A comprehensive school has been fined for sneakily selecting clever pupils:
Pupils applying for places were assessed on a points system which awarded marks for such things as primary school references, the child’s attendance record and punctuality, and the extent of parental support.
The children were also asked to write a description of themselves and their family lives which Mr Redmond said was very likely to have favoured the more articulate family and more able child.
Selecting in this way? How very dare they.
March 28th, 2007 at 12:02 pm
The lottery system would be the best as I have argued at length elsewhere. Class divisions are growing Bel and this is not a good thing .
You cannot argue for a Libertarian meritocracy if most people never get off the starting line
What do you suggest and don`t say Grammar schools . They only worked when the cost of housing wasnot such that selection for wealth was the inevitable result of any selection.
Lotteries would make the noble ideas behind Comp ed( Grammars for all) a posibility. Instead of …the crap we have now
March 28th, 2007 at 6:32 pm
All schools do it.
I know mine did. On the fringe of the cachement area, I don’t think they were over scrupulous. I know there wa a srange kind of overlap zone.
Be honest, with the OFSTED system, what do you expect?
March 28th, 2007 at 6:54 pm
A lottery only tackles the symptom- it doesn’t fix the underlying problem which is that too many schools are lacklustre.
Forcing children to stay on until eighteen is a retrograde move- most of them don’t want to stay until sixteen in the first place.
March 29th, 2007 at 11:02 am
Iain you can`t begin to fix the abysmal level of commitment shown by teachers who are the porblem ( not systems or resources) until you have level playing field . With nowhere to hide they will have to perform. then reward and redundancy can be instituted like anywhere else. having established a fair level a voucher scheme would be workable which in the past has not been for the same reason but you have to take socially monopolistic behaviour out first.
I would also stop private education or at the very least remove charitable status ,. They are not charities. They exist to predate upon the under priveliged who are already facing great obstacles.
Without accces no market can work and education is access ot the society market,. The state must act to keep it working as it should
Honest Bel will agree with me when she gets back and you on the iother hand will be in Beeeeeeeg trouble
March 29th, 2007 at 5:48 pm
Newmania, I agree.
A true meritocracy must be meritocratic at the roots, or it a classed based society in disguise.
March 29th, 2007 at 5:59 pm
Universities are already being fined for selecting by ability. (Eg you can’t charge fees unless you take into account all manner of non-academic issues regarding the students, all in the name of ‘widening access’)
newmania, I agree with you when you make the point about a level playing field for entry into secondary schools, and if that cannot be attained, why not use a lottery? My response, as you probably know, is this: if you must use a lottery, why not use an entrance exam? It is a lottery after all, and has the added benefit of at least being related to academic matters.
Joe, I agree with you and newmania about meritocracy. However, I have yet to come across a society where meritocracy was more than just an aspiration. Still looking.
March 30th, 2007 at 12:45 am
My response, as you probably know, is this: if you must use a lottery, why not use an entrance exam? It is a lottery after all, and has the added benefit of at least being related to academic matters.
Bel you do need an entrance exam but then you do not put all the best pupils at that stage into one school they are distributed equally. Grammar schools , which is what in effect you want , were better than what we have now where you can buy your child into the best state school or out of the state system completely. Because society has because much more class polarised geographically Grammar schools would only be use as an even better way of buying out . The areas around them would be priced upwards and the poor child that in the past had a chance because of the 11plus would not .
It is a political possibility. But even if it were this is what would happen we can se this by what happens to ex Grammar schools ,. Much the same thing.
If all the teaches are judge-ble they would immediately improve. Without the horror f saving your child from the local pre Prison dump( which I face now ), the community school can be a reality Without access to the race I cannot see how you can justify a low tax economy and a minimal state . Bear in mind bel that class separation is actually worse now than it was in 1958 and the .lowest strata are going backwards in REAL terms . We have to do something new so I don`t feel myself that your answer is “fit for purpose”. It is enormously better as an idea than what we currently suffer I admit.
Meritocracy is a reasonable aspiration for economic social and moral reasons to a degree amd we can do a lot better . If we do not then Conservatism or the right is no more than the defence of privilege and that cannot and should not have power.
” We must show that we are the Party for working people , not rich and powerful vested interests ”
David Cameron
( For all I know I am the only Conservative here)
March 30th, 2007 at 1:01 pm
newmania, would you be happy with an entrance exam that formed the basis of streaming by ability? So all children take the exam for one particular school, the school has no power to turn away anyone, but admits them all, and based on their results, allocates them into classes based on ability?
Would you prefer that option?