Yet Another Cycling Forum
Off Topic => The Pub => Arts and Entertainment => Topic started by: Exit Stage Left on 26 January, 2011, 06:43:20 pm
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Tonight 9pm BBC2.
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Except for viewers in Scotland.
It's on on Thursday here. Tonight we have Crimewatch.
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Except for viewers in Scotland.
It's on on Thursday here. Tonight we have Crimewatch.
I'd say the English do too.
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Except for viewers in Scotland.
It's on on Thursday here. Tonight we have Crimewatch.
I'd say the English do too.
;D :thumbsup: POTD
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Interesting program, didn't catch the end.
It seemed fairly damning of the comprehensive's ability to match public school education compared to the grammar system. It seemed to confirm what my old history teacher told me, that the actual value of a private education these days is much higher than it was 30-40 years ago, because the gap is getting wider.
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And further evidenced in the awarding of music contracts apparently.
It seems to me that what we're seeing is the success of the previous generation of grammar schools. These gave children of modest means the chance to shine. Many took full advantage and achieved sufficient wealth that they in turn were able to send their children to fee paying schools. And this is the generation that is now achieving success in Parliamentary elections/the music industry etc. I see this as just a natural progression.
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Interesting program, didn't catch the end.
It seemed fairly damning of the comprehensive's ability to match public school education compared to the grammar system. It seemed to confirm what my old history teacher told me, that the actual value of a private education these days is much higher than it was 30-40 years ago, because the gap is getting wider.
I wouldn't have got any more "O" levels or "A" levels at a fee-paying school, I don't think; maybe I would have got three A grades at "A" level rather than AAC, but in 1987 even AAC was more than good enough to apply to Cambridge for an engineering course. I didn't, because of the fear of not fitting in with all the private school lot.
Some private school teachers are crap; you don't actually need any qualifications as I understand it (my wife is a state school teacher and her friend's brother teaches at a prestigious private school).
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The programme raised quite a large number of questions, I'm surprised that there hasn't been more response to it on this forum.
Amongst the points that struck a chord with me were
- The dominance of the career politician
- The closing of the trade union channel as a means of entry into political office
- The lack of socio-economic diversity
- The fact that none of the above apply to the same extent in Scotland or Wales (or presumably N Ireland)
- That comprehensives are not providing the opportunities formerly provided by grammar schools for those with talent to shine
Edit - the other point I've just remembered was the staunch Labour Party member he interviewed who refused to vote at the last election because not of the candidates had a working class background. In my book that's not much different from refusing to vote for them because of their gender or race.
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I think there is a million miles between most private schools and those such as Eton, in all sorts of ways.
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I agree with the grammar school (and, by extension, assisted places) having been a hugely powerful route for entry into politics and business. And, often overlooked, the TUs.
One aspect touched on in the programme was the power of party over constituency - the parachuting in of the favoured and connected into safe seats - at the expense of popular but unconnected local candidates. I'd be interested to know if this has become worse over the past decade. Incidentally, another reason I dislike PR systems as it increase the ease of parties to do this.
However, the question remains - why can't comps adequately develop pupils in the way grammars did or the assisted places scheme allowed?
Last week I watched my daughter in a public speaking competition in which there was a single state school team entered. I was quietly hoping that, Hollywood style, they would confound stereotypes and, with their fantastic oration, wipe the floor with the opposition. It wasn't to be - their posture-free shamble onto stage in their scruffy labourer style uniforms[1] set the tone perfectly for their performance.
I spoke to them after and left the event angered. These were bright kids and happy to put the time in outside of school. How could they be let down so badly? They weren't just poor performers on stage; they lacked the important one-to-one discussion skills for the in-the-margins parts of these events; giggly girls and boys shuffling with eyes downcast. Intelligent, yes, but utterly unschooled. And this was the only comp that had the wit to even enter. Poor sods.
Hopefully, I'll report back from the next rounds of the event to say our region is unrepresentative. I'll let you know next week.
[1] I'm undecided on uniforms but if you are going to have them at school, don't choose a rig that makes the wearer look like he's turned up to move the furniture around.
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Don't feel angry about it...you've helped create the situation.
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Don't feel angry about...you've helped create the situation.
Care to elaborate?
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I flagged this up on this board because it's where people might look to plan their viewing, but a discussion belongs on POBI. It's an important subject, largely because our current education sytem is out of step with developing countries.
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Don't feel angry about...you've helped create the situation.
Care to elaborate?
By supporting the private school system.
The downcast glances and shuffling on stage are happening because those pupils are well aware of their social inferiority.
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Don't feel angry about...you've helped create the situation.
Care to elaborate?
By supporting the private school system.
The downcast glances and shuffling on stage are happening because those pupils are well aware of their social inferiority.
You need to back this up because I have anecdotical evidence showing the opposite.
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I flagged this up on this board because it's where people might look to plan their viewing, but a discussion belongs on POBI. It's an important subject, largely because our current education sytem is out of step with developing countries.
Good point - can someone move it to its rightful location?
