Schools will have more freedom next year, but concerns about a fragmenting system are real, says Estelle Morris, and teaching schools may be our only hope
The next school year will see a further big step towards the government's goal of a nation of independent state schools, each with additional freedom over their curriculum and admissions and free from any legal obligation to work or cooperate with anyone beyond their own gate.
I've no doubt that the majority of our school leaders will use these additional freedoms responsibly, but concerns about a fragmented and incoherent school system are well rehearsed and real.
The beacon of hope in all this is the development of teaching schools, a network of schools that will work with others to help train teachers and support them throughout their careers. The names of the first 100 of these have been announced. They will build on the training schools and collaborative initiatives of the last government, but they do so in a bold and imaginative way. They are without doubt a good thing.
It's widely accepted that schools improve most when they challenge and support each other; the irony is that although the government signs up to this philosophy, many of the successful school partnerships of recent years have either been abolished or ignored. The specialist schools networks, creative partnerships, city challenge areas: all depended on schools learning from each other, but they are not the players they once were on the education scene.
These teaching schools will carry a huge responsibility and the government will need to make absolutely sure that they get the details right. They are the only glue that is holding a fragmenting system together.
I offer three suggestions as helpful advice. First, they are based on the idea of teaching hospitals, so let's make sure that they do learn from them. Teaching hospitals are all linked to a university; one of their strengths is that they bring together research and practice. Medical students and doctors have the chance to see the relationship between the two and learn to understand the nature and importance of evidence.
That ability to bring together research and practice is the mark of a professional. Too many in government see teaching only as a craft; skills to be learned from those already in the business. It is that ... but not only that.
Education has never had really effective links between research and practice. Education research is the great unreformed part of the system. Too little has an impact on children's learning, and too few teachers use research evidence to inform their teaching. Teaching schools could change that. Initial training should include how to use research and evidence and teaching schools should hold a research budget to fund teachers as researchers.
Second, teaching schools are not a cheap option. Providing £50,000 a year for core costs doesn't sound enough to do the job. These schools will have to fundamentally re-assess the way they operate, and their new responsibilities must not be at the expense of their prime task of teaching their own children. If any of these teaching schools ever felt they could no longer continue, it would leave a massive hole in the local provision.
Third, there must be the right balance between the training we expect all teachers to do and that over which they have some choice.
It looks as though most of the funding going to teaching schools will be commissioned work to deliver government objectives – supporting under-performing schools, or initial training, for example. These schools will need to be more than government agencies, but places of learning that will inspire teachers and give them a sense of true professionalism.
We should all hope for the very best for this particular government initiative. At a time when "independence" is the only show in town, it stands alone in reflecting that equally important characteristic of "interdependence". I'm convinced that, to a large measure, our future lies in their hands.
Schools will have more freedom next year, but concerns about a fragmenting system are real, says Estelle Morris, and teaching schools may be our only hope
The next school year will see a further big step towards the government's goal of a nation of independent state schools, each with additional freedom over their curriculum and admissions and free from any legal obligation to work or cooperate with anyone beyond their own gate.
I've no doubt that the majority of our school leaders will use these additional freedoms responsibly, but concerns about a fragmented and incoherent school system are well rehearsed and real.
Continue reading...Schools will have more freedom next year, but concerns about a fragmenting system are real, says Estelle Morris, and teaching schools may be our only hope
The next school year will see a further big step towards the government's goal of a nation of independent state schools, each with additional freedom over their curriculum and admissions and free from any legal obligation to work or cooperate with anyone beyond their own gate.
I've no doubt that the majority of our school leaders will use these additional freedoms responsibly, but concerns about a fragmented and incoherent school system are well rehearsed and real.
Continue reading...This week on the Guardian Teacher Network you can find out how to make the most of a trip to one of the UK's 15 national parks
Those seeking to refresh an exhausted mind, body or spirit this summer, or to plan for next term and beyond, may want to visit one of the UK's 15 stunning national parks. "National parks are ideal for outdoor learning – they are free, and available 365 days a year," says Kathryn Cook, the UK coordinator of the UK Association of National Park Authorities (UKANPA).
"All young people should experience inspiring landscapes first-hand and they cover a huge range of issues – from farming to tourism, rural history to sustainable development and renewable energy."
