bozo one of the most devout people in the country.
The wealthy are the only people able to afford large families these days.
well lets try doctors too? Can we spot the area where the bands are the bottom row are bigger....oh right only for black consultants which are at 3% vs 4% of population
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
From 1964 to 1997 we did not have a single private school educated PM, they were all grammar school educated. Since 1997 most of our PMs have been educated privately, May is our only PM to have been to a comp and that was a grammar when she joined.
The law, journalism, the city, medicine etc are also dominated by the privately educated, so great job comprehensive schools are doing in getting their products to the top!
And they are dominated by white men, so pretty poor show by the brown chaps and the women.
Not medicine, where I as a state educated white male am in quite under represented demographic!
Having looked at the competition I think the GB men's 4x100 relay team are a good shout for the gold medal. If there's no jumping of guns or baton drops they have the ability to win. If Zharnel Hughes is on the anchor leg he will have a standing start which removes his biggest weakness. Only the Americans have got the same depth in their team to field 4 men with competitive times.
What an extraordinary coincidence that the best person to be on the anti-sleaze watchdog just happened to be an old chum of Johnsons from his Bullingdon Club days.
However, I remember some Corbyn fans on here defending McDonnell employing Corbyn's son in a taxpayer-funded role. By an astonishing coincidence, the son of his best bud was the best candidate for the job.
(Hint, he wasn't.)
If we want to stop people hiring friends, family and chums to roles, especially to taxpayer-funded roles, then it needs to apply equally to all.
I don't think I have ever defended cronyism in the Labour Party either.
The nepotism and Chumocracy does show how illusory "taking back control" was.
Jobs for the sons and daughters of friends is as old as jobs themselves. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't; sometimes it's not the best way of hiring someone but sometimes it can work. Rather depends on how how up the chain the job is.
That's the Indy. And there seems to be not a shred of actual evidence of malpractice.
Has anyone provided any evidence that Johnson had a corrupt role in the process, or how the process worked such that Johnson could manipulate it? Or that the member appointed is unfit to be on the Committee or is corrupt?
Or is this just Hoof-in-Mouth Rayner howling at the moon because it is Tuesday and she still does not have anything to say?
"You were in a student club with him 35 years ago" is some way beyond farfetched.
The only possible chink I can see is if the PM is supplied with say 50 names, from which he then gets to choose who he wants, and that would still require a lot more evidence that we have.
It's quite a dangerous argument to make because it shrinks the pool of acceptable candidates - 'No, you went to the same school when you were six!" - and undermines the expectation of personal integrity.
At this level it looks bad, though. However, I agree that we've not seen evidence that, for example, Johnson looked at the shortlist and said 'He's the one. Know him. Good chap' or similar. Nor have we seen any suggestion, AFAIK, that a selection committee produced three names in order of preference, and the Good Chap was third.
I think what we may get here at some time is similar to what happened to selection of Bishops, where the process was that the PM got 2 names and a theoretical convention that they could choose either - which has only been used once in 100-200 appointments.
That has now been replaced with the second name being a "reserve" if eg the first one dies.
Quite concerning, though, is the dire quality of opposition a reliance on painting this stuff in poster paints indicates.
Despite your archaeology you haven’t really found a good reason why Boris should be picking an old school friend to head the Boris-monitoring committee, have you?
I don't need one.
I was pointing out that this particular outrage bus is fuelled by BS and hot air.
Yes. What we need is a tape with Johnson saying, "Ah, Fergie! He was in the old Bullers with me. Sound as a pound. Hired."
Short of that, as Charles would stress, nothing to see and unfair to insinuate.
And the Lord that drew up the shortlist was enabled by David Cameron, who was in the same dissolute dining club.
It's almost like a self replicating oligarchy.
Gets my goat it really does. Private schools have to go. It's the only way imo.
Cutting the head off a hydra, mate. Everywhere has oligarchies, nowhere else has public schools (except in the sense of actually public actual schools). If you strike them down, they will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.
I think that is making the perfect the enemy of the good. Elitism can be reduced but not eradicated. In fact you shouldn't even try to eradicate it. That leads to totalitarianism and - yes - elites. Worse ones. I'm just thinking about what's realistic in England 2021. This could be possible one day. But not this day, I'm fully aware of that. It's electoral poison. People who can't afford this privilege still support it. Until this changes, no chance of reform, I'll be talking to the hand.
I can promise you there's also people who can and do afford it who'd be secretly not wholly disgruntled if the option were denied them, and they had to spend the money on horses and yachts instead, dammit.
For sure. It's kind of a tax cut for the rich. In fact that's how I'd sell it in the drawing rooms and boardrooms of England.
They are still not going to send their kids to the average or below average local comp.
They will make sure they live in the most expensive postcodes and thus the locals schools their kids attend will still be those mainly attended by the offspring of the wealthy.
So you would have to ban expensive detached houses too and make everyone live in a 2 bed semi or council flat
That's just the old "if we can't totally deal with an issue let's not deal with it at all" shtick.
No - it's about not letting the state decide everything and accepting that individuals and indeed parents have the right to make choices - and that those choices have consequences which no amount of state engineering can, or should negate.
The whole rationale of the state is to prevent people's choices from harming other people. Otherwise we wouldn't need it, we could all just do whatever we want. I want the state to do its best to create a level playing field so that (a) everyone gets a fair shot in life and (b) the best people end up in top positions. It should be fairly evident that that's not happening right now, and private schools play a big part in that failure.
The best instrument we had for getting people from average or below average income backgrounds into top positions was of course the grammar schools.
Labour of course could not have that so abolished most of them, for socialists equality of outcome is more important than equality of opportunity
You keep saying this, despite the evidence that grammar schools get captured by the middle class via tutoring and prep schools. If grammar schools were these incredible engines of social mobility, then Kent (where they still exist) would be a classless society. Anyone who has spent more than a few minutes in Kent will know that the opposite is the case. Personally I am all for equality of opportunity - equality of outcome is impossible in education because some people are just smarter than others. The way to get equality of opportunity is to fund all schools better, rigorously enforce standards, pay teachers better to get good teachers to stay in the profession, and to make sure there are no kids too hungry to learn.
Private schools are a symptom not a cause. Take them away and parents will find a zillion ways to give their children a "better" start in life - for a start they will have £40k after tax to play with to do so.
So you've got to go back to the root cause and then you are either build a Communist state or become like Finland, which would mean a root and branch transformation of our schooling - and university - system.
Problem is, as the man said, I wouldn't have started from here. Today we have bog standard comprehensives, Eton, Winchester and Oxbridge. All that would need to be reformed to get to "free" education.
I imagine that the extra percentage of GDP to be spent plus the requirement for all teachers to have a masters degree might also cause some problems, politically, as an example.
We know that wealthy people think a lot of money should be spent on educating children, from revealed preference. They just don't want other people's kids to have that kind of money spent on them. You say that spending more on schools would cause political problems. Why is that? The problem we have is that the constituency for spending more money on schools is too small, because many of those who feel most passionately about education have taken matters into their own hands. In many cases they have become opponents of funding state schools more generously in the process.
Singapore spends far less than we do as a percentage of its gdp but is top of the PISA rankings now
That's incorrect. According to the World Bank, Singapore spent 21.6% of its GDP per capita on each secondary school pupil in the most recent year for which data are available (2017) while the UK spent 21.2% (2016). Since Singapore's GDP per capita is approximately 50% higher than ours, this means that they spent about 50% more per pupil than we did. Which I suppose could account for their higher PISA score. Incidentally, UK spending has gone down from a peak of 31.2% of per capita GDP in 2010, thanks to the Tories.
Are those stats right?
Roughly speaking Uk government spending is about 50% of GDP, so if we are spending 20% of gdp we are spending 40% of the government budget. Yes there will be extra around the edges for private sector etc but that analysis doesn’t pass the sniff test
Please read what I wrote again Charles old bean, you have completely misunderstood it. Must try harder!
You said the UK spent 21% of GDP per capita on education. I challenged that figure.
Perhaps you can provide your workings?
No I didn't. I said that spending per secondary pupil was 21% of GDP per capita. Eg if GDP per capita were £50k spending per pupil would be £10.5k. I have no workings to share with you as I took the number directly from the World Bank's World Development Indicators database, which is freely available online if you want to look it up.
That’s not what you said
“Singapore spent 21.6% of its GDP per capita on each secondary school pupil in the most recent year for which data are available (2017) while the UK spent 21.2% (2016).
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
Yes that's a big point that should be in the mix. The more the 'powers that be' are personally invested in something the more they'll be motivated to make it better.
Exactly. It is that opting out from looking after the broader population that drove the sense of alienation behind Brexit.
HYUFD shows why the Tories will fail on the levelling up agenda. They don't really believe in it.
We don't believe in the levelling down agenda of high tax and no parental choice no.
That is why we are Tories after all.
It was lost national sovereignty and uncontrolled immigration that drove Brexit
But you voted to Remain like the socialist you truly are!
Brexit was nothing to do with socialism or capitalism
Nonsense. Socialists voted for Brexit to escape the Capitalist hegemony.
Capitalists voted for Brexit to escape EU regulation, Socialists to escape the single market and EU corporatism
So you supported both EU regulation and corporatism.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
London centric view...you had a choice of schools probably due to the density of london. For a lot of the country your choice of comprehensive to send your kids to amounts to a list of 1
Yeah I grew up in a small town with one comprehensive school and I attended it.