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One of the reasons my kids are so eternally grateful to the head teacher of their primary school was that he expected his pupils to excel, no matter what the opposition. When we took chess teams to National Championships, he actually told them that not only did he want them to "beat the posh kids" but that he wanted them to make them cry. Chess, of course, tends to be the domain of the Public Schoolboy. There are very few girls.
Quite frequently, at primary school age, my daughters used to find themselves playing a small boy who would look smugly at his blazered chums and say, all too often rubbing his hands in glee, "Oh good! I'm playing a girl!" What he didn't realise, of course, was that the girl in question happened to be a National Champion in her age group and she didn't say a word nor bat an eyelid. She just thought "Oh good! I'm playing an idiot!" Generally the games were very one-sided: the good players knew who my daughters were.
Of course, there were other state schools who participated and some who succeeded, but they were normally from Richmond-upon-Thames or Hampstead Garden Suburb. For the record, Temple Sutton won 4 national titles in a 10 year period.
This year, the school has the best team for about 10 years I reckon. They are in the National Championships again and have already accounted for Southend High (a State Grammar) and Forest School (a massive fee-paying establishment in Redbridge) and will play Norwich School in the East of England Final soon.
The Temple Sutton Head doesn't just concentrate on chess: we still have the 11+ in Southend and the grammar schools operate it as their entrance exam. He takes his best Year 6 kids and crams them for this. Temple Sutton's best ever scorer in this was a young lad who came 16th in the County. He also won the British u11 Chess Championship with a 100% score - only the 4th junior ever to achieve this. For three or four consecutive years I took him on holiday with us to the British Championships, and for most of the rest of the year I would take him to weekend events where he would clean up with prize money. Sadly, this lad came from a very difficult background and, because of his mother's influence, became very unreliable. A couple of times I went to pick him up for a County match only to be told by his mother that he wasn't there when I could see him in the bedroom window. I suspect that she was depriving him from his chess because he's been misbehaving. Essex would turn up a player short, which was extremely embarrassing, so I just stopped picking him for the team. His academic success collapsed. From being 16th in the County at 11+ he had a mediocre set of GCSEs and worse A levels. His chess went nowhere.
With hindsight, we were conducting a social experiment. We demonstrated that, with the right schooling, kids from council-estate schools can compete with, and beat, the public schools. Allow them to fall way from that and they become mediocre. So in this country we cream off at two levels: firstly, whether you can afford the privileged education and, in Essex, Kent and a few other places, whether we can run an 11+ system which allows kids to be creamed off again. We stick the failures in the sink schools and concentrate on the elite.
What's the difference between the kids? Parental attitude. In the fee-paying and grammar school, the right parental attitude is highly concentrated, they make demands of the school and of course the school provides. The norm in the other schools is tending towards the couldn't-care-less and those kids who have the potential for success are quite often labelled swats and creeps. The system is geared to make them fail.
It is a great tragedy that a Labour government didn't sweep away all this privilege and at a stroke remove all the fee-paying and entrance-exam schools. If they had, and comprehensives had become the norm, every school would have had a hard core of parents with the right parental attitude who would have carried the rest along. There would be no school in which there would have been an anti-educational hard core. There would be far fewer barriers to success amongst kids from less privileged backgrounds.
Curiously, the posh kids would have benefitted from this. Having street-hardened opposition tests them to see if they could sink or swim. The young lad I mentioned above used to terrify his opponents because, so far as they were concerned, he was a freak. A wily, sharp chess player who spoke Saarfend and could give them a bloody nose afterwards (not that he ever did but he had a commanding physical presence). Just imagine what Tim Henman could have achieved if he's gone to a comprehensive school.
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every school would have had a hard core of parents with the right parental attitude who would have carried the rest along.
A mistake is to 'leave' this up to parents alone. The success or otherwise of schools impacts on the whole of society, health, business, the voluntary sector, crime, governance. Parents are hugely important but we need to find a way of making sure all sectors realise how important schooling is, and then get involved in local schooling and education.
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What's the difference between the kids? Parental attitude. In the fee-paying and grammar school, the right parental attitude is highly concentrated, they make demands of the school and of course the school provides. The norm in the other schools is tending towards the couldn't-care-less and those kids who have the potential for success are quite often labelled swats and creeps. The system is geared to make them fail.
I'd say that the far more important point in this is something that you didn't list at all; some parents push their kids to succeed, others don't. Most parents at private schools will push their children because they know how important an education is. What I mean by this is that they'll, for example, sit them down and make them do homework properly. If you're unemployed and have no interest in finding a job, you're going to pass on your 'couldn't care less' attitude about exams to the children.
To give you an example, a successful friend of mine was given 15 minutes of mental arithmetic every night when he went home from school. He was also sat down to do homework every night. Both his sisters went to Cambridge, he decided to go to a different uni.
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You need to back this up because I have anecdotical evidence showing the opposite.
I know you place a lot of value on anecdotal evidence.
