A Tangled Web

EDUCATING SLUGGER!



Mick Fealty, over at Slugger O'Toole, has made a great point about interblog dialogue. It strikes me that there is considerable value in web sites which have complimentary and sometimes contradictory takes on contemporary political and cultural issues engaging with each other! Mick has very kindly responded to a few comments I made the other day on the "A" Level issue (dumbing-down). You can read his take here.



In the spirit of positive engagement, I will respond to Mick and would invite other readers who have thoughts on this topic to post either here on ATW or on Slugger.



Mick,



Let's step back a little and consider what we actually believe the point of education to be.



It seems to me that there are two competing philosophies in this country with respect to this.



One is Traditional - the other is Progressive.



The latter is the staple diet of Labour, the Trade Unions, the Educationalists and the Media elite. And leftists. The former is where I, and more conservative-minded people stand. There is a chasm between these views.



My understanding of education in the UK is pretty well summed up by the Campaign for Real Education. Let me quote the essence of what they say;



"Since the 1960's, state education in this country has been inexorably driven towards progressive ideology by means of teacher training, the 'philosophical cleansing' of the teaching profession and its administrators, the removal of the eleven-plus exam, of different examinations for different abilities, and of the choice of grammar, technical or other types of school."



This progressive ideology is egalitarian at all costs, student-centred, process driven, morally neutral, subjective, feeling-based and focused on skills. By contrast, the traditional ideology was meritocratic, subject centred, knowledge based, objective and judgemental.



The two views are not compatible and the progressive view now prevails.



When we look at the ever-rising "A" level issue....let's consider this.



A study at Queen’s University, Belfast, has compared the performance in maths of about 150 students each year since 1995. Despite improvements in the grades attained at GCSE and A-level, the researchers found a decline in basic numeracy skills among undergraduates between 1995 and 2000. It was reported that university staff resented time spent on teaching basic maths, which should have been learnt in school. (Times Educational Supplement, 29 March 2002.)



A survey of 100 academics at Russell Group universities found that 90 of them believed that an A grade at A-level was worth less than it was 10 years ago. The study, by the Conservative Bow Group, said 49 thought academic standards had declined.



So rising standards at "A" level requires QUB staff to introduce remedial maths..mmmm?



There's a major disconnect here between what is presented on paper and what is experienced in reality and from my perspective the disconnect is that successive British Governments, urged on by the 1960's generation of radical educationalist ideologues, have delighted in announcing ever-rising Academic results (because it's not JUST the "A" level that has been dumbed down, it's the "GCSE" and the Degree.) Ministers like Milliband love to claim the glory of the students results and yet they come out with this disturbing nonsense;



"There are eight different types of intelligence. These include: spatial, the ability to perceive the visual world accurately; intra-personal, the ability to understand oneself and one's emotions; and bodily-kinesthetic, the ability to use one's body to express oneself and meet goals.Because different people are good at different things, it is silly to rely on a single metric of aptitude in measuring achievement. Increasingly, our tests and exams are focusing on a broader range of intellectual competence than was traditionally measured by conventional IQ tests" Maybe we need eight versions of the "A" level?



I also find it remarkable that we are asked to believe that intellectual competence has not really been tested suficiently rigourously until New Labour comes to power. Milliband personifies "progressive" educationalist chic - a man with a vision but a man without a clue or, in the long term, accountability for the damage he causes



Finally, as regards my "gold standard" line - It is perhaps worth also considering that in times of financial crisis, gold is frequently used as the safest investment. Maybe even "prudent" Gordon (Brown) who flogged off 50% of the UK's gold deposits realises the fiscal stupidity of THAT move five years on. Our children's education is much more important than the price of gold and that is why I sincerely believe that the traditonal approach is the correct one. I fear however that whilst politicians remain central to Education and in the pockets of the Trade Unions then progressives will rule, "A" levels results will elevate higher and the Dodo from Alice in Wonderland will reign supreme "Everyone's a winner and all will have prizes"