I used to think they were dishonest corrupt b*st*rds. Now I wonder if they are so utterly deluded that they actually believe it ; they're shielded (mostly) from the reality.

I really began to wonder over the "48 hour appointment" thing. Blair seemed really surprised - genuinely so (even allowing for his acting) that this was met by stopping people booking appointments more than 48 hours in advance (something obvious to anyone with any experience of public sector bureaucracy)

Prescott's Christmas appointment on the NHS. There seemed to be no comprehension that as the DPM, he might just have got special treatment and that his treatment may not have been representative.

Are they so completely disconnected and deluded that they don't know what things are really like out there ? I used to think it was impossible ; it required spectacular self delusion. I'm not sure any more.

Education. The figures are a joke. Any teacher can tell you this. Any teacher (especially ICT and Science the two cheapy GNVQs) knew for ages that these were propping up dodgy schools through their spurious "4 GCSE equivalence" (it's not even remotely anything like 4 GCSEs ; it's not even ONE GCSE). All teachers are looking at these headlines and thinking "yes ... we know ...."

The reason they've got caught and schools have crashed down to the bottom is that the measures been changed half way through the cycle.

What will happen now. Well, the new measure is Maths, English and 3 others.

First thing you do is take out the ones who will do it no problem, and the no hopers, who won't get anything whatever you do. This gives you a rump in the middle.

These will be given stacks of Maths and English lessons, boosters, support plus a fairly tight selection of GCSEs which will probably include the GNVQ replacements.

It'll be something like Key Stage 2 (the tests pupils do in their last year in primary). Pupils are drilled endlessly in English, Maths and Science, and s*d the rest of the curriculum. (Because that's what measured).

So from about Year 9 onwards the English and Maths will be drilled home. This won't be attempting to achieve excellence (because who cares whether they get A, B or C as long as they get at least a C), aimed at the middle rump, in a desperate attempt to train them to pass English and Maths GCSE. If you look at Maths/Eng achievement as a standard distribution, you can make a heck of difference by shifting the middle of that bump a few percentage points to the right.

Then make up the 3 others from dodgy qualifications, and hey presto ! the new standards are met and standards will "rise" again.

Of course, the high flyers won't be stretched (as with KS2, all the effort goes into the borderliners) and the SEN and low achieving ones will just be abandoned. Plus ca change.

Posted by: Paul at January 14, 2007 03:58 PM

I'm not surprised at these figures. There is clearly a culture of under-achievement in our schools that seems to be getting worse. It's in fact quite bad that well over half of State school students do not leave school with the basic qualifications needed to access further and higher education. Unfortunately for New Labour, simply pouring money into the system wont do, it will require, in my view, the creation of a more competitive education market where good schools expand and poor schools contract; where schools develop their own ethos and move away from the one size fits all policy of the past; where teachers are allowed to teach free from regulations and targets; where the curriculum is more flexible to allow students more choice and more input into their future. Simply ploughing money into a bad system will do nothing to help.

Posted by: Daniel Cowdrill at January 20, 2007 10:09 PM

I think the real problem in schools is not the educational provision, poor though it frequently is. It's the behavioural issues (which aren't actually measured and are hidden by limiting exclusions).

Some schools are in near anarchy. But this isn't limited just to the obvious inner city ones. In my village in rural Norfolk there is a High School ; there are no council estates, and very little of the "Dalrympean" underclass. It's intake is almost entirely small rural primary schools.

Behaviour there is pretty dire. I used to work in a specialist school for children with behaviour problems which was better. It's not dangerously bad (stabbings etc.) as it is in some schools, but overall it's just poor.

This whole problem is kept under the radar at present. And it is getting worse.

I send my daughter (Yr7) to a private school, costs me £9000 a year ; a significant cost to me. If I am honest with myself this was not because of the better education (though it is better and has helped her along enormously), but because of what I know about what goes on in the local High School, the effects of which are visible in some of her former friends after a term.

It's a cultural difference. My sister's boys attend a different private school ; her best friend is a teacher in the state sector. The difference between the two schools can be shown by the "practical joke" played by the leaving Year 11s. In the private school, they hid or turned off every single clock. In the state school, they damaged the teachers cars with keys etc.

(and this state school wasn't an obvious sink school either)

Posted by: Paul at January 27, 2007 09:28 AM