After all, you subscribe to an entire belief system based on a fantasy novel. ;D
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What's the difference between the kids? Parental attitude. In the fee-paying and grammar school, the right parental attitude is highly concentrated, they make demands of the school and of course the school provides. The norm in the other schools is tending towards the couldn't-care-less and those kids who have the potential for success are quite often labelled swats and creeps. The system is geared to make them fail.
I'd say that the far more important point in this is something that you didn't list at all; some parents push their kids to succeed, others don't. Most parents at private schools will push their children because they know how important an education is. What I mean by this is that they'll, for example, sit them down and make them do homework properly. If you're unemployed and have no interest in finding a job, you're going to pass on your 'couldn't care less' attitude about exams to the children.
To give you an example, a successful friend of mine was given 15 minutes of mental arithmetic every night when he went home from school. He was also sat down to do homework every night. Both his sisters went to Cambridge, he decided to go to a different uni.
That's precisely what I mean by parental attitude: the expectation that the child will succeed and the wherewithal to make it happen.
Regarding Jaded's point, spot on, but just imagine the difference that is made when every school has a critical mass of parents who are willing that school to succeed, rather than bunging them all into the same school. When every school has its fair share of captains of industry, academics, politicians, high court judges and trade union leaders, they expect results for their kids and there is then no barrier for the poorer kids in the same school to take advantage of the benefits.
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Yup. But a hiccup with parents, is that unless they have multiple kids they are involved for a limited time. Consistency and continuity is valuable (as is gradual change too, of course)
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Regarding Jaded's point, spot on, but just imagine the difference that is made when every school has a critical mass of parents who are willing that school to succeed, rather than bunging them all into the same school. When every school has its fair share of captains of industry, academics, politicians, high court judges and trade union leaders, they expect results for their kids and there is then no barrier for the poorer kids in the same school to take advantage of the benefits.
Currently the Captains of Industry (if they can't afford private schools in this recession) send their kids to the best comp in the area, and all the other CsofI follow.
You can only join this club if you can afford a house in the right area.
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You can only join this club if you can afford a house in the right area.
Which is a real problem; it's even more purely financially selective than the independent system - there you still have to pass entry exams however much wonga your parents might be able to wave.
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Yup. But a hiccup with parents, is that unless they have multiple kids they are involved for a limited time. Consistency and continuity is valuable (as is gradual change too, of course)
That's true, but every year group has its own highly-motivated parents. The baton gets passed on.
I was vice-chair of governors at the kids' primary school for about 10 years, working to the same chairman, one Ron Kennedy, who was leader of the Labour group on Essex County Council. When my youngest left, I thought long and hard about staying on, but the deciding factor was when a couple of parents, working together, decided to make a bid for the chair and vice-chair's job. The timing was perfect: to be honest, my heart wasn't in the job after my daughter had left, I didn't want to fight an election and win (pressure to perform) and I certainly didn't want to fight an election and lose (I'm a very bad loser). The time was right for both Ron and me to retire gracefully and that's exactly what we did. We'd helped the Head steer the school through the choppy waters of Local Management and Grant Maintained status (we always avoided the latter, hanging on to the ideological belief that it was the Local Authority's job to oversee education) and now it was someone else's turn.
I still go into the school to teach chess, but that's now my only involvement. That may well come to an end in July as the Head is due to retire.
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Regarding Jaded's point, spot on, but just imagine the difference that is made when every school has a critical mass of parents who are willing that school to succeed, rather than bunging them all into the same school. When every school has its fair share of captains of industry, academics, politicians, high court judges and trade union leaders, they expect results for their kids and there is then no barrier for the poorer kids in the same school to take advantage of the benefits.
Currently the Captains of Industry (if they can't afford private schools in this recession) send their kids to the best comp in the area, and all the other CsofI follow.
You can only join this club if you can afford a house in the right area.
Choice in schools helps cause this.
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Wow, Governors have an important part to play, however I would look at developing a wider community-school link than that.
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Which is a real problem; it's even more purely financially selective than the independent system - there you still have to pass entry exams however much wonga your parents might be able to wave.
Money buys you coaching, and access to a prep school geared to injecting its pupils into private schools.
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It is a great tragedy that a Labour government didn't sweep away all this privilege and at a stroke remove all the fee-paying and entrance-exam schools. If they had, and comprehensives had become the norm, every school would have had a hard core of parents with the right parental attitude who would have carried the rest along. There would be no school in which there would have been an anti-educational hard core. There would be far fewer barriers to success amongst kids from less privileged backgrounds.
My own experience suggests quite the opposite. I did my O levels at a non selective comprehensive and my A levels at a selective sixth form college. The difference was huge - I went from being the much derided class swot in the comprehensive to one of the many keen to succeed in the sixth form. Comprehensives may bring up the average but it's at the expense of the top end.
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WB, isn't this parentally driven schooling all a bit, well, Big Society for you?
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Wow, Governors have an important part to play, however I would look at developing a wider community-school link than that.
Agreed. Temple Sutton is a leading "Extended School" and it has very strong community links.
It takes a very special person to be able to run a school in this way and the Head is one of the leaders nationally. He gives lectures on the subject and, certainly in the last administration, he advised ministers.