As it is national parks week (25-31 July), there are extra incentives to visit. You can brush up on bushcraft and survival skills in the Lake District, or experience life in an Iron Age hut on the Pembrokeshire coast. Details are at: www.nationalparks.gov.uk.
The Guardian Teacher Network has excellent resources on national parks, mostly supplied by UKANPA. To record a wonderful walk, children can follow in the footsteps of native Australians and Americans by making a journey stick .
What impact does tourism have on an area of natural beauty? Our activity sheets and questionnaires encourage children to get to grips with what's going on by observing and recording.
For those seeking a real adventure there are resources designed to be used on the mysterious island of Inchcailloch on Loch Lomond, an uninhabited island in Loch Lomond and The Trossachs national park. Activity notes describe the thrilling Island Detectives activity, which includes using burial grounds to discover the story of previous inhabitants. Everything you need for the adventure of a lifetime can be found here.
The debate about windfarms rages on and children will find fuel for thought in these factsheets and activities for use after an outdoor visit or in the classroom.
More educational resources from UKANPA .
• The Guardian Teacher Network offers more than 70,000 pages of lesson plans and interactive materials. This is added to every day: 35,000 teachers have already registered. Go to teachers.guardian.co.uk. There are more than 1,000 jobs and schools can advertise free: schoolsjobs.guardian.co.uk
This week on the Guardian Teacher Network you can find out how to make the most of a trip to one of the UK's 15 national parks
Those seeking to refresh an exhausted mind, body or spirit this summer, or to plan for next term and beyond, may want to visit one of the UK's 15 stunning national parks. "National parks are ideal for outdoor learning – they are free, and available 365 days a year," says Kathryn Cook, the UK coordinator of the UK Association of National Park Authorities (UKANPA).
"All young people should experience inspiring landscapes first-hand and they cover a huge range of issues – from farming to tourism, rural history to sustainable development and renewable energy."
Continue reading...This week on the Guardian Teacher Network you can find out how to make the most of a trip to one of the UK's 15 national parks
Those seeking to refresh an exhausted mind, body or spirit this summer, or to plan for next term and beyond, may want to visit one of the UK's 15 stunning national parks. "National parks are ideal for outdoor learning – they are free, and available 365 days a year," says Kathryn Cook, the UK coordinator of the UK Association of National Park Authorities (UKANPA).
"All young people should experience inspiring landscapes first-hand and they cover a huge range of issues – from farming to tourism, rural history to sustainable development and renewable energy."
Continue reading...Scientists are appealing for jars of honey to help them try to develop new antibacterial drugs
Who knows what medicinal secrets lurk in a pot of honey? Scientists in Wales intend finding out and are asking beekeepers throughout the UK to send in their honey for inspection. They're especially keen to know what plants their bees have been feeding on – information that could, in time, help to develop new antibacterial drugs.
Researchers at Cardiff University and the National Botanic Garden of Wales (NBGW) plan to construct a detailed profile of the nation's honey. By analysing each sample, they aim to identify plants that can help to fight antibiotic-resistant bacteria such as MRSA, scourge of many a hospital ward; and also diseases ravaging the bee population.
At the university's Welsh School of Pharmacy, work has just begun on screening samples of honey collected from different locations across the UK. The first stage is to see if the honey can conquer MRSA and Clostridium difficile. There's a straightforward test: honey is mixed with the bacteria and if these are killed off by antimicrobial activity within the honey, this indicates the medicinal potential of the bees' plant food.
The second key piece of work is to identify the plants that show up in the most potent antibacterial honeys. This will be done using a DNA-based identification method developed by the National Botanic Garden.
Long-term, the research aims to point a way towards creating drugs through the plants rather than the honey itself. Les Baillie, professor of microbiology at Cardiff University, sees tackling bugs such as MRSA with new plant-based products as an urgent matter. "We're running out of ways of treating them," he says. "We're living with the legacy of the past – the inappropriate use of antibiotics through buying them on the internet and using them in animal feed."
Honey has been used as a medicine since time immemorial, yet the science of its therapeutic properties is little understood. So far, Baillie's team has acquired more than 50 jars to work on, mainly from supermarkets and Welsh beekeepers, along with a handful from England.