And if had been one of those really dire schools like mine was? Because that is what is going to happen if you abolish public schools, that 7% will have parents looking to purchase the property in the area's of good schools pushing those that rent outwards to make do with what is left
I wouldn't abolish them, I hate them and despair at their malign influence over our country but people have a right to send their kids there if they want to. Anyway, if there is only one school in an area the process you describe can't happen.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
From 1964 to 1997 we did not have a single private school educated PM, they were all grammar school educated. Since 1997 most of our PMs have been educated privately, May is our only PM to have been to a comp and that was a grammar when she joined.
The law, journalism, the city, medicine etc are also dominated by the privately educated, so great job comprehensive schools are doing in getting their products to the top!
It's not our fault there's a self-perpetuating clique who won't let us sit at the top table in these professions.
The selection committee at my Medical School has actively altered its selection methods to favour those from State schools. This is based on performance in course assessments, where we find the students from state schools outperform those from private schools when the latter are no longer spoon fed.
I presume that is just to fill the few remaining places that haven’t been taken by the sons and daughters of doctors.
What an extraordinary coincidence that the best person to be on the anti-sleaze watchdog just happened to be an old chum of Johnsons from his Bullingdon Club days.
However, I remember some Corbyn fans on here defending McDonnell employing Corbyn's son in a taxpayer-funded role. By an astonishing coincidence, the son of his best bud was the best candidate for the job.
(Hint, he wasn't.)
If we want to stop people hiring friends, family and chums to roles, especially to taxpayer-funded roles, then it needs to apply equally to all.
I don't think I have ever defended cronyism in the Labour Party either.
The nepotism and Chumocracy does show how illusory "taking back control" was.
Jobs for the sons and daughters of friends is as old as jobs themselves. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't; sometimes it's not the best way of hiring someone but sometimes it can work. Rather depends on how how up the chain the job is.
That's the Indy. And there seems to be not a shred of actual evidence of malpractice.
Has anyone provided any evidence that Johnson had a corrupt role in the process, or how the process worked such that Johnson could manipulate it? Or that the member appointed is unfit to be on the Committee or is corrupt?
Or is this just Hoof-in-Mouth Rayner howling at the moon because it is Tuesday and she still does not have anything to say?
"You were in a student club with him 35 years ago" is some way beyond farfetched.
The only possible chink I can see is if the PM is supplied with say 50 names, from which he then gets to choose who he wants, and that would still require a lot more evidence that we have.
It's quite a dangerous argument to make because it shrinks the pool of acceptable candidates - 'No, you went to the same school when you were six!" - and undermines the expectation of personal integrity.
At this level it looks bad, though. However, I agree that we've not seen evidence that, for example, Johnson looked at the shortlist and said 'He's the one. Know him. Good chap' or similar. Nor have we seen any suggestion, AFAIK, that a selection committee produced three names in order of preference, and the Good Chap was third.
I think what we may get here at some time is similar to what happened to selection of Bishops, where the process was that the PM got 2 names and a theoretical convention that they could choose either - which has only been used once in 100-200 appointments.
That has now been replaced with the second name being a "reserve" if eg the first one dies.
Quite concerning, though, is the dire quality of opposition a reliance on painting this stuff in poster paints indicates.
Despite your archaeology you haven’t really found a good reason why Boris should be picking an old school friend to head the Boris-monitoring committee, have you?
I don't need one.
I was pointing out that this particular outrage bus is fuelled by BS and hot air.
Yes. What we need is a tape with Johnson saying, "Ah, Fergie! He was in the old Bullers with me. Sound as a pound. Hired."
Short of that, as Charles would stress, nothing to see and unfair to insinuate.
And the Lord that drew up the shortlist was enabled by David Cameron, who was in the same dissolute dining club.
It's almost like a self replicating oligarchy.
Gets my goat it really does. Private schools have to go. It's the only way imo.
Cutting the head off a hydra, mate. Everywhere has oligarchies, nowhere else has public schools (except in the sense of actually public actual schools). If you strike them down, they will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.
I think that is making the perfect the enemy of the good. Elitism can be reduced but not eradicated. In fact you shouldn't even try to eradicate it. That leads to totalitarianism and - yes - elites. Worse ones. I'm just thinking about what's realistic in England 2021. This could be possible one day. But not this day, I'm fully aware of that. It's electoral poison. People who can't afford this privilege still support it. Until this changes, no chance of reform, I'll be talking to the hand.
I can promise you there's also people who can and do afford it who'd be secretly not wholly disgruntled if the option were denied them, and they had to spend the money on horses and yachts instead, dammit.
For sure. It's kind of a tax cut for the rich. In fact that's how I'd sell it in the drawing rooms and boardrooms of England.
They are still not going to send their kids to the average or below average local comp.
They will make sure they live in the most expensive postcodes and thus the locals schools their kids attend will still be those mainly attended by the offspring of the wealthy.
So you would have to ban expensive detached houses too and make everyone live in a 2 bed semi or council flat
That's just the old "if we can't totally deal with an issue let's not deal with it at all" shtick.
No - it's about not letting the state decide everything and accepting that individuals and indeed parents have the right to make choices - and that those choices have consequences which no amount of state engineering can, or should negate.
The whole rationale of the state is to prevent people's choices from harming other people. Otherwise we wouldn't need it, we could all just do whatever we want. I want the state to do its best to create a level playing field so that (a) everyone gets a fair shot in life and (b) the best people end up in top positions. It should be fairly evident that that's not happening right now, and private schools play a big part in that failure.
The best instrument we had for getting people from average or below average income backgrounds into top positions was of course the grammar schools.
Labour of course could not have that so abolished most of them, for socialists equality of outcome is more important than equality of opportunity
You keep saying this, despite the evidence that grammar schools get captured by the middle class via tutoring and prep schools. If grammar schools were these incredible engines of social mobility, then Kent (where they still exist) would be a classless society. Anyone who has spent more than a few minutes in Kent will know that the opposite is the case. Personally I am all for equality of opportunity - equality of outcome is impossible in education because some people are just smarter than others. The way to get equality of opportunity is to fund all schools better, rigorously enforce standards, pay teachers better to get good teachers to stay in the profession, and to make sure there are no kids too hungry to learn.
Private schools are a symptom not a cause. Take them away and parents will find a zillion ways to give their children a "better" start in life - for a start they will have £40k after tax to play with to do so.
So you've got to go back to the root cause and then you are either build a Communist state or become like Finland, which would mean a root and branch transformation of our schooling - and university - system.
Problem is, as the man said, I wouldn't have started from here. Today we have bog standard comprehensives, Eton, Winchester and Oxbridge. All that would need to be reformed to get to "free" education.
I imagine that the extra percentage of GDP to be spent plus the requirement for all teachers to have a masters degree might also cause some problems, politically, as an example.
We know that wealthy people think a lot of money should be spent on educating children, from revealed preference. They just don't want other people's kids to have that kind of money spent on them. You say that spending more on schools would cause political problems. Why is that? The problem we have is that the constituency for spending more money on schools is too small, because many of those who feel most passionately about education have taken matters into their own hands. In many cases they have become opponents of funding state schools more generously in the process.
Singapore spends far less than we do as a percentage of its gdp but is top of the PISA rankings now
That's incorrect. According to the World Bank, Singapore spent 21.6% of its GDP per capita on each secondary school pupil in the most recent year for which data are available (2017) while the UK spent 21.2% (2016). Since Singapore's GDP per capita is approximately 50% higher than ours, this means that they spent about 50% more per pupil than we did. Which I suppose could account for their higher PISA score. Incidentally, UK spending has gone down from a peak of 31.2% of per capita GDP in 2010, thanks to the Tories.
Are those stats right?
Roughly speaking Uk government spending is about 50% of GDP, so if we are spending 20% of gdp we are spending 40% of the government budget. Yes there will be extra around the edges for private sector etc but that analysis doesn’t pass the sniff test
Please read what I wrote again Charles old bean, you have completely misunderstood it. Must try harder!
You said the UK spent 21% of GDP per capita on education. I challenged that figure.
Perhaps you can provide your workings?
No I didn't. I said that spending per secondary pupil was 21% of GDP per capita. Eg if GDP per capita were £50k spending per pupil would be £10.5k. I have no workings to share with you as I took the number directly from the World Bank's World Development Indicators database, which is freely available online if you want to look it up.
That’s not what you said
“Singapore spent 21.6% of its GDP per capita on each secondary school pupil in the most recent year for which data are available (2017) while the UK spent 21.2% (2016).
But it’s a pointless argument
Those two statements are identical. I despair at your schooling!
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
From 1964 to 1997 we did not have a single private school educated PM, they were all grammar school educated. Since 1997 most of our PMs have been educated privately, May is our only PM to have been to a comp and that was a grammar when she joined.
The law, journalism, the city, medicine etc are also dominated by the privately educated, so great job comprehensive schools are doing in getting their products to the top!
It's not our fault there's a self-perpetuating clique who won't let us sit at the top table in these professions.
When grammar schools were around in far greater numbers their products were storming the top ranks of the law, medicine and indeed politics. The 1950s-1980s were a golden age of meritocracy.
Indeed it used to be the case that generally you only sent your child to private school if you were middle class if they failed the 11+ and did not get into the grammar school (outside of a handful of the poshest private schools like Eton which could still trade on snob value)
What an extraordinary coincidence that the best person to be on the anti-sleaze watchdog just happened to be an old chum of Johnsons from his Bullingdon Club days.
However, I remember some Corbyn fans on here defending McDonnell employing Corbyn's son in a taxpayer-funded role. By an astonishing coincidence, the son of his best bud was the best candidate for the job.
(Hint, he wasn't.)
If we want to stop people hiring friends, family and chums to roles, especially to taxpayer-funded roles, then it needs to apply equally to all.