He's going to be bloody hard to replace when he goes at the end of this academic year.
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Do they have stuff about this on their website, and do you have the web address? Sounds good. Ta
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It is a great tragedy that a Labour government didn't sweep away all this privilege and at a stroke remove all the fee-paying and entrance-exam schools. If they had, and comprehensives had become the norm, every school would have had a hard core of parents with the right parental attitude who would have carried the rest along. There would be no school in which there would have been an anti-educational hard core. There would be far fewer barriers to success amongst kids from less privileged backgrounds.
My own experience suggests quite the opposite. I did my O levels at a non selective comprehensive and my A levels at a selective sixth form college. The difference was huge - I went from being the much derided class swot in the comprehensive to one of the many keen to succeed in the sixth form. Comprehensives may bring up the average but it's at the expense of the top end.
Isn't that what I said in my earlier post? By definition, it can't have been comprehensive if there were any fee-paying or selective schools within a 30 mile radius.
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WB, isn't this parentally driven schooling all a bit, well, Big Society for you?
The better parts of the "Big Society" agenda consist of government arrogating to itself the kudos for people doing community things they've always done ;)
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It is a great tragedy that a Labour government didn't sweep away all this privilege and at a stroke remove all the fee-paying and entrance-exam schools. If they had, and comprehensives had become the norm, every school would have had a hard core of parents with the right parental attitude who would have carried the rest along. There would be no school in which there would have been an anti-educational hard core. There would be far fewer barriers to success amongst kids from less privileged backgrounds.
My own experience suggests quite the opposite. I did my O levels at a non selective comprehensive and my A levels at a selective sixth form college. The difference was huge - I went from being the much derided class swot in the comprehensive to one of the many keen to succeed in the sixth form. Comprehensives may bring up the average but it's at the expense of the top end.
My experience is of extremes as well. I went to both a sub-bog-standard rural comp and one of the best independent schools on the planet. This, possibly unfair, comparison does explain my choices when educating my own children.
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WB, isn't this parentally driven schooling all a bit, well, Big Society for you?
Big Society would work well if you break down the class barriers. Our schooling in this country is geared to reinforcing them.
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To Charterhall & Pancho: a comprehensive is only Comprehensive when there is no selection, either by wealth or entrance exam, giving privileged kids the opt out. Otherwise, it's just a mis-named secondary modern.
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You need to back this up because I have anecdotical evidence showing the opposite.
I know you place a lot of value on anecdotal evidence.
After all, you subscribe to an entire belief system based on a fantasy novel. ;D
Anecdotal evidence is still better than assertions out of thin air!
As Wow explained above good state schools see the others as a benchmark to exceed. Although it is true that if they don't they may get into a downward spiral which will make parents flee, this is not a fatality. Equally private school who don't perform eventually go bust. My anecdotal evidence is that if you look at a map of France showing academic results and another showing the percentage of private schools, there is a very strong correlation.
baccalauréat results:
(http://www.mapanddata.com/media/cartes_actu/carte-actu-estimation-resultat-2010-series-generales.jpg)
Proportion of pupils going to private schools:
(http://www.insee.fr/fr/insee_regions/nord-pas-de-calais/themes/pages_de_profils/P08_37/img/carte7_t.png)
Being of a superior atheist breed that can demonstrate everything purely through Cartesian reasoning, I am sure that you will come back proving the contrary ;)
And don't try to start saying that western France is privileged, this used to be the poorest part of France until the suburb phenomenon emerged!
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To Charterhall & Pancho: a comprehensive is only Comprehensive when there is no selection, either by wealth or entrance exam, giving privileged kids the opt out. Otherwise, it's just a mis-named secondary modern.
Which, of course, is true. But your nirvana is never going to happen; independent schools have thrived under all governments and are never going to be abolished. And, if they were, some people would just opt out altogether and home educate (maybe with tutors) or send sprogs abroad.
Given this reality, that's why grammars and assisted places were essential in creating access to the leadership cadre.
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It is a great tragedy that a Labour government didn't sweep away all this privilege and at a stroke remove all the fee-paying and entrance-exam schools. If they had, and comprehensives had become the norm, every school would have had a hard core of parents with the right parental attitude who would have carried the rest along. There would be no school in which there would have been an anti-educational hard core. There would be far fewer barriers to success amongst kids from less privileged backgrounds.
My own experience suggests quite the opposite. I did my O levels at a non selective comprehensive and my A levels at a selective sixth form college. The difference was huge - I went from being the much derided class swot in the comprehensive to one of the many keen to succeed in the sixth form. Comprehensives may bring up the average but it's at the expense of the top end.
Isn't that what I said in my earlier post? By definition, it can't have been comprehensive if there were any fee-paying or selective schools within a 30 mile radius.
I'm not sure I'm following you. Let me clarify, both institutions were drawing from the same population. The Borough had adopted non selective education up to age 16 then if you wanted to stay on you either went to the quite highly selective sixth form college or the less selective technical college. So if you followed the same set of potentially high achievers through the system most only got mediocre results in their O level but then a real step change upwards at A level, ie at the sixth form college. The kids and parents were the same, the difference was the environment within the institution.