Samples have been passed on to the NBGW. There, plants contained in the most powerful honeys will be identified by a DNA profiling process that has already "barcoded" Wales's 1,143 species of flowering plants.
The usual pattern of drug development entails an expensive laboratory screening of many plant products, often without success. "We're hoping to cut out the middle man and let the bees do a lot of the hard work, guiding to us those plants which work," says Baillie.
Another focus of the research is to try to find honeys with plant constituents that could help bees to resist pests such as the Varroa mite, which has ravaged the UK bee population, and American foulbrood, a destructive infectious disease that attacks bee larvae throughout the world.
"Honey at its most basic is concentrated sugar, but even that can do nasty things to bugs, sucking the water out of them," says Baillie. Antibacterial activity is linked to factors such as the presence of phytochemicals, which derive from plants visited by bees. These include chemicals that are produced by plants as protection against pathogens (organisms that cause disease). "We hope to identify compounds that will also target pathogens of humans and bees," says Baillie.
In the past, honey has been used as a medicine on a "try it and see" basis. Baillie believes most of the science is unknown: "we've only scratched the surface of the biology". The research is currently being financed by the Society for Applied Microbiology and will, from October, be supported by the European Social Fund and the Welsh government.
Baillie is now on the hunt for a PhD student to work on the project full-time. Meanwhile, his early screening of samples has already yielded honeys with antimicrobial properties that can kill MRSA.
Who knows what chance the Welsh research project has of isolating a plant with similar properties to manuka, celebrated for its antibacterial potency and used in medication to treat wounds? "If you don't look, you don't find," says Dr Natasha de Vere, head of conservation and research at NBGW. "While some plants are closely related, their chemical properties are quite different, so there's all to play for."
Around half of Wales's flowering plant varieties are insect-pollinated and de Vere is keen to get samples of honey from the same hive at different times of the year. DNA extraction is likely to begin in the next couple of weeks after samples have been through the bar-coding process.
NBGW has a detailed biological record of every Welsh flowering plant on its database. This has been built up by using sections of DNA that enable any species to be identified from the tiniest fragment of leaf, seed or pollen grain; and also at different life stages, or from a mixture of samples.
Aside from the latest research, Wales has long focused on studying the value of honey for use in dressing wounds. Professor Rose Cooper, of the University of Wales Institute, Cardiff's microbiology and infection group, has focused on manuka honey, but also examined other honeys from Britain and abroad.
Although people have been tempted into home experiments with cheap honey, Cooper's team found that more than half – 10 out of 18 – samples examined failed to display any antibacterial activity because they lacked the necessary constituent plants. And while the quality of honey used in the manufacture of licensed wound-care products is regulated, supermarket honey is not regulated for medical use. The possibility of infecting vulnerable patients exists, Cooper warns.
Soon the fog over what works – and why – may be lifted , though understanding the potential of what's under your nose can take time. "It wasn't until the 1950s that the medical properties of daffodils were fully appreciated," says de Vere. "Research has since developed a chemical, galantamine, that's important in treating Alzheimer's.
"There's an awful lot we don't know. This is one aim of the project – looking at the medicinal properties of the plants to see if there's anything like manuka. We might even be able to make a superhoney."
• Beekeepers, please send your honey samples to: Jenny Hawkins, Welsh School of Pharmacy, Redwood Building, King Edward VII Avenue, Cardiff, CF10 3NB
Scientists are appealing for jars of honey to help them try to develop new antibacterial drugs
Who knows what medicinal secrets lurk in a pot of honey? Scientists in Wales intend finding out and are asking beekeepers throughout the UK to send in their honey for inspection. They're especially keen to know what plants their bees have been feeding on – information that could, in time, help to develop new antibacterial drugs.
Researchers at Cardiff University and the National Botanic Garden of Wales (NBGW) plan to construct a detailed profile of the nation's honey. By analysing each sample, they aim to identify plants that can help to fight antibiotic-resistant bacteria such as MRSA, scourge of many a hospital ward; and also diseases ravaging the bee population.
Continue reading...Scientists are appealing for jars of honey to help them try to develop new antibacterial drugs
Who knows what medicinal secrets lurk in a pot of honey? Scientists in Wales intend finding out and are asking beekeepers throughout the UK to send in their honey for inspection. They're especially keen to know what plants their bees have been feeding on – information that could, in time, help to develop new antibacterial drugs.