I don't think I have ever defended cronyism in the Labour Party either.
The nepotism and Chumocracy does show how illusory "taking back control" was.
Jobs for the sons and daughters of friends is as old as jobs themselves. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't; sometimes it's not the best way of hiring someone but sometimes it can work. Rather depends on how how up the chain the job is.
That's the Indy. And there seems to be not a shred of actual evidence of malpractice.
Has anyone provided any evidence that Johnson had a corrupt role in the process, or how the process worked such that Johnson could manipulate it? Or that the member appointed is unfit to be on the Committee or is corrupt?
Or is this just Hoof-in-Mouth Rayner howling at the moon because it is Tuesday and she still does not have anything to say?
"You were in a student club with him 35 years ago" is some way beyond farfetched.
The only possible chink I can see is if the PM is supplied with say 50 names, from which he then gets to choose who he wants, and that would still require a lot more evidence that we have.
It's quite a dangerous argument to make because it shrinks the pool of acceptable candidates - 'No, you went to the same school when you were six!" - and undermines the expectation of personal integrity.
At this level it looks bad, though. However, I agree that we've not seen evidence that, for example, Johnson looked at the shortlist and said 'He's the one. Know him. Good chap' or similar. Nor have we seen any suggestion, AFAIK, that a selection committee produced three names in order of preference, and the Good Chap was third.
I think what we may get here at some time is similar to what happened to selection of Bishops, where the process was that the PM got 2 names and a theoretical convention that they could choose either - which has only been used once in 100-200 appointments.
That has now been replaced with the second name being a "reserve" if eg the first one dies.
Quite concerning, though, is the dire quality of opposition a reliance on painting this stuff in poster paints indicates.
Despite your archaeology you haven’t really found a good reason why Boris should be picking an old school friend to head the Boris-monitoring committee, have you?
I don't need one.
I was pointing out that this particular outrage bus is fuelled by BS and hot air.
Yes. What we need is a tape with Johnson saying, "Ah, Fergie! He was in the old Bullers with me. Sound as a pound. Hired."
Short of that, as Charles would stress, nothing to see and unfair to insinuate.
And the Lord that drew up the shortlist was enabled by David Cameron, who was in the same dissolute dining club.
It's almost like a self replicating oligarchy.
Gets my goat it really does. Private schools have to go. It's the only way imo.
Cutting the head off a hydra, mate. Everywhere has oligarchies, nowhere else has public schools (except in the sense of actually public actual schools). If you strike them down, they will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.
I think that is making the perfect the enemy of the good. Elitism can be reduced but not eradicated. In fact you shouldn't even try to eradicate it. That leads to totalitarianism and - yes - elites. Worse ones. I'm just thinking about what's realistic in England 2021. This could be possible one day. But not this day, I'm fully aware of that. It's electoral poison. People who can't afford this privilege still support it. Until this changes, no chance of reform, I'll be talking to the hand.
I can promise you there's also people who can and do afford it who'd be secretly not wholly disgruntled if the option were denied them, and they had to spend the money on horses and yachts instead, dammit.
For sure. It's kind of a tax cut for the rich. In fact that's how I'd sell it in the drawing rooms and boardrooms of England.
They are still not going to send their kids to the average or below average local comp.
They will make sure they live in the most expensive postcodes and thus the locals schools their kids attend will still be those mainly attended by the offspring of the wealthy.
So you would have to ban expensive detached houses too and make everyone live in a 2 bed semi or council flat
That's just the old "if we can't totally deal with an issue let's not deal with it at all" shtick.
No - it's about not letting the state decide everything and accepting that individuals and indeed parents have the right to make choices - and that those choices have consequences which no amount of state engineering can, or should negate.
The whole rationale of the state is to prevent people's choices from harming other people. Otherwise we wouldn't need it, we could all just do whatever we want. I want the state to do its best to create a level playing field so that (a) everyone gets a fair shot in life and (b) the best people end up in top positions. It should be fairly evident that that's not happening right now, and private schools play a big part in that failure.
The best instrument we had for getting people from average or below average income backgrounds into top positions was of course the grammar schools.
Labour of course could not have that so abolished most of them, for socialists equality of outcome is more important than equality of opportunity
You keep saying this, despite the evidence that grammar schools get captured by the middle class via tutoring and prep schools. If grammar schools were these incredible engines of social mobility, then Kent (where they still exist) would be a classless society. Anyone who has spent more than a few minutes in Kent will know that the opposite is the case. Personally I am all for equality of opportunity - equality of outcome is impossible in education because some people are just smarter than others. The way to get equality of opportunity is to fund all schools better, rigorously enforce standards, pay teachers better to get good teachers to stay in the profession, and to make sure there are no kids too hungry to learn.
Private schools are a symptom not a cause. Take them away and parents will find a zillion ways to give their children a "better" start in life - for a start they will have £40k after tax to play with to do so.
So you've got to go back to the root cause and then you are either build a Communist state or become like Finland, which would mean a root and branch transformation of our schooling - and university - system.
Problem is, as the man said, I wouldn't have started from here. Today we have bog standard comprehensives, Eton, Winchester and Oxbridge. All that would need to be reformed to get to "free" education.
I imagine that the extra percentage of GDP to be spent plus the requirement for all teachers to have a masters degree might also cause some problems, politically, as an example.
We know that wealthy people think a lot of money should be spent on educating children, from revealed preference. They just don't want other people's kids to have that kind of money spent on them. You say that spending more on schools would cause political problems. Why is that? The problem we have is that the constituency for spending more money on schools is too small, because many of those who feel most passionately about education have taken matters into their own hands. In many cases they have become opponents of funding state schools more generously in the process.
Singapore spends far less than we do as a percentage of its gdp but is top of the PISA rankings now
That's incorrect. According to the World Bank, Singapore spent 21.6% of its GDP per capita on each secondary school pupil in the most recent year for which data are available (2017) while the UK spent 21.2% (2016). Since Singapore's GDP per capita is approximately 50% higher than ours, this means that they spent about 50% more per pupil than we did. Which I suppose could account for their higher PISA score. Incidentally, UK spending has gone down from a peak of 31.2% of per capita GDP in 2010, thanks to the Tories.
Are those stats right?
Roughly speaking Uk government spending is about 50% of GDP, so if we are spending 20% of gdp we are spending 40% of the government budget. Yes there will be extra around the edges for private sector etc but that analysis doesn’t pass the sniff test
Please read what I wrote again Charles old bean, you have completely misunderstood it. Must try harder!
You said the UK spent 21% of GDP per capita on education. I challenged that figure.
Perhaps you can provide your workings?
No I didn't. I said that spending per secondary pupil was 21% of GDP per capita. Eg if GDP per capita were £50k spending per pupil would be £10.5k. I have no workings to share with you as I took the number directly from the World Bank's World Development Indicators database, which is freely available online if you want to look it up.
That’s not what you said
“Singapore spent 21.6% of its GDP per capita on each secondary school pupil in the most recent year for which data are available (2017) while the UK spent 21.2% (2016).
But it’s a pointless argument
Those two statements are identical. I despair at your schooling!
They definitely aren't. Simply a nation can't spent GDP per capita.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
London centric view...you had a choice of schools probably due to the density of london. For a lot of the country your choice of comprehensive to send your kids to amounts to a list of 1
Yeah I grew up in a small town with one comprehensive school and I attended it.
And if had been one of those really dire schools like mine was? Because that is what is going to happen if you abolish public schools, that 7% will have parents looking to purchase the property in the area's of good schools pushing those that rent outwards to make do with what is left
I wouldn't abolish them, I hate them and despair at their malign influence over our country but people have a right to send their kids there if they want to. Anyway, if there is only one school in an area the process you describe can't happen.
Unless you live in a very rural area there will almost always be more than 1 secondary school in the area
Bit of a sense of the world becoming more lawless than usual geopolitically speaking this evening, with the Iranian hijacking of a tanker and the Belarusian assassination of an exile in Kiev.
Are things objectively deteriorating, or am I just interpreting things that way because of my developing depression?
Interesting to see the UK Prime Minister treating the Scottish First Minister as though she were the Mayor of Manchester or the leader of Surrey County Council.
I'm not sure it's helpful but no doubt it plays well in some circles.
I don't see the disadvantage. It won't change many minds one way or another in Scotland I would imagine. And it winds up NS.
There has been a strong tendency in the UK government under both Cameron and May to pussy foot around Sturgeon and try to give her her way where possible in the slightly bizarre thought that this would keep her quiet. Under Boris that has changed. She is not invited to COP26 even although it is in Glasgow. He is not interested in giving her a photoshot with him at Bute House. She wanted to have a "greenport" instead of a freeport in Scotland. She was told to get lost. There is more UK government advertising on local Scottish radio. His response to a demand for a further referendum has so far been blunt.
Boris has worked out that playing nice with Nicola is playing on her terms. He isn't minded to.
Nevertheless, she was elected in Scotland. He wasn't.
He was elected in the United Kingdom - which Scotland voted to remain part of.
Whilst that is true, telling Scotland that they need to suck it up isn't a good way to promote the union. The challenge for Shagger is that he is trying to build a centralised control system where his magnificence will permeate into all things.
Like Thatcher before him, he can't stand the idea that in places people actively vote for the other option. So instead of accepting that the democratic will is different in places, like Thatcher he wants to abolish democracy. London votes against me? Scrap the GLC! Scotland votes against me, scrap devolution!
It is Hailsham's Elective Dictatorship, the tyranny of the masses.