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To Charterhall & Pancho: a comprehensive is only Comprehensive when there is no selection, either by wealth or entrance exam, giving privileged kids the opt out. Otherwise, it's just a mis-named secondary modern.
Which, of course, is true. But your nirvana is never going to happen; independent schools have thrived under all governments and are never going to be abolished. And, if they were, some people would just opt out altogether and home educate (maybe with tutors) or send sprogs abroad.
Given this reality, that's why grammars and assisted places were essential in creating access to the leadership cadre.
That's why I greatly rue the fact that a Labour government never made it happen. Mostly, I understand that on the continent they have a far more egalitarian education system than we do here. Why? Because they are not so tied up with bloody class distinctions the whole time.
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It is a great tragedy that a Labour government didn't sweep away all this privilege and at a stroke remove all the fee-paying and entrance-exam schools. If they had, and comprehensives had become the norm, every school would have had a hard core of parents with the right parental attitude who would have carried the rest along. There would be no school in which there would have been an anti-educational hard core. There would be far fewer barriers to success amongst kids from less privileged backgrounds.
My own experience suggests quite the opposite. I did my O levels at a non selective comprehensive and my A levels at a selective sixth form college. The difference was huge - I went from being the much derided class swot in the comprehensive to one of the many keen to succeed in the sixth form. Comprehensives may bring up the average but it's at the expense of the top end.
Isn't that what I said in my earlier post? By definition, it can't have been comprehensive if there were any fee-paying or selective schools within a 30 mile radius.
I'm not sure I'm following you. Let me clarify, both institutions were drawing from the same population. The Borough had adopted non selective education up to age 16 then if you wanted to stay on you either went to the quite highly selective sixth form college or the less selective technical college. So if you followed the same set of potentially high achievers through the system most only got mediocre results in their O level but then a real step change upwards at A level, ie at the sixth form college. The kids and parents were the same, the difference was the environment within the institution.
What borough are we talking about? Were there selective schools, either fee-paying or by entrance exam? If so, then by definition the school can't have been a comprehensive. It might call itself one, but that's not the same as being one.
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WB, isn't this parentally driven schooling all a bit, well, Big Society for you?
The better parts of the "Big Society" agenda consist of government arrogating to itself the kudos for people doing community things they've always done ;)
Trouble with Big Society is that it seems to be "Provide the same Services for Free using volunteers" and lets governmentalise the Voluntary Sector.
I'd harboured a vague hope that it would have been much wider than this, as hinted in my school governance stuff earlier.
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Elite education is the most cost effective way of delivering an educated elite.
The Grammar school system was based on German experience. In the late 19th Century, it was perceived that we were falling behind in technical education. What we got in response, was a watered-down German system, with the emphasis on Science tempered by aspects of the liberal education tradition. It was succeeded by an American model of universal education.
The emergent economies all have ruthlessly competitive educational systems inspired by the German model.
Panoramix's map upthread is intriguing. If you look at the Bac' results for Alsace Moselle, they are as high as Brittany, but the percentage of private schools is apparently low. There is a specific reason for this.
Perhaps the most striking of the legal differences between France and Alsace-Moselle is the absence in Alsace-Moselle of a separation of church and state, even though a constitutional right of freedom of religion is guaranteed by the French government. Alsace-Moselle is still governed by a pre-1905 law established by the Concordat of 1801 which provides for the public subsidy of the Roman Catholic Church, the Lutheran Church, the Calvinist Church and the Jewish religion, as well as providing for public education in these faiths; although parents are allowed to refuse religious education for their children. The clergy for these religions are paid for by the state. Catholic bishops are named by the President of the French Republic following proposal by the Pope. The public University of Strasbourg has courses in theology and is famous for its teaching of Protestant theology.
Local law in Alsace-Moselle - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_law_in_Alsace-Moselle)
Coupled with an historic connection with German educational traditions, it turns Alsace-Moselle into something of a laboratory for much of what we are discussing.
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What borough are we talking about? Were there selective schools, either fee-paying or by entrance exam? If so, then by definition the school can't have been a comprehensive. It might call itself one, but that's not the same as being one.
Solihull. I couldn't tell you whether there were any fee paying schools in the area, I don't recall being aware of any. But I would assume so, on the grounds that most areas have them don't they ? (They certainly do in my current country of residence !).
I can see that my earlier statement requires adjustment to 'non selective schools may bring up the average but it's at the expense of the top end'. Happy now ?
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To Charterhall & Pancho: a comprehensive is only Comprehensive when there is no selection, either by wealth or entrance exam, giving privileged kids the opt out. Otherwise, it's just a mis-named secondary modern.
Which, of course, is true. But your nirvana is never going to happen; independent schools have thrived under all governments and are never going to be abolished. And, if they were, some people would just opt out altogether and home educate (maybe with tutors) or send sprogs abroad.
Given this reality, that's why grammars and assisted places were essential in creating access to the leadership cadre.