Researchers at Cardiff University and the National Botanic Garden of Wales (NBGW) plan to construct a detailed profile of the nation's honey. By analysing each sample, they aim to identify plants that can help to fight antibiotic-resistant bacteria such as MRSA, scourge of many a hospital ward; and also diseases ravaging the bee population.
Continue reading...How does a college go about selecting students for an 'Oxbridge' among apprenticeships?
"I'm really, really happy!" exclaims Lucy Cockett, 16. She is one of just 16 young people to win a place on a new hospitality apprenticeship scheme at the Michael Caines Academy launching at Exeter College this September. She knows the next four years are going to be very hard work — and an extraordinary opportunity.
While catering courses are sometimes viewed as a last-resort option for kids with poor GCSE results, there was a clamour for places on this apprenticeship because the Michael Caines Academy aims to offer its students something approaching an Oxbridge experience. Caines, a Michelin-starred chef, who himself trained at Exeter College and is now a governor there, is determined to improve the quality of graduates looking for work in his field. "The hospitality industry is a great employer," he says. "It's fantastically dynamic and requires energy, creativity and all sorts of different people and personalities."
He aims to recruit the best and persuade big names from every sector of hospitality to teach them. "Industry has always come to the college saying 'you're not up-to-date, you're not supplying the quality we need,'" he says. "And the college replies, 'you're not supporting us'."
Caines recently hosted a reception for prospective partners, inviting leading lights in the south-west food world to come on board. He's not just after their time and expertise; he wants them to offer placements so students are exposed to the best in the profession. "It's about the chance to develop in-depth knowledge," says Caines. "I want them to understand about food culture, regionality, fair trade, sustainability, environmental issues such as food miles and how that affects local economies."
With coffee, for instance, it's not just about making the coffee, but understanding where it's from, the ethics of it, the value of that, what organic means. My coffee supplier will come and show them."
But before that, students have to demonstrate their potential under pressure. Many universities, let alone further education colleges, don't bother interviewing prospective students these days. For the academy, however, Exeter College assistant principal Rob Bosworth decided to dedicate several staff to run a two-day selection process.
Day one is about testing applicants' practical skills. In the college training kitchens, under Caines's eagle eye, six pairs of hands shake visibly as nervous teenagers slice leeks into wafer thin julienne strips. Some efforts turn out distinctly chunkier than others. One girl gets her juliennes in a tangle and struggles to marshall them back into a tidy stack. Tensely, silently, the group completes the task.
Along the counter, the academy director, Huw Southcott, is assessing applicants' palates. Bright green, variously flavoured jellies are arranged on a plate, accompanied by an oily shred of mackerel and a morsel of sweetbread. "What I'm looking for is that they're prepared to taste everything," Southcott explains. "Also, I'm interested in how they approach it – are they going to do more than taste? If they get part of the way there – that it's citrusy, or tropical – if they think about it, that counts."
Investing the time to find out more about applicants' attitudes certainly exposes the faint-hearted: one student, asked to taste and identify the offal, shrieks, covers her mouth and jumps up and down in horror. Though Southcott's expression remains admirably non-committal, this reaction doesn't bode well.
Connor Saunders, 16, however, looks carefully at his first jelly, sniffs it, chews and considers the flavour for an age before suggesting what it might be. His passion for food and the maturity of his approach to the task is instantly evident.
Steve Edwards, who heads all front-of-house services for Caines's Abode group and is interviewing applicants about their views on the service side of hospitality, says that this selection process must also assess enthusiasm and understanding of the importance of engaging with customers.
"I've had a 17-year-old who's never even stepped into a brasserie, and that's hugely challenging because he has no experience of that environment," says Edwards, adding that the question then had to be, "can they grow enough?"
By day two, the group has been whittled down to 19 serious contenders.
"Really, really scary," is Cockett's reaction to her grilling by six panelists, though she says she was quickly put at ease. And having the time to dig deeper into individuals' motivations certainly gave the panel pause for thought, says Bosworth. "One young lad learned to cook at 12 because his mum and dad fell ill," he says. "He then developed diabetes and had to learn the skills and knowledge to deal with that."