That punchline works for anyone moaning about any government policy they don't like. Lockdowns were elective dictatorship - a majority are in favour of removing what would be unargued human rights so it's imposed on 100% of people. But that's not a line of argument which tends to make many converts.
To a point - and that is certainly what Mr Hogg was warning about. My specific point is about regions and nations where the vote is sharply against the government. Whilst the government is duly elected, in the region / nation in question they do not agree and have voted accordingly.
We either have elected and empowered regions and nations where Westminster respects their mandate and the will of the people, or we do not.
Hailshsm had many names during his life. At this point he was not “Mr Hogg”.
His name was Mr Quintin Hogg. The absurd titles aside his name was still Quintin Hogg.
The name he used was Quintin Hailsham.
...the Old Etonian who gave up the inherited viscountcy he'd held for 13 years - including when he was Minister of Education - in the belief that he'd have a better chance of succeeding fellow OE Harold Macmillan as Tory leader and prime minister if he got sworn in as an MP first, then won a by-election in a safe seat 15 days later, but had to watch another OE, Alec Douglas-Home, become the leader instead of him, and then displayed steel, courage, and fine character by sauntering back to the red benches of the House of Lords 7 years later on a life peerage.
On private schools, this issue only seems to exist to a problematic extent in Britain. I think part of the fault is our binary approach to public and private sector.
Private schools are hugely expensive on the whole and only becoming more so. As a result they become ever more exclusive reserves of the upper middle classes and the gap between their outcomes and those of most other schools gets larger. There is pitifully little cross pollination, no intermediate or mixed models.
Where are the easyschools, or the state schools with privately funded sixth forms, or the state-private joint ventures? How about means tested school fees, or school fees regulated by government, as happens in telecoms and energy markets? The most we ever seem to manage is business sponsorships of the occasional academy school. I’m not saying these would all work (and we all remember the excesses of PFI), but there is little or no experimentation. Two systems living an almost mutually exclusive existence.
Isn't this entirely because state funding is all or nothing? I don't think there is any mechanism for places at private schools to be state funded, or for state funded schools to charge for any places.
I think the more I think about this issue, the less I care about it. We have this strange idea that money and power are all that matters. It really doesn't. I'm fairly sure I would be quite capable of doing some review of standards in public life, or whatever. I'd guess the gig probably pays four times what I earn now, plus expenses. I'm not even slightly bothered it's gone to some toff whose mates with Bozo. If he'd rung me up and offered me it, I'd have turned it down.
I earn enough to live on. I enjoy what I do. I'm pretty good at what I do. I work with a decent bunch of lads. What else exactly might I want?
At the end of the day, we can shuffle the pile however we like - only one person gers to be prime minister at a time. Complaining that modern prime ministers are drawn from a fairly small group of people (at least we aren't as bad as US presidents) is pretty pointless - even if we legislated to bar the public schooled from the office, we'd only be benifiting the one comprehensive educated bloke who got the job out of the maybe 40million comprehensively educated people in the county.
We might do better to try and make the lot of all those comprehensively educated types that but better - ideally by reducing the amount of their money which is taken from them as tax and (mostly) wasted, and by dispensing with about half the stupid rules and regulations imposed on them over the last 50 years.
Yeah people like us should know our place right? Leave the big jobs for our betters.
I think the issue is that there is a disproportionate number of public school educated MPs. That could reflect interests or skills or contacts. But it’s better to seek to encourage the skills and interests that make people good MPs than to whine that there are lots of public school and Oxbridge educated PMs
I don't mind the MPs, they've faced an electorate and won a fair contest. It's the endless jobs for the boys, the cushy sinecures for members of the Bullingdon Club, paid for by my taxes, that I object to. (yeah it's another of those irregular verbs, I object to, you whine etc).
I was really referring to the PM - selected from a pool of MPs - so you need to fix the pool to fix the PM ratios
Re: sinecures politicians give their supporters patronage based positions. So it has been for thousands of years. Unless these posts are elected or random you can’t fix that
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
From 1964 to 1997 we did not have a single private school educated PM, they were all grammar school educated. Since 1997 most of our PMs have been educated privately, May is our only PM to have been to a comp and that was a grammar when she joined.
The law, journalism, the city, medicine etc are also dominated by the privately educated, so great job comprehensive schools are doing in getting their products to the top!
It's not our fault there's a self-perpetuating clique who won't let us sit at the top table in these professions.
The selection committee at my Medical School has actively altered its selection methods to favour those from State schools. This is based on performance in course assessments, where we find the students from state schools outperform those from private schools when the latter are no longer spoon fed.
I presume that is just to fill the few remaining places that haven’t been taken by the sons and daughters of doctors.
On what do you base that statement?. It is plainly bollocks.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
London centric view...you had a choice of schools probably due to the density of london. For a lot of the country your choice of comprehensive to send your kids to amounts to a list of 1
Yeah I grew up in a small town with one comprehensive school and I attended it.
And if had been one of those really dire schools like mine was? Because that is what is going to happen if you abolish public schools, that 7% will have parents looking to purchase the property in the area's of good schools pushing those that rent outwards to make do with what is left
Not all state schools are equal, and there are still some shockers out there. But if you run a really bad school now, it will get picked up and burned in unquenchable flames... Sorry, academised.
So what are the differences?
First, schools that take on brighter pupils get higher results. But apart from at a few outliers, that's about the pupils, not the teaching. Even differences in progress scores are mostly about demographics. Your kids will get about the same grades almost anywhere. A good school in 2021 can't make a dumb kid bright, and a poor school won't make a bright kid dumb. Parents- put the time you were going to spend in getting them into the "best" school reading with them. It will do their education more good.
Some schools are much better at aspirations than others. If you are trying to source breakfast for pupils, it cuts the headspace available to encourage them into professional careers. Unfortunate but true. Take them to museums. Talk to your sprigs about jobs.
Finally, a very small number of schools give their alumni the sort of social networks where they can give each other top jobs twenty years down the line. That's most of what you get by paying for school places. Can't blame any parent who does it for their children, but it is an English failing it would be good to solve.
well lets try doctors too? Can we spot the area where the bands are the bottom row are bigger....oh right only for black consultants which are at 3% vs 4% of population
Isn’t that just a question of time?
Assuming that the average consultant has 20 years experience then the proportion of consultants will reflect the starting position 20 years ago which - I assume - was less balanced than today
Tomorrow's Daily Record leads on drugs minister Angela Constance saying Scotland will bring in safe drug consumption rooms – and defy the UK Government #scotpapers #tomorrowspaperstoday @AllieHBNews
Having looked at the competition I think the GB men's 4x100 relay team are a good shout for the gold medal. If there's no jumping of guns or baton drops they have the ability to win. If Zharnel Hughes is on the anchor leg he will have a standing start which removes his biggest weakness. Only the Americans have got the same depth in their team to field 4 men with competitive times.
Bit of a sense of the world becoming more lawless than usual geopolitically speaking this evening, with the Iranian hijacking of a tanker and the Belarusian assassination of an exile in Kiev.
Are things objectively deteriorating, or am I just interpreting things that way because of my developing depression?
A question for the ages, and one which I've had to ponder on occasion. I usually end up deciding that there's plenty about which to be fucking depressed.
One of the problems with Independent schools now is just how expensive they have become: I was at one in the eighties and the fees were about £1000 a term (just under £3000 in today’s money) just for tuition; I lived next to the school and didn’t board. The same school is now charging £8000 a term, again just for day fees. This puts it beyond the range of many who would have been able to afford it back when I was at school; indeed I don’t expect my father would have been able to pay for me to go there if the fees had been nearly three times as much. In fact he didn’t have to pay the full £1000 as I got a discount for living close to the school, and an academic “exhibition” on top of that, knocking about half off the fee. I suspect the argument over Public Schools might be a bit different if most people had to pay under £5000 a year for it.
Interesting to see the UK Prime Minister treating the Scottish First Minister as though she were the Mayor of Manchester or the leader of Surrey County Council.
I'm not sure it's helpful but no doubt it plays well in some circles.
I don't see the disadvantage. It won't change many minds one way or another in Scotland I would imagine. And it winds up NS.
There has been a strong tendency in the UK government under both Cameron and May to pussy foot around Sturgeon and try to give her her way where possible in the slightly bizarre thought that this would keep her quiet. Under Boris that has changed. She is not invited to COP26 even although it is in Glasgow. He is not interested in giving her a photoshot with him at Bute House. She wanted to have a "greenport" instead of a freeport in Scotland. She was told to get lost. There is more UK government advertising on local Scottish radio. His response to a demand for a further referendum has so far been blunt.
Boris has worked out that playing nice with Nicola is playing on her terms. He isn't minded to.
Nevertheless, she was elected in Scotland. He wasn't.
He was elected in the United Kingdom - which Scotland voted to remain part of.
Whilst that is true, telling Scotland that they need to suck it up isn't a good way to promote the union. The challenge for Shagger is that he is trying to build a centralised control system where his magnificence will permeate into all things.
Like Thatcher before him, he can't stand the idea that in places people actively vote for the other option. So instead of accepting that the democratic will is different in places, like Thatcher he wants to abolish democracy. London votes against me? Scrap the GLC! Scotland votes against me, scrap devolution!
It is Hailsham's Elective Dictatorship, the tyranny of the masses.
That punchline works for anyone moaning about any government policy they don't like. Lockdowns were elective dictatorship - a majority are in favour of removing what would be unargued human rights so it's imposed on 100% of people. But that's not a line of argument which tends to make many converts.
To a point - and that is certainly what Mr Hogg was warning about. My specific point is about regions and nations where the vote is sharply against the government. Whilst the government is duly elected, in the region / nation in question they do not agree and have voted accordingly.
We either have elected and empowered regions and nations where Westminster respects their mandate and the will of the people, or we do not.
Hailshsm had many names during his life. At this point he was not “Mr Hogg”.
His name was Mr Quintin Hogg. The absurd titles aside his name was still Quintin Hogg.
The name he used was Quintin Hailsham.
...the Old Etonian who gave up the inherited viscountcy he'd held for 13 years - including when he was Minister of Education - in the belief that he'd have a better chance of succeeding fellow OE Harold Macmillan as Tory leader and prime minister if he got sworn in as an MP first, then won a by-election in a safe seat 15 days later, but had to watch another OE, Alec Douglas-Home, become the leader instead of him, and then displayed steel, courage, and fine character by sauntering back to the red benches of the House of Lords 7 years later on a life peerage.
Heath wanted him to serve as Lord Chancellor, so he needed to be in the lords. He served under Douglas Home as well.
I think senior politicians continuing to serve at a senior level even though their career has peaked is a good think.
(FWIW, Thatcher’s appointment of him as Lord Chancellor in 1979 proves that fundamentally she was a decent woman)
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
London centric view...you had a choice of schools probably due to the density of london. For a lot of the country your choice of comprehensive to send your kids to amounts to a list of 1
Yeah I grew up in a small town with one comprehensive school and I attended it.
And if had been one of those really dire schools like mine was? Because that is what is going to happen if you abolish public schools, that 7% will have parents looking to purchase the property in the area's of good schools pushing those that rent outwards to make do with what is left
Not all state schools are equal, and there are still some shockers out there. But if you run a really bad school now, it will get picked up and burned in unquenchable flames... Sorry, academised.
So what are the differences?
First, schools that take on brighter pupils get higher results. But apart from at a few outliers, that's about the pupils, not the teaching. Even differences in progress scores are mostly about demographics. Your kids will get about the same grades almost anywhere. A good school in 2021 can't make a dumb kid bright, and a poor school won't make a bright kid dumb. Parents- put the time you were going to spend in getting them into the "best" school reading with them. It will do their education more good.
Some schools are much better at aspirations than others. If you are trying to source breakfast for pupils, it cuts the headspace available to encourage them into professional careers. Unfortunate but true. Take them to museums. Talk to your sprigs about jobs.
Finally, a very small number of schools give their alumni the sort of social networks where they can give each other top jobs twenty years down the line. That's most of what you get by paying for school places. Can't blame any parent who does it for their children, but it is an English failing it would be good to solve.
A poor school can’t make a good pupil dumb, but it can severely limit their chances of getting a good grade by failing to actually teach the curriculum properly. This includes schools where the turnover of teachers is so great that pupils have several different Maths or English teachers over the course of a year, and those where the teachers are spending more time on basic crowd control than actually teaching. Often one is caused by the other, though it can be hard to work out cause and effect.
Teaching bright pupils is a different skill to teaching those who need more help, but it is not always easier unless the teachers are on the top of their game when it comes to both subject knowledge and what the exam boards actually want from the candidates. This is particularly true at A-level, though it is still relevant at GCSE.
One of the problems with Independent schools now is just how expensive they have become: I was at one in the eighties and the fees were about £1000 a term (just under £3000 in today’s money) just for tuition; I lived next to the school and didn’t board. The same school is now charging £8000 a term, again just for day fees. This puts it beyond the range of many who would have been able to afford it back when I was at school; indeed I don’t expect my father would have been able to pay for me to go there if the fees had been nearly three times as much. In fact he didn’t have to pay the full £1000 as I got a discount for living close to the school, and an academic “exhibition” on top of that, knocking about half off the fee. I suspect the argument over Public Schools might be a bit different if most people had to pay under £5000 a year for it.
The catch there is that the state school funding is about £5k per secondary pupil- and for all we moan about management, there's not that much fat to be trimmed from that budget. (There's James Tooley's experiment with a no-frills independent school in Durham, but it's hard to see how the sums for that work at scale.)
So how do you run an independent school whose education is worth handing over £5k for, when you could send them to Bogstandard Academy (which is probably perfectly fine these days) and spend some of the money on a tutor instead?
One of the problems with Independent schools now is just how expensive they have become: I was at one in the eighties and the fees were about £1000 a term (just under £3000 in today’s money) just for tuition; I lived next to the school and didn’t board. The same school is now charging £8000 a term, again just for day fees. This puts it beyond the range of many who would have been able to afford it back when I was at school; indeed I don’t expect my father would have been able to pay for me to go there if the fees had been nearly three times as much. In fact he didn’t have to pay the full £1000 as I got a discount for living close to the school, and an academic “exhibition” on top of that, knocking about half off the fee. I suspect the argument over Public Schools might be a bit different if most people had to pay under £5000 a year for it.
The catch there is that the state school funding is about £5k per secondary pupil- and for all we moan about management, there's not that much fat to be trimmed from that budget. (There's James Tooley's experiment with a no-frills independent school in Durham, but it's hard to see how the sums for that work at scale.)
So how do you run an independent school whose education is worth handing over £5k for, when you could send them to Bogstandard Academy (which is probably perfectly fine these days) and spend some of the money on a tutor instead?
My first boss (as in head of Physics at the first school I taught at) used to fund two skiing holidays a year for his family just though the tutoring he did as a sideline.
I charge £80 an hour, though to be fair that’s the price I quote because I don’t actually want to do any…
Bit of a sense of the world becoming more lawless than usual geopolitically speaking this evening, with the Iranian hijacking of a tanker and the Belarusian assassination of an exile in Kiev.
Are things objectively deteriorating, or am I just interpreting things that way because of my developing depression?
Yes, I think it's not as stable as it was, though the risk of thermonuclear armageddon is much less than when I was young and we thought it might well be imminent.
If you're serious about developing depression, do see your GP, without delay. I've seen depression develop at close hand and you really don't want to go there.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
London centric view...you had a choice of schools probably due to the density of london. For a lot of the country your choice of comprehensive to send your kids to amounts to a list of 1
Yeah I grew up in a small town with one comprehensive school and I attended it.
And if had been one of those really dire schools like mine was? Because that is what is going to happen if you abolish public schools, that 7% will have parents looking to purchase the property in the area's of good schools pushing those that rent outwards to make do with what is left
Not all state schools are equal, and there are still some shockers out there. But if you run a really bad school now, it will get picked up and burned in unquenchable flames... Sorry, academised.
So what are the differences?
First, schools that take on brighter pupils get higher results. But apart from at a few outliers, that's about the pupils, not the teaching. Even differences in progress scores are mostly about demographics. Your kids will get about the same grades almost anywhere. A good school in 2021 can't make a dumb kid bright, and a poor school won't make a bright kid dumb. Parents- put the time you were going to spend in getting them into the "best" school reading with them. It will do their education more good.
Some schools are much better at aspirations than others. If you are trying to source breakfast for pupils, it cuts the headspace available to encourage them into professional careers. Unfortunate but true. Take them to museums. Talk to your sprigs about jobs.
Finally, a very small number of schools give their alumni the sort of social networks where they can give each other top jobs twenty years down the line. That's most of what you get by paying for school places. Can't blame any parent who does it for their children, but it is an English failing it would be good to solve.
A poor school can’t make a good pupil dumb, but it can severely limit their chances of getting a good grade by failing to actually teach the curriculum properly. This includes schools where the turnover of teachers is so great that pupils have several different Maths or English teachers over the course of a year, and those where the teachers are spending more time on basic crowd control than actually teaching. Often one is caused by the other, though it can be hard to work out cause and effect.
Teaching bright pupils is a different skill to teaching those who need more help, but it is not always easier unless the teachers are on the top of their game when it comes to both subject knowledge and what the exam boards actually want from the candidates. This is particularly true at A-level, though it is still relevant at GCSE.
Both true, but the size of the truth is smaller than a lot of parents think.
One education datacrucher put it this way; it's almost always better to send your child to the nearest school, even if a more distant one is better. Just use the travel time saved to do more homework or reading- that has a much bigger impact.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
London centric view...you had a choice of schools probably due to the density of london. For a lot of the country your choice of comprehensive to send your kids to amounts to a list of 1
Yeah I grew up in a small town with one comprehensive school and I attended it.
And if had been one of those really dire schools like mine was? Because that is what is going to happen if you abolish public schools, that 7% will have parents looking to purchase the property in the area's of good schools pushing those that rent outwards to make do with what is left
Not all state schools are equal, and there are still some shockers out there. But if you run a really bad school now, it will get picked up and burned in unquenchable flames... Sorry, academised.
So what are the differences?
First, schools that take on brighter pupils get higher results. But apart from at a few outliers, that's about the pupils, not the teaching. Even differences in progress scores are mostly about demographics. Your kids will get about the same grades almost anywhere. A good school in 2021 can't make a dumb kid bright, and a poor school won't make a bright kid dumb. Parents- put the time you were going to spend in getting them into the "best" school reading with them. It will do their education more good.
Some schools are much better at aspirations than others. If you are trying to source breakfast for pupils, it cuts the headspace available to encourage them into professional careers. Unfortunate but true. Take them to museums. Talk to your sprigs about jobs.
Finally, a very small number of schools give their alumni the sort of social networks where they can give each other top jobs twenty years down the line. That's most of what you get by paying for school places. Can't blame any parent who does it for their children, but it is an English failing it would be good to solve.
A poor school can’t make a good pupil dumb, but it can severely limit their chances of getting a good grade by failing to actually teach the curriculum properly. This includes schools where the turnover of teachers is so great that pupils have several different Maths or English teachers over the course of a year, and those where the teachers are spending more time on basic crowd control than actually teaching. Often one is caused by the other, though it can be hard to work out cause and effect.
Teaching bright pupils is a different skill to teaching those who need more help, but it is not always easier unless the teachers are on the top of their game when it comes to both subject knowledge and what the exam boards actually want from the candidates. This is particularly true at A-level, though it is still relevant at GCSE.
Both true, but the size of the truth is smaller than a lot of parents think.
One education datacrucher put it this way; it's almost always better to send your child to the nearest school, even if a more distant one is better. Just use the travel time saved to do more homework or reading- that has a much bigger impact.
Why not do both? I knew one pupil who claimed to have learned enough to get an A* in one of his A-level Maths modules (back when they were a thing) on the bus into school on the morning of the exam.
Given it was Decision maths I’m not sure he was joking…
NEW: Florida reports 50,997 new coronavirus cases for 3 days, up 33% from last week
Francis U: thanks for your late night Olympic postings over the last few days. I was reading them, but wasn't able to comment at the time due to a problem with my laptop.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
London centric view...you had a choice of schools probably due to the density of london. For a lot of the country your choice of comprehensive to send your kids to amounts to a list of 1
Yeah I grew up in a small town with one comprehensive school and I attended it.
And if had been one of those really dire schools like mine was? Because that is what is going to happen if you abolish public schools, that 7% will have parents looking to purchase the property in the area's of good schools pushing those that rent outwards to make do with what is left
Not all state schools are equal, and there are still some shockers out there. But if you run a really bad school now, it will get picked up and burned in unquenchable flames... Sorry, academised.
So what are the differences?
First, schools that take on brighter pupils get higher results. But apart from at a few outliers, that's about the pupils, not the teaching. Even differences in progress scores are mostly about demographics. Your kids will get about the same grades almost anywhere. A good school in 2021 can't make a dumb kid bright, and a poor school won't make a bright kid dumb. Parents- put the time you were going to spend in getting them into the "best" school reading with them. It will do their education more good.
Some schools are much better at aspirations than others. If you are trying to source breakfast for pupils, it cuts the headspace available to encourage them into professional careers. Unfortunate but true. Take them to museums. Talk to your sprigs about jobs.
Finally, a very small number of schools give their alumni the sort of social networks where they can give each other top jobs twenty years down the line. That's most of what you get by paying for school places. Can't blame any parent who does it for their children, but it is an English failing it would be good to solve.
A poor school can’t make a good pupil dumb, but it can severely limit their chances of getting a good grade by failing to actually teach the curriculum properly. This includes schools where the turnover of teachers is so great that pupils have several different Maths or English teachers over the course of a year, and those where the teachers are spending more time on basic crowd control than actually teaching. Often one is caused by the other, though it can be hard to work out cause and effect.
Teaching bright pupils is a different skill to teaching those who need more help, but it is not always easier unless the teachers are on the top of their game when it comes to both subject knowledge and what the exam boards actually want from the candidates. This is particularly true at A-level, though it is still relevant at GCSE.
Both true, but the size of the truth is smaller than a lot of parents think.
One education datacrucher put it this way; it's almost always better to send your child to the nearest school, even if a more distant one is better. Just use the travel time saved to do more homework or reading- that has a much bigger impact.
I remember hearing that the best teachers can make about half a grade difference over the merely competent.
What an extraordinary coincidence that the best person to be on the anti-sleaze watchdog just happened to be an old chum of Johnsons from his Bullingdon Club days.
However, I remember some Corbyn fans on here defending McDonnell employing Corbyn's son in a taxpayer-funded role. By an astonishing coincidence, the son of his best bud was the best candidate for the job.
(Hint, he wasn't.)
If we want to stop people hiring friends, family and chums to roles, especially to taxpayer-funded roles, then it needs to apply equally to all.
I don't think I have ever defended cronyism in the Labour Party either.
The nepotism and Chumocracy does show how illusory "taking back control" was.
Jobs for the sons and daughters of friends is as old as jobs themselves. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't; sometimes it's not the best way of hiring someone but sometimes it can work. Rather depends on how how up the chain the job is.
That's the Indy. And there seems to be not a shred of actual evidence of malpractice.
Has anyone provided any evidence that Johnson had a corrupt role in the process, or how the process worked such that Johnson could manipulate it? Or that the member appointed is unfit to be on the Committee or is corrupt?
Or is this just Hoof-in-Mouth Rayner howling at the moon because it is Tuesday and she still does not have anything to say?
"You were in a student club with him 35 years ago" is some way beyond farfetched.
The only possible chink I can see is if the PM is supplied with say 50 names, from which he then gets to choose who he wants, and that would still require a lot more evidence that we have.
It's quite a dangerous argument to make because it shrinks the pool of acceptable candidates - 'No, you went to the same school when you were six!" - and undermines the expectation of personal integrity.
At this level it looks bad, though. However, I agree that we've not seen evidence that, for example, Johnson looked at the shortlist and said 'He's the one. Know him. Good chap' or similar. Nor have we seen any suggestion, AFAIK, that a selection committee produced three names in order of preference, and the Good Chap was third.
I think what we may get here at some time is similar to what happened to selection of Bishops, where the process was that the PM got 2 names and a theoretical convention that they could choose either - which has only been used once in 100-200 appointments.
That has now been replaced with the second name being a "reserve" if eg the first one dies.
Quite concerning, though, is the dire quality of opposition a reliance on painting this stuff in poster paints indicates.
Despite your archaeology you haven’t really found a good reason why Boris should be picking an old school friend to head the Boris-monitoring committee, have you?
I don't need one.
I was pointing out that this particular outrage bus is fuelled by BS and hot air.
Yes. What we need is a tape with Johnson saying, "Ah, Fergie! He was in the old Bullers with me. Sound as a pound. Hired."
Short of that, as Charles would stress, nothing to see and unfair to insinuate.
And the Lord that drew up the shortlist was enabled by David Cameron, who was in the same dissolute dining club.
It's almost like a self replicating oligarchy.
Gets my goat it really does. Private schools have to go. It's the only way imo.
Cutting the head off a hydra, mate. Everywhere has oligarchies, nowhere else has public schools (except in the sense of actually public actual schools). If you strike them down, they will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.
I think that is making the perfect the enemy of the good. Elitism can be reduced but not eradicated. In fact you shouldn't even try to eradicate it. That leads to totalitarianism and - yes - elites. Worse ones. I'm just thinking about what's realistic in England 2021. This could be possible one day. But not this day, I'm fully aware of that. It's electoral poison. People who can't afford this privilege still support it. Until this changes, no chance of reform, I'll be talking to the hand.
I can promise you there's also people who can and do afford it who'd be secretly not wholly disgruntled if the option were denied them, and they had to spend the money on horses and yachts instead, dammit.
For sure. It's kind of a tax cut for the rich. In fact that's how I'd sell it in the drawing rooms and boardrooms of England.
They are still not going to send their kids to the average or below average local comp.
They will make sure they live in the most expensive postcodes and thus the locals schools their kids attend will still be those mainly attended by the offspring of the wealthy.
So you would have to ban expensive detached houses too and make everyone live in a 2 bed semi or council flat
That's just the old "if we can't totally deal with an issue let's not deal with it at all" shtick.
No - it's about not letting the state decide everything and accepting that individuals and indeed parents have the right to make choices - and that those choices have consequences which no amount of state engineering can, or should negate.
The whole rationale of the state is to prevent people's choices from harming other people. Otherwise we wouldn't need it, we could all just do whatever we want. I want the state to do its best to create a level playing field so that (a) everyone gets a fair shot in life and (b) the best people end up in top positions. It should be fairly evident that that's not happening right now, and private schools play a big part in that failure.
The best instrument we had for getting people from average or below average income backgrounds into top positions was of course the grammar schools.
Labour of course could not have that so abolished most of them, for socialists equality of outcome is more important than equality of opportunity
You keep saying this, despite the evidence that grammar schools get captured by the middle class via tutoring and prep schools. If grammar schools were these incredible engines of social mobility, then Kent (where they still exist) would be a classless society. Anyone who has spent more than a few minutes in Kent will know that the opposite is the case. Personally I am all for equality of opportunity - equality of outcome is impossible in education because some people are just smarter than others. The way to get equality of opportunity is to fund all schools better, rigorously enforce standards, pay teachers better to get good teachers to stay in the profession, and to make sure there are no kids too hungry to learn.
Private schools are a symptom not a cause. Take them away and parents will find a zillion ways to give their children a "better" start in life - for a start they will have £40k after tax to play with to do so.
So you've got to go back to the root cause and then you are either build a Communist state or become like Finland, which would mean a root and branch transformation of our schooling - and university - system.
Problem is, as the man said, I wouldn't have started from here. Today we have bog standard comprehensives, Eton, Winchester and Oxbridge. All that would need to be reformed to get to "free" education.
I imagine that the extra percentage of GDP to be spent plus the requirement for all teachers to have a masters degree might also cause some problems, politically, as an example.
We know that wealthy people think a lot of money should be spent on educating children, from revealed preference. They just don't want other people's kids to have that kind of money spent on them. You say that spending more on schools would cause political problems. Why is that? The problem we have is that the constituency for spending more money on schools is too small, because many of those who feel most passionately about education have taken matters into their own hands. In many cases they have become opponents of funding state schools more generously in the process.
Singapore spends far less than we do as a percentage of its gdp but is top of the PISA rankings now
That's incorrect. According to the World Bank, Singapore spent 21.6% of its GDP per capita on each secondary school pupil in the most recent year for which data are available (2017) while the UK spent 21.2% (2016). Since Singapore's GDP per capita is approximately 50% higher than ours, this means that they spent about 50% more per pupil than we did. Which I suppose could account for their higher PISA score. Incidentally, UK spending has gone down from a peak of 31.2% of per capita GDP in 2010, thanks to the Tories.
Are those stats right?
Roughly speaking Uk government spending is about 50% of GDP, so if we are spending 20% of gdp we are spending 40% of the government budget. Yes there will be extra around the edges for private sector etc but that analysis doesn’t pass the sniff test
Please read what I wrote again Charles old bean, you have completely misunderstood it. Must try harder!
You said the UK spent 21% of GDP per capita on education. I challenged that figure.
Perhaps you can provide your workings?
No I didn't. I said that spending per secondary pupil was 21% of GDP per capita. Eg if GDP per capita were £50k spending per pupil would be £10.5k. I have no workings to share with you as I took the number directly from the World Bank's World Development Indicators database, which is freely available online if you want to look it up.
That’s not what you said
“Singapore spent 21.6% of its GDP per capita on each secondary school pupil in the most recent year for which data are available (2017) while the UK spent 21.2% (2016).
But it’s a pointless argument
Those two statements are identical. I despair at your schooling!
They definitely aren't. Simply a nation can't spent GDP per capita.
There’s perhaps a slight ambiguity in OLB’s phrasing, but it’s quite obvious what he means. GDP per capita is easily calculable, and he’s talking about the percentage of that figure which is spent on each pupil.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
London centric view...you had a choice of schools probably due to the density of london. For a lot of the country your choice of comprehensive to send your kids to amounts to a list of 1
Yeah I grew up in a small town with one comprehensive school and I attended it.
And if had been one of those really dire schools like mine was? Because that is what is going to happen if you abolish public schools, that 7% will have parents looking to purchase the property in the area's of good schools pushing those that rent outwards to make do with what is left
Not all state schools are equal, and there are still some shockers out there. But if you run a really bad school now, it will get picked up and burned in unquenchable flames... Sorry, academised.
So what are the differences?
First, schools that take on brighter pupils get higher results. But apart from at a few outliers, that's about the pupils, not the teaching. Even differences in progress scores are mostly about demographics. Your kids will get about the same grades almost anywhere. A good school in 2021 can't make a dumb kid bright, and a poor school won't make a bright kid dumb. Parents- put the time you were going to spend in getting them into the "best" school reading with them. It will do their education more good.
Some schools are much better at aspirations than others. If you are trying to source breakfast for pupils, it cuts the headspace available to encourage them into professional careers. Unfortunate but true. Take them to museums. Talk to your sprigs about jobs.
Finally, a very small number of schools give their alumni the sort of social networks where they can give each other top jobs twenty years down the line. That's most of what you get by paying for school places. Can't blame any parent who does it for their children, but it is an English failing it would be good to solve.
A poor school can’t make a good pupil dumb, but it can severely limit their chances of getting a good grade by failing to actually teach the curriculum properly. This includes schools where the turnover of teachers is so great that pupils have several different Maths or English teachers over the course of a year, and those where the teachers are spending more time on basic crowd control than actually teaching. Often one is caused by the other, though it can be hard to work out cause and effect.
Teaching bright pupils is a different skill to teaching those who need more help, but it is not always easier unless the teachers are on the top of their game when it comes to both subject knowledge and what the exam boards actually want from the candidates. This is particularly true at A-level, though it is still relevant at GCSE.
Surely your peers also have a significant effect, not just the teacher? If most of them have no ambition, even the clever ones get dragged down.
My mum was a primary school teacher in one of the worst catchment areas you could imagine. After one particular playground fight she enquired as to the cause. "His Dad shot my Dad" came the answer...
What can you do? No middle classes are going to be terribly keen on sending their children there, nor were they to the local comprehensive in the same catchment (which was worse, if anything).
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
My parents were strongly in favour of state comprehensives, partly because my father was at Wigan Grammar in the 1950s. He hated the petty snobbery of Wigans small middle class.
My parents once told me that it was important that articulate demanding parents keep their kids in the state system, as strong advocates for higher standards. Once they opt out, then standards will drop for those without pushy parents.
They weren't left wing. Indeed my mother has been a lifelong member of the Conservative Party, and my father was a Liberal. They just believed in a duty to others, not just their own kin.
In comprehensives it tends to be middle class kids with pushy parents outside who still do fine, especially as most tend to be sent to high performing comps in leafy suburbs.
It is bright working class kids without pushy parents who most needed the grammar schools, otherwise they just end up in below average comps in inner cities or increasingly now declining seaside towns etc without the ladder grammars provided.
There is no great moral benefit in sending your children to comprehensives at all
Most bright working class kids failed the 11 plus because they weren't coached for it, and ended up in shitty Secondary Moderns where they had no chance of a good education. (Funny how nobody ever says bring back the Secondary Moderns, but you can't have Grammar Schools without Secondary Moderns). FWIW it's mostly the middle class parents at our kids' school who organise the fundraising, the PTA, help with extracurricular activities etc, things that all the kids benefit from. And we vote for parties that want to increase funding for schools instead of cutting it. And we want to bring up kids who are at ease with the community they live in because they learn and play with the whole community. So actually, I think there is a whole lot of moral benefit in that, thanks.
Not all, the 11+ was basically an iq test and they are harder to revise for.
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
You're right, I wouldn't send my kids to a really dire school, and I'm lucky that there are good schools in our part of London. I think you are exaggerating the degree to which comprehensives become segregated by class though, a good proportion of the kids at my kids' school are on free school meals, and the neighbourhood is a mix of expensive homes, private flats and social housing. It is a genuine comprehensive school, and I think it is a wonderful thing. You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
London centric view...you had a choice of schools probably due to the density of london. For a lot of the country your choice of comprehensive to send your kids to amounts to a list of 1
Yeah I grew up in a small town with one comprehensive school and I attended it.
And if had been one of those really dire schools like mine was? Because that is what is going to happen if you abolish public schools, that 7% will have parents looking to purchase the property in the area's of good schools pushing those that rent outwards to make do with what is left
Not all state schools are equal, and there are still some shockers out there. But if you run a really bad school now, it will get picked up and burned in unquenchable flames... Sorry, academised.
So what are the differences?
First, schools that take on brighter pupils get higher results. But apart from at a few outliers, that's about the pupils, not the teaching. Even differences in progress scores are mostly about demographics. Your kids will get about the same grades almost anywhere. A good school in 2021 can't make a dumb kid bright, and a poor school won't make a bright kid dumb. Parents- put the time you were going to spend in getting them into the "best" school reading with them. It will do their education more good.
Some schools are much better at aspirations than others. If you are trying to source breakfast for pupils, it cuts the headspace available to encourage them into professional careers. Unfortunate but true. Take them to museums. Talk to your sprigs about jobs.
Finally, a very small number of schools give their alumni the sort of social networks where they can give each other top jobs twenty years down the line. That's most of what you get by paying for school places. Can't blame any parent who does it for their children, but it is an English failing it would be good to solve.
A poor school can’t make a good pupil dumb, but it can severely limit their chances of getting a good grade by failing to actually teach the curriculum properly. This includes schools where the turnover of teachers is so great that pupils have several different Maths or English teachers over the course of a year, and those where the teachers are spending more time on basic crowd control than actually teaching. Often one is caused by the other, though it can be hard to work out cause and effect.
Teaching bright pupils is a different skill to teaching those who need more help, but it is not always easier unless the teachers are on the top of their game when it comes to both subject knowledge and what the exam boards actually want from the candidates. This is particularly true at A-level, though it is still relevant at GCSE.
Surely your peers also have a significant effect, not just the teacher? If most of them have no ambition, even the clever ones get dragged down.
My mum was a primary school teacher in one of the worst catchment areas you could imagine. After one particular playground fight she enquired as to the cause. "His Dad shot my Dad" came the answer...
What can you do? No middle classes are going to be terribly keen on sending their children there, nor were they to the local comprehensive in the same catchment (which was worse, if anything).
I escaped to a grammar school.
The only way to improve things in schools like this would be firm but fair discipline, but that goes against the grain of modern teaching ideas.
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Given you have no control over systems overseas (in the thought experiment where you, terrifyingly, have control on this island) how much relative educational & economic performance are you willing to sacrifice for more egalitarianism? Or is it a panacea and closing the best schools will also improve the overall average?
It's not levelling down or up. It's levelling. But probably you'd see a net uplift since there'd be more potential realized.
But Kinabulu, if you're not smart enough to have a rich daddy then how much potential have you really got?
I should perhaps mention that many kids going to private schools don't have 'rich' parents. Many are on scholarships or subsidised, and many parents scrimp and save to send their kids to the school.
Yeah but most of them are wealthy, unless these schools have a magic money tree growing in their ample grounds that enable them to spend much more per pupil than local state schools while charging no fees. The scholarships are only there so they can do the whole charity tax dodge bollocks.
I know it's the end of t' thread, but that really is rubbish. And you've now changed from 'rich' to 'wealthy'. How long before you get down to 'parents who scrimp and save in order to send their kids' ?
It is sober. It's not an extreme position. The fact it is painted as such says a great deal about how relaxed we are about privilege and inequality.
No I haven't decided all private schools are evil. Or indeed any of them. I have no personal criticism of those who use private schools or personal prejudice against those who went to one.
Some of my best friends ... 🙂
But my strong and considered view is that they contribute significantly to our imo far too unequal society. Since I'm egalitarian inclined I'd like to see this addressed. Call that ideology if you like. It's not a dirty word in my book. You need some otherwise you're just flapping around with anecdote and tinker.
Okay, let's put it this way. You want a change. What is the output of that change? What is the end result you want?
That's a very fair and clarifying question. Where have you been all my life?
The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today.
I think an egalitarian education system would contribute greatly to that. And I think the private schools are a serious impediment to creating an egalitarian education system.
I define an egalitarian education system as one where a similar - and high - standard of schooling is available to all children. It will never be perfectly achievable but this should be the goal.
Thanks, but I think you're really off-track.
People send kids to private school because they think it will give their kids better results and/or prospects in life than sending them to their local state school. It costs them money to do so. In the absence of private school, that money will be spent in other ways to achieve the same aim. everything from home schooling to tutoring. results will still strongly depend on bank balance. Even after-school clubs are an issue.
As an example, we're in a fortunate position where Mrs J earns enough for me not to have to work. This meant I can focus much more on the little 'un, which has proved particularly invaluable during lockdown. How would your egalitarian system make up for that? Or the fact that I could purchase a subscription to Twinkl and other websites during lockdown to help us out (I know a couple of other parents who could not afford it). My son has many more opportunities to do tings because I have a car and can drive - hence our trip to Duxford today. One of his friends does not have such opportunities.
A problem with searching for an 'egalitarian' system is that the starting points are not egalitarian.
I really fail to see how banning private schools will lead to better results for children of either 'rich' or 'poor' parents. In fact, I can see it easily making matters much worse.
But I'm not saying removal of this advantage removes all advantages. It won't and also shouldn't. Lots of the advantages that come from parents are because they're good parents, not that they're rich parents. I'm not seeking to interfere with that. Not at all.
Then it will do f'all to achieve your aim: "The output is a society where the link between parental bank balance and life prospects is significantly weaker than it is today."
Comments
There are plenty of high schools in selective areas like Trafford and Bucks now that get good results too and do excellent vocational and technical courses as well.
No system is perfect but at least the grammars offered bright working class kids a chance if they passed the 11+. Now a bright working class kid in say a declining seaside town has near zero chance of getting on and getting a professional career. Comprehensives are divided by class, most middle class parents send their children to good or outstanding comprehensives or academies or free schools they get places for by buying expensive houses in the catchment area.
They would not dream of sending their children to inadequate or requires improvement comprehensives where large numbers of working class kids end up
1) The very rich will send their kids to private schools abroad
2) The medium rich will buy up property surrounding good schools and push out the poor who currently might have a chance to live there
3) The slightly rich will pay for additional tutoring
4) The poor will end up in the failing schools as all the good school areas have now been priced beyond their means
Left wing ideology always fails simple as that because its an ideology of spite and envy that cares more about hurting those you see in the lead than helping those that are left behind.
Points 1 to 3 already happen so don't even bother replying if your only answer is "Oh that won't happen because reasons"
And when all these things come to pass you will then move onto your next bugbear.....possibly its unfair parents use money to buy books for their kids and gives them an unfair advantage lets make them all be restricted to public libraries....oh rich people are buying internet access for their kids and good pc's and failing families can't afford them we should ban that too
https://theconversation.com/irans-secular-shift-new-survey-reveals-huge-changes-in-religious-beliefs-145253
The sneering tends to come from the middle classes/metropolitan set who have decided that they are the arbiters of all that is right and good in the world
However I am happy with the points system Boris has introduced
Was it an inadequate or requires improvement comp? Because that is what most of the poor are faced with as their only choice in much of the country.
At least with universal selection everyone had the opportunity of attending a grammar whether in a leafy suburb, fading seaside town or inner city
You are wrong about the 11 plus though, do some research about how it actually works. If I thought the Grammar/Secondary Modern system worked like you think it does, I would be in favour of it, believe me. I have no interest in Levelling down or whatever fantasies you have about how people on the left actually think. Selective education only reinforces class division and is a barrier to social mobility.
In this case signalling your virtue by sending kids to state school, but also signalling luxury and wealth by using the state school no one more 'middling' can afford to get near because of leafy catchment.
Hopefully I have understood the concept. Toby Y was on about it being used by academics who could work from home imploring everyone else to do the same for the good of community covid, knowing many people could not because they didn't have high status uni job. Thereby indirectly signalling to the other monkeys that they had a top job they passed exams to get.
Or something like that...
*I went to public (ie state) schools in America for 4 years too.
What it means of course is that those Secondary Moderns that do still exist have a much higher funding per pupil than the Grammar schools due to the effects of Pupil Premium.
The law, journalism, the city, medicine etc are also dominated by the privately educated, so great job comprehensive schools are doing in getting their products to the top!
https://www.sra.org.uk/sra/equality-diversity/archive/law-firms-2017/
There has been an increase in the proportion of black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) lawyers working in law firms, now one in five lawyers. This is up 7%, from 14% in 2014 to 21% in 2017. In 2015, 11% of the UK workforce were BAME.2
so 21% of lawyers are bame but only 11% of the workforce....perhaps we should have positive discrimination in favour of employing more white men instead?
Can we spot the area where the bands are the bottom row are bigger....oh right only for black consultants which are at 3% vs 4% of population
“Singapore spent 21.6% of its GDP per capita on each secondary school pupil in the most recent year for which data are available (2017) while the UK spent 21.2% (2016).
But it’s a pointless argument
Anyway, if there is only one school in an area the process you describe can't happen.
Indeed it used to be the case that generally you only sent your child to private school if you were middle class if they failed the 11+ and did not get into the grammar school (outside of a handful of the poshest private schools like Eton which could still trade on snob value)
Are things objectively deteriorating, or am I just interpreting things that way because of my developing depression?
Re: sinecures politicians give their supporters patronage based positions. So it has been for thousands of years. Unless these posts are elected or random you can’t fix that
So what are the differences?
First, schools that take on brighter pupils get higher results. But apart from at a few outliers, that's about the pupils, not the teaching. Even differences in progress scores are mostly about demographics. Your kids will get about the same grades almost anywhere. A good school in 2021 can't make a dumb kid bright, and a poor school won't make a bright kid dumb. Parents- put the time you were going to spend in getting them into the "best" school reading with them. It will do their education more good.
Some schools are much better at aspirations than others. If you are trying to source breakfast for pupils, it cuts the headspace available to encourage them into professional careers. Unfortunate but true. Take them to museums. Talk to your sprigs about jobs.
Finally, a very small number of schools give their alumni the sort of social networks where they can give each other top jobs twenty years down the line. That's most of what you get by paying for school places. Can't blame any parent who does it for their children, but it is an English failing it would be good to solve.
Assuming that the average consultant has 20 years experience then the proportion of consultants will reflect the starting position 20 years ago which - I assume - was less balanced than today
Tomorrow's Daily Record leads on drugs minister Angela Constance saying Scotland will bring in safe drug consumption rooms – and defy the UK Government #scotpapers #tomorrowspaperstoday @AllieHBNews
https://twitter.com/Daily_Record/status/1422673910693306372?s=20
He calls her out on ignoring agreed procedures put in place for meetings, including ALL FMs - she’s not unique
Mentions “our country”
Mentions “devolved Scottish government”
Mentions “The Government”
And best of all paps her aff to Govey
https://twitter.com/gorbalsgoebbels/status/1422683184051982336?s=20
In fact he didn’t have to pay the full £1000 as I got a discount for living close to the school, and an academic “exhibition” on top of that, knocking about half off the fee. I suspect the argument over Public Schools might be a bit different if most people had to pay under £5000 a year for it.
I think senior politicians continuing to serve at a senior level even though their career has peaked is a good think.
(FWIW, Thatcher’s appointment of him as Lord Chancellor in 1979 proves that fundamentally she was a decent woman)
Often one is caused by the other, though it can be hard to work out cause and effect.
Teaching bright pupils is a different skill to teaching those who need more help, but it is not always easier unless the teachers are on the top of their game when it comes to both subject knowledge and what the exam boards actually want from the candidates. This is particularly true at A-level, though it is still relevant at GCSE.
So how do you run an independent school whose education is worth handing over £5k for, when you could send them to Bogstandard Academy (which is probably perfectly fine these days) and spend some of the money on a tutor instead?
I charge £80 an hour, though to be fair that’s the price I quote because I don’t actually want to do any…
If you're serious about developing depression, do see your GP, without delay. I've seen depression develop at close hand and you really don't want to go there.
One education datacrucher put it this way; it's almost always better to send your child to the nearest school, even if a more distant one is better. Just use the travel time saved to do more homework or reading- that has a much bigger impact.
Given it was Decision maths I’m not sure he was joking…
"Germany, Ipsos poll:
CDU/CSU-EPP: 27% (-1)
GRÜNE-G/EFA: 20% (-1)
SPD-S&D: 18% (+3)
AfD-ID: 11% (+1)
FDP-RE: 10% (-1)
LINKE-LEFT: 7% (-1)
+/- vs. 21-27 Jun
Fieldwork: 21-31 July 2021
Sample size: 2,002"
https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1422535238836703233
GDP per capita is easily calculable, and he’s talking about the percentage of that figure which is spent on each pupil.
My mum was a primary school teacher in one of the worst catchment areas you could imagine. After one particular playground fight she enquired as to the cause. "His Dad shot my Dad" came the answer...
What can you do? No middle classes are going to be terribly keen on sending their children there, nor were they to the local comprehensive in the same catchment (which was worse, if anything).
I escaped to a grammar school.
In fact, it might even make it worse.