That's why I greatly rue the fact that a Labour government never made it happen. Mostly, I understand that on the continent they have a far more egalitarian education system than we do here. Why? Because they are not so tied up with bloody class distinctions the whole time.
Really? I'm not an expert but (at least when I was at school), Denmark, Sweden, Germany and Netherlands (IIRC and off the top of my head) were selective or at had a grammar/secondary type streaming. Also, higher % of private pupils in many countries.
Give a few mins and I'll get wiki-ing.
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And don't try to start saying the western France is privileged, this used to be the poorest part of France until the suburb phenomenon emerged!
It could be because Western France is full of rich English families who send their kids to private schools. :P
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When people talk about the importance of parental attitude in creating a successful school, whether in state or private systems, I agree definitely, but cannot see how allowing a pool of such parents to drive each state school will break down class barriers. This attitude is surely a defining factor of the middle class (as opposed to the rich or any other income definition). You simply aren't going to get a critical mass of such parents in an area like Knowle West.
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When people talk about the importance of parental attitude in creating a successful school, whether in state or private systems, I agree definitely, but cannot see how allowing a pool of such parents to drive each state school will break down class barriers. This attitude is surely a defining factor of the middle class (as opposed to the rich or any other income definition). You simply aren't going to get a critical mass of such parents in an area like Knowle West.
You would in the Knowle that I know ;)
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One of the reasons my kids are so eternally grateful to the head teacher of their primary school was that he expected his pupils to excel, no matter what the opposition. When we took chess teams to National Championships, he actually told them that not only did he want them to "beat the posh kids" but that he wanted them to make them cry.
Do you think instilling that kind of prejudice at such a young age is a good thing?
After all it's the reason you seem to think our school system is such a mess ???
That's why I greatly rue the fact that a Labour government never made it happen. Mostly, I understand that on the continent they have a far more egalitarian education system than we do here. Why? Because they are not so tied up with bloody class distinctions the whole time.
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One of the reasons my kids are so eternally grateful to the head teacher of their primary school was that he expected his pupils to excel, no matter what the opposition. When we took chess teams to National Championships, he actually told them that not only did he want them to "beat the posh kids" but that he wanted them to make them cry.
Do you think instilling that kind of prejudice at such a young age is a good thing?
At my school it was called bullying.
On another note, I'm sick of bright kids being treated as nothing more than fuel for driving the less bright/privileged/whatever kids on to greater things. The bright ones are people too, you know!
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One of the reasons my kids are so eternally grateful to the head teacher of their primary school was that he expected his pupils to excel, no matter what the opposition. When we took chess teams to National Championships, he actually told them that not only did he want them to "beat the posh kids" but that he wanted them to make them cry.
Do you think instilling that kind of prejudice at such a young age is a good thing?
At my school it was called bullying.
On another note, I'm sick of bright kids being treated as nothing more than fuel for driving the less bright/privileged/whatever kids on to greater things. The bright ones are people too, you know!
Prejudice? Bullying? Against the very people having an attitude of entitlement and superiority systematically thrust upon them? ;D
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One of the reasons my kids are so eternally grateful to the head teacher of their primary school was that he expected his pupils to excel, no matter what the opposition. When we took chess teams to National Championships, he actually told them that not only did he want them to "beat the posh kids" but that he wanted them to make them cry.
Do you think instilling that kind of prejudice at such a young age is a good thing?
Thank you Rapples for making that point. If I found that a headmaster was encouraging bullying based on who a child's parents are, I would be appalled.
And yes, I was bullied for being "posh" - because I didn't live on the council estate next to school, like many other kids!
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One of the reasons my kids are so eternally grateful to the head teacher of their primary school was that he expected his pupils to excel, no matter what the opposition. When we took chess teams to National Championships, he actually told them that not only did he want them to "beat the posh kids" but that he wanted them to make them cry.
Do you think instilling that kind of prejudice at such a young age is a good thing?
Thank you Rapples for making that point. If I found that a headmaster was encouraging bullying based on who a child's parents are, I would be appalled.
And yes, I was bullied for being "posh" - because I didn't live on the council estate next to school, like many other kids!
Kids cry when they lose games of chess: I've seen grown men cry when they lose games of chess. They cry when they have been given an unreasonable expectation of their entitlement to something. It's a hard game and there's no escaping the fact that, if you lose, on that occasion your opponent was better than you.
If you are brought up, as many privately-educated kids are, to expect everything on a plate, it comes as a nasty shock when it doesn't happen, especially when it's your supposed inferiors who dish it out to you.
It's nothing whatever to do with bullying.
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Making the posh kids[1] cry has long been a tradition of bullies in UK schools. To see WB praising it and to hear of a headmaster encouraging it is shocking.
[1] Usually "posh" meaning intelligent or articulate or just going to a different school.
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Making the posh kids[1] cry has long been a tradition of bullies in UK schools. To see WB praising it and to hear of a headmaster encouraging it is shocking.
[1] Usually "posh" meaning intelligent or articulate or just going to a different school.