Those who weren't chosen will have the chance to prove themselves on the college's standard hospitality course and can move across in their second year. But for those like Cockett and Saunders who emerged triumphant from their two-day selection marathon, the world is now their oyster — they just have to learn how to shuck it.
How does a college go about selecting students for an 'Oxbridge' among apprenticeships?
"I'm really, really happy!" exclaims Lucy Cockett, 16. She is one of just 16 young people to win a place on a new hospitality apprenticeship scheme at the Michael Caines Academy launching at Exeter College this September. She knows the next four years are going to be very hard work — and an extraordinary opportunity.
While catering courses are sometimes viewed as a last-resort option for kids with poor GCSE results, there was a clamour for places on this apprenticeship because the Michael Caines Academy aims to offer its students something approaching an Oxbridge experience. Caines, a Michelin-starred chef, who himself trained at Exeter College and is now a governor there, is determined to improve the quality of graduates looking for work in his field. "The hospitality industry is a great employer," he says. "It's fantastically dynamic and requires energy, creativity and all sorts of different people and personalities."
Continue reading...How does a college go about selecting students for an 'Oxbridge' among apprenticeships?
"I'm really, really happy!" exclaims Lucy Cockett, 16. She is one of just 16 young people to win a place on a new hospitality apprenticeship scheme at the Michael Caines Academy launching at Exeter College this September. She knows the next four years are going to be very hard work — and an extraordinary opportunity.
While catering courses are sometimes viewed as a last-resort option for kids with poor GCSE results, there was a clamour for places on this apprenticeship because the Michael Caines Academy aims to offer its students something approaching an Oxbridge experience. Caines, a Michelin-starred chef, who himself trained at Exeter College and is now a governor there, is determined to improve the quality of graduates looking for work in his field. "The hospitality industry is a great employer," he says. "It's fantastically dynamic and requires energy, creativity and all sorts of different people and personalities."
Continue reading...A study of Slovakian shepherds and their sheep, and another comparing Austrian hunters with Austrian butchers
When you hobnob with Slovakian shepherds, don't mention wolves. A new study called Mitigating Carnivore-Livestock Conflict in Europe: Lessons from Slovakia, says: "Compared to other sectors of society shepherds had the most negative attitudes, particularly towards wolves."
Wolves are again roaming the forests of Slovakia. They were almost wiped out in the mid-20th century, then reappeared thanks to a 30-year moratorium on hunting. Now the small-but-growing wolf population has restored its tradition of helping local livestock go missing or be mauled.
The researchers, Robin Rigg and Maria Wechselberger at the Slovak Wildlife Society, Slavomir Findo at the Carpathian Wildlife Society, Martyn Gorman at the University of Aberdeen, and Claudio Sillero-Zubiri and David Macdonald at the University of Oxford, published their work in the journal Oryx.
They found that, mostly, wolves grab sheep near the edge of a forest, especially if the shepherds employ what the scientists call "ineffective methods (chained dogs and inadequate electric fencing)". Experimenting, the team identified two effective methods: unchained guard dogs and adequate fencing.
As with much research, the obvious was apparently not obvious beforehand to all who needed to know about it.
That's the story with shepherds. Now, for people who kill lots of animals: hunters and butchers. A study by an Austrian/British/Malaysian team probes the psychological differences between them.
The monograph, Multi-Method Personality Assessment of Butchers and Hunters: Beliefs and Reality, appeared last year in the journal Personality and Individual Differences. The authors, Martin Voracek, Stefan Stieger and Viren Swami, learned, through direct questioning, that 102 Austrian university students feel hunters and butchers have "higher aggressiveness and masculinity". The students also seem to believe that hunters — but not butchers — possess unusually high self-esteem.
The researchers then studied 25 hunters and 23 butchers from rural Lower Austria, and compared them with 48 persons who neither hunt nor butcher.
First, they tested for hypermasculinity, using a survey technique that "gauges macho personality". They verified their findings "unobtrusively", by doing an analysis based on the relative lengths of each person's second and fourth fingers.
Then they used a standard test to measure each person's self-esteem. They double-checked by having each individual rate "the likeability of all letters of the alphabet", bearing in mind that "letters appearing in individuals' names, especially their initials, are rated more favorably than the remainder of the alphabet".
All told, the researchers "found little evidence for the factuality of" hunters or butchers having great masculinity, aggressiveness, or self-esteem.
(Thanks to Greg Wells for bringing the Slovakian shepherds to my attention.)
• Marc Abrahams is editor of the bimonthly Annals of Improbable Research and organiser of the Ig Nobel prize
A study of Slovakian shepherds and their sheep, and another comparing Austrian hunters with Austrian butchers
When you hobnob with Slovakian shepherds, don't mention wolves. A new study called Mitigating Carnivore-Livestock Conflict in Europe: Lessons from Slovakia, says: "Compared to other sectors of society shepherds had the most negative attitudes, particularly towards wolves."
Wolves are again roaming the forests of Slovakia. They were almost wiped out in the mid-20th century, then reappeared thanks to a 30-year moratorium on hunting. Now the small-but-growing wolf population has restored its tradition of helping local livestock go missing or be mauled.
Continue reading...A study of Slovakian shepherds and their sheep, and another comparing Austrian hunters with Austrian butchers
When you hobnob with Slovakian shepherds, don't mention wolves. A new study called Mitigating Carnivore-Livestock Conflict in Europe: Lessons from Slovakia, says: "Compared to other sectors of society shepherds had the most negative attitudes, particularly towards wolves."
Wolves are again roaming the forests of Slovakia. They were almost wiped out in the mid-20th century, then reappeared thanks to a 30-year moratorium on hunting. Now the small-but-growing wolf population has restored its tradition of helping local livestock go missing or be mauled.
Continue reading...We are asking schools to tell us about their A-level and GCSE results online
This summer, the Guardian is asking schools to tell us all about their A-level and GCSE exam successes. We are asking schools to respond to a few quick questions as soon as possible – on August 18 for A-levels and August 25 for GCSEs.
Simply go to our website (the addresses are below) to fill in results on those days.
No special login is needed.
www.guardian.co.uk/gcse-results-2011
www.guardian.co.uk/a-level-results-2011
We want to tell our readers how well your pupils have performed: please get ready to tell us.
We are asking schools to tell us about their A-level and GCSE results online
This summer, the Guardian is asking schools to tell us all about their A-level and GCSE exam successes. We are asking schools to respond to a few quick questions as soon as possible – on August 18 for A-levels and August 25 for GCSEs.
Simply go to our website (the addresses are below) to fill in results on those days.
Continue reading...We are asking schools to tell us about their A-level and GCSE results online
This summer, the Guardian is asking schools to tell us all about their A-level and GCSE exam successes. We are asking schools to respond to a few quick questions as soon as possible – on August 18 for A-levels and August 25 for GCSEs.
Simply go to our website (the addresses are below) to fill in results on those days.
Continue reading...Sats marking, chaos in the school system and the ethics of widening participation
Last week, Janet Murray reported that 93% of headteachers in a poll were unhappy with the marking of this year's Sats writing paper and we printed a paper that was being sent back for re-marking.
When our Sats results came back we found that they were worse than our teacher assessments. No one can remember the last time this happened.
RogerOThornhill
• That's better handwriting than I've seen on many an undergraduate exam script. In fact, it's better handwriting than mine.
hardatwork
• By my count (based on what I can see) there are 150 words in the piece and I count easily 20 errors of spelling or punctuation. What good is done by ignoring these?
limondd
• It is indeed scandalous that such a piece of writing was marked so low. For a 10-year-old, it shows great facility. It is coherent; it is logically organised and demonstrates awareness of cohesion (great use of adverb sequencers such as "surprisingly" and "however"). There is a good range of lexis and grammar; there is a good attempt at punctuation (tries to use a semi-colon!), though obviously this is not always proficient. It demonstrates good awareness of spelling, overall the handwriting is entirely legible. I'm not a state school teacher (I teach EFL), but I completely concur with the headteacher that it shows "real flair and imagination for a 10-year-old".
LiveButNotKicking
• Is anyone counting the emotional cost to these children who cried when they received their results? Children do need to learn hard lessons in life, but those lessons should be fair. If you have not prepared for a test then you accept the result you get back. If you have written a piece of work that has been incorrectly marked, that is nothing but wrong.
NoraTheExplorer
• What do you expect when a bunch of arses are given stacks of papers and told that the faster they can grade them, the more money they make?
Novelist
Fiona Millar argued that sooner or later local education authorities would have to be re-invented to bring order to admissions, SEN provision and place planning since academies and free schools will create "chaos".
All credit to Fiona Millar for staying with this. Secondary education will become chaotic and corrupt in no time at all under the laissez-faire attitude of the current government. Education authorities have been so panned that it may well take the demise of strategic provision and accountability before this is recognised. How much public money has already gone in to free schools and academies? I'd like my contribution back.
rolandb
• The stuck-in-the-mud educational establishment of which Fiona Millar is a part are squealing like stuck pigs as they realise that their failed education ideas will be exposed as useless. More power to Gove's elbow.
chesney9
Harriet Swain reported on debate among academics about the ethics of widening participation and whether the whole idea is a middle-class distraction.
The question is more fundamental. Widening participation" may (or may not) be a good thing. But should it be the business of a university?
GeoffreyAlderman
• Yes it should be the business of a university that takes state dollar. The state has its own interests, which include supplying the wider higher skills needs of the labour market and reducing the waste of human capital potential, and of course there are social justice arguments that all who are qualified and can benefit should have the opportunity.
Capaddona
Sue Learner reported on the closure of school "nurture" groups. The same day, a new Ofsted report praised their work.
I hope we don't lose ours. For many kids these groups keep them out of the special education system. That costs far more.
ajchm
• Cost issues aside, this is a no-brainer! Nurture groups change lives in profound ways.
Doctorow1
Sats marking, chaos in the school system and the ethics of widening participation
Continue reading...
Sats marking, chaos in the school system and the ethics of widening participation
Continue reading...
The Wolf report says 350,000 young people are on 'dead-end' vocational courses, but this charge is never made of university courses, says Andrew Thomson
People are quick to condemn vocational qualifications as "dead-end" if they fail to lead directly to jobs, but have rarely subjected A-levels and degrees to the same test. This could change as degrees become more expensive and people question whether the qualification is worth the cost.
As colleges gear up for the autumn intake from schools, and send tens of thousands of students on to higher education, it is surprising so little has been said about this. After all, while the Wolf report praised some vocational qualifications, it claimed there were 350,000 young people on "dead-end" courses. Meanwhile we saw a hike in university fees to £9,000 maximum.
So how do you judge the value of a qualification? It is always assumed academic studies are valuable in themselves; people would never say an engineering degree is a dead end if you ultimately become a banker. So why should an IT qualification be a cul-de-sac, if you become a care worker?
The Wolf report struck chords, not least because people recognised the perverse incentives that drive schools to use so-called dead-end courses: school league tables and the contested idea of GCSE equivalence. But the assertion begs two questions. Are "dead-end" courses only available in vocational education? And can cul-de-sacs be changed into part of a highway to success in life?
In 2003, the government calculated that graduates earned an average £400,000 more during their working lives than non-graduates. There was an acceptance that it didn't really matter what the subject was because the degree itself said something about your value.
However, expanding the number of graduates is certain to reduce the dividend of a degree. And though some young people may be persuaded that the loan repayments are acceptable, others won't, and the number of applicants for HE will fall.
While the way degrees relate to jobs is not yet a subject for public anxiety, it's a different story for other qualifications at lower levels of the qualification tree. What value will A-levels have in a world where they are less needed – where progress to HE is seen as an expensive investment and not necessarily cost-beneficial? And what about A-levels that do not lead to HE? Another "dead end"?
There is a different way of doing things and it means being less obsessed with certificates and more concerned with education. The world ahead for young people is one of increasing need for high-value skills and the capacity to be entrepreneurs. We will never be able to match future job-specific needs to the supply of young people via training, in a democracy. So we need to develop a thrust in our curriculum, teaching and learning that promotes the wider skills essential to success in work.
We need courses and teaching that provide skills, nurture attributes and encourage ingenuity. The "dead end" is avoided if a person can transfer these things to their next stage in learning. The answer is not just to dump tranches of vocational courses or restrict A-levels – so long as they deliver these greater goods.
In 2007, Professor Michael Shayer of King's College London published research showing that as test scores for 11-year-olds had risen, cognitive abilities had declined: they passed tests better but they could not think as well. Our future prosperity depends on young people who can think. We do not need perverse incentives to drive schools to put certificates ahead of capabilities, school targets ahead of individual opportunities; the need to fill places ahead of the needs of young people.
We need the potential of our young people to be liberated, and while there is a focus on liberating institutions we risk losing this much greater good in yet more dead ends.
• Andrew Thomson is former CEO of the Quality Improvement Agency and currently interim CEO of the Association of Colleges in the Eastern Region
The Wolf report says 350,000 young people are on 'dead-end' vocational courses, but this charge is never made of university courses, says Andrew Thomson
People are quick to condemn vocational qualifications as "dead-end" if they fail to lead directly to jobs, but have rarely subjected A-levels and degrees to the same test. This could change as degrees become more expensive and people question whether the qualification is worth the cost.
As colleges gear up for the autumn intake from schools, and send tens of thousands of students on to higher education, it is surprising so little has been said about this. After all, while the Wolf report praised some vocational qualifications, it claimed there were 350,000 young people on "dead-end" courses. Meanwhile we saw a hike in university fees to £9,000 maximum.
Continue reading...The Wolf report says 350,000 young people are on 'dead-end' vocational courses, but this charge is never made of university courses, says Andrew Thomson
People are quick to condemn vocational qualifications as "dead-end" if they fail to lead directly to jobs, but have rarely subjected A-levels and degrees to the same test. This could change as degrees become more expensive and people question whether the qualification is worth the cost.
As colleges gear up for the autumn intake from schools, and send tens of thousands of students on to higher education, it is surprising so little has been said about this. After all, while the Wolf report praised some vocational qualifications, it claimed there were 350,000 young people on "dead-end" courses. Meanwhile we saw a hike in university fees to £9,000 maximum.
Continue reading...This week on the Guardian Teacher Network you can find lots of fun resources in celebration of archaeology
Offer a class the chance to make fake poo, and they might think the teacher had lost the plot.
But making fake poo and learning how to excavate it is just one of the resources lined up for teachers on the Guardian Teacher Network this week – in celebration of the start of the 21st British Festival of Archaeology.
And if constructing fake poo for an Aztec or a Viking doesn't appeal, then pupils can have a go at mummifying an orange, making a Viking braid, or even making a tussy mussy or medieval nosegay to ward off illness and disease.
These resources, which have been provided by the Young Archaeologists' Club (YAC), offer more than just a fun activity to fill a bit of space in the timetable. They are also not just about "history", but offer routes into drama, maths, science and geography.
There are also teacher packs on how to identify monuments, record findings and investigate historic buildings on the site – simply search Guardian Teacher Network under archaeology.
Wendi Terry, head of the YAC at the Council for British Archaeology, firmly believes the subject has many cross-curricular links and loads of opportunities for hands-on learning.
She says: "By its very nature, archaeology involves primary sources, problem-solving and co-operation, investigating and interpreting, observing and describing, measuring and recording, preserving and protecting and communicating findings – all of which can be applied to a range of different topics and subjects.
"Archaeology offers a great range of practical, real-life starting points."
Some background resources are available on our network in the form of the Pocket Histories series from the Museum of London – themes include Queen Boudicca in London, the River Thames in prehistory and What Life was like in Roman London.
Archaeological images for use on the interactive whiteboard are another resource now available to use and download, thanks to the Higher Education Academy, Subject Centre for History, Classics and Archaeology.
And to really get involved in archaeology, you could take part in one of the 800 archaeological events being showcased around the country for the festival. Highlights for families include getting involved with a community dig at a typical Victorian terraced house in Sheffield, drill practice for junior soldiers at the Housesteads Roman Fort at Hadrian's Wall, and Stone Age survival at Cheddar Gorge, Somerset.
For anyone living in or visiting London over the next couple of weeks, the Museum of London has a wide selection of Roman-themed events planned, ranging from Gladiator Games and an interactive Roman archaeology walk to how to make your own Roman mosaics or lamp.
The Tower of London is also opening its beach, for the one and only time this year, for a treasure hunt.
• The Guardian Teacher Network offers more than 70,000 pages of lesson plans and interactive materials. This is being added to every day: 35,000 teachers have already registered. Go to teachers.guardian.co.uk. There are more than 1,000 jobs and schools can advertise free: schoolsjobs.guardian.co.uk