Bollocks. The rules of chess were applied and overseen by several of the country's top arbiters, at least two of whom were associated with what I believe to be fee-paying schools (Liverpool College and Haberdasher's, London).
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We do have in our presence somone well qualified to comment on Grammar Schools and social mobility. The programme was bemoaning the fact that it was now unlikely that anyone from a less moneyed background could now do PPE at Oxford.
But some counties do still have selective Grammar Schools, and their results are good. One factor is that they atrract a high standard of teaching staff. Essex and Kent spring to mind. I remember reading a thread about a debating competition held at Maidstone Girl's Grammar, and the two privately-educated women wo went along to help with the judging of it seemed quite impressed by the standard, as was the proud father of the Head of History at that school.
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Poor little overprivileged.
If they are beaten in a formal process such as chess, which knows no class but does discriminate between skill levels, that's just tough.
If they have been told that they will win everything all the time because they are inherently 'better' (and they are), then the cruelty is on the part of their teachers.
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We do have in our presence somone well qualified to comment on Grammar Schools and social mobility. The programme was bemoaning the fact that it was now unlikely that anyone from a less moneyed background could now do PPE at Oxford.
But some counties do still have selective Grammar Schools, and their results are good. One factor is that they atrract a high standard of teaching staff. Essex and Kent spring to mind. I remember reading a thread about a debating competition held at Maidstone Girl's Grammar, and the two privately-educated women wo went along to help with the judging of it seemed quite impressed by the standard, as was the proud father of the Head of History at that school.
Oh, fantastic! Straight 10s for that personal attack, ESL. Do you actually make notes on ancient threads and posts so that you can use them years later to attack people? You sad individual! (Edited on advice)
I've really riled the right-whingers today, haven't I? ;D
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I usually get quite pissed off when grown men talk about how they want to making children cry, especially when it's not because of anything those children have done but because of something they can't control, i.e. their parents' income.
I was also bullied in school for being the dorky nice kid with the funny accent, but at least the bullies didn't pretend to be doing it for the good of class war. Everyone knew they were just being little shits.
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No, you've completely discredited your side of the debate by descending into swearing at someone for what (and I've read it several times now in case I missed something) seems like a perfectly innocuous post.
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No, you've completely discredited your side of the debate by descending into swearing at someone for what (and I've read it several times now in case I missed something) seems like a perfectly innocuous post.
It's a thinly veiled personal attack. Given time, I could supply you with the links to demonstrate the fact.
I'll deal with the issues with reasoned debate. Personal attack is something else.
The ironic part is that a whole succession of people have lined up to attack me because they have chosen to misinterpret something I posted earlier as condoning bullying! ;D
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But reducing children to tears for going to the wrong school or just being "posh" is something to be cheered, eh?
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Compare and contrast:
Go out there and show them that being 'privileged' does not mean they're better than you.
Go out there and make the rich little bastards cry.
I sometimes wonder what people would moan about if Britain did become a 'classless' society.
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But reducing children to tears for going to the wrong school or just being "posh" is something to be cheered, eh?
Point out where anyone said it was.
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But reducing children to tears for going to the wrong school or just being "posh" is something to be cheered, eh?
Point out where anyone said it was.
Well you were. You gave it as an example of why such and such a school or head was so good.
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Wowbagger, you quoted this with approval. As someone who escaped school after not a few tears, I hope my kids never come into contact with your headmaster.
he actually told them that not only did he want them to "beat the posh kids" but that he wanted them to make them cry. Chess, of course, tends to be the domain of the Public Schoolboy. There are very few girls.
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The ironic part is that a whole succession of people have lined up to attack me ... <SNIP>
Does this whining make you a left-whinger ?
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But reducing children to tears for going to the wrong school or just being "posh" is something to be cheered, eh?
Point out where anyone said it was.
Well you were. You gave it as an example of why such and such a school or head was so good.
What's the alternative? The posh kids turn up to the matches in pristine blazers and tailored trousers to our lot's sweatshirts, jeans and trainers. Mummy and Daddy hover around in sharp suits and rattling jewellery - a bit overdressed for an event taking place at a Pontins' holiday camp! Their whole body language - and, indeed, language, was geared to try to impose their superiority off the board. That's bullying - flaunting your extra wealth, code for saying "Whatever happens in this game of chess, when I'm grown up daddy will see to it that I get a very lucrative job as an investment banker whereas the best any of you will manage is a teacher." They are advertising the fact that they are posh. Why should we not refer to this ostentatious display of wealth in disparaging terms?
As for making them cry, it happens in all competitive arenas. If you don't like it, don't compete.
As an aside, I'm wondering what the catalyst has been for it taking until page 5 of the thread for you to attack me for something I wrote on page 2 when you've posted several times in the interim.
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The ironic part is that a whole succession of people have lined up to attack me ... <SNIP>
Does this whining make you a left-whinger ?
No, because you carefully edited out the bit which demonstrated the irony and the fact that I find it funny.
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One of the reasons my kids are so eternally grateful to the head teacher of their primary school was that he expected his pupils to excel, no matter what the opposition. When we took chess teams to National Championships, he actually told them that not only did he want them to "beat the posh kids" but that he wanted them to make them cry.
Do you think instilling that kind of prejudice at such a young age is a good thing?
Thank you Rapples for making that point. If I found that a headmaster was encouraging bullying based on who a child's parents are, I would be appalled.
And yes, I was bullied for being "posh" - because I didn't live on the council estate next to school, like many other kids!
Kids cry when they lose games of chess: I've seen grown men cry when they lose games of chess. They cry when they have been given an unreasonable expectation of their entitlement to something. It's a hard game and there's no escaping the fact that, if you lose, on that occasion your opponent was better than you.
If you are brought up, as many privately-educated kids are, to expect everything on a plate, it comes as a nasty shock when it doesn't happen, especially when it's your supposed inferiors who dish it out to you.
It's nothing whatever to do with bullying.
I think that's a bit harsh on the public school kids. Yes, children cry when they lose, but to say it's mere sense of entitlement is to lose a lot of the background there.
Kids at private school - as I know, having been to one, as ESL has kindly pointed out - don't have as much of a sense of entitlement as you suggest. (Possibly at Eton / Rugby / Harrow, but not at places like the one I went to.) Yes, the parents have to pay, but they don't just push the money in like a parking meter and leave the kids doing nothing.
To get in, you pass some hideously difficult exams (our 11+ paper was based on a GCSE text). If you are willing to work hard enough, there are amazing opportunities there - peripatetic music lessons, a huge art lab, playing fields for miles, drama clubs, teachers who are always willing to spend morning break going over work with you. It's an atmosphere in which it's difficult nott to learn.
But within that hothouse environment, you don't often fail. When you have that much input from parents and teachers, and a classroom full of other kids who are (secretly) keen to learn, you DO get through the 11+ and you DO get brilliant GCSEs and you DO get the grade 8 music and you DO get the sports medals and you DO get good A levels and you DO get your top UCAS place.
You learn that if you just work that bit harder, you can achieve anything.
And then you enter the real world and you're not competing against thirty other kids, there are six billion adults in the world and you cannot, no matter how hard you work, be best any more.
It's not a coincidence that a number of my classmates had a couple of holidays at Rhodes Farm, and almost all of my friends from Oxford have at some stage been provided with Citalopram.
Your little chess players didn't, I suspect, cry because they felt entitled to win, but because losing was synonymous with shame, inadequacy, parental disappointment, and failure. If you're hothoused into winning everything you do, losing is a REALLY big deal.
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Hence why I said that the cruelty lies not with the comp side of the equation.
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Compare and contrast:
Go out there and show them that being 'privileged' does not mean they're better than you.
Go out there and make the rich little bastards cry.
I sometimes wonder what people would moan about if Britain did become a 'classless' society.
They'd moan about money, because money has become synonymous with class.
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We do have in our presence somone well qualified to comment on Grammar Schools and social mobility. The programme was bemoaning the fact that it was now unlikely that anyone from a less moneyed background could now do PPE at Oxford.
But some counties do still have selective Grammar Schools, and their results are good. One factor is that they atrract a high standard of teaching staff. Essex and Kent spring to mind. I remember reading a thread about a debating competition held at Maidstone Girl's Grammar, and the two privately-educated women wo went along to help with the judging of it seemed quite impressed by the standard, as was the proud father of the Head of History at that school.
I stopped apologizing for where my parents chose to send me to school some years ago. ;D
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Our experience was that there were different levels of fee-paying schools. There were some who were perfectly decent and gracious in victory or defeat. There was one in particular which was the classical stereotype I've described above. On one famous occasion their teacher was warned by an arbiter for physically threatening me! Whilst the match between our teams was in progress, and it was clearly going against them, each time I tried to get a view of a board, he deliberately stood in my way. I'd move to another board, he would stand in the way again. When I asked him to stop doing it, he rounded on me in a very aggressive fashion.
Oh, we got at them all right. These schools would invest about £100 an hour for a top IM's time and our school had me. The sad part was that when the kids left Temple Sutton and went on (mostly) to Southend High, the secondary school did nothing whatever. That was the point at which the top IM could have made a difference. I'm not a good enough chess player to be able to advance the career of a strong secondary age player - not that Southend High ever asked me.
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At my school it was called bullying.
I think you need to take a step back. This is about a chess match. The head was not inciting physical or verbal violence against the other side, just firing up his own team to win at the game they were playing. I read Wow's comment more as reflecting the likely reaction of the "posh kids" in being thrashed at chess by some oiks, for the reasons Julian outlined so eloquently.
For children from a comp up against the poised self-assurance that private education can bring - it's a bit like the coach of a rugby team firing up his players when they take on a famous side.
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What's the alternative?
The alternative is to teach how to be magnanimous in victory. To take pride in achievement in its own right. To have self-respect.
The posh kids turn up to the matches in pristine blazers and tailored trousers to our lot's sweatshirts, jeans and trainers. Their whole body language - and, indeed, language, was geared to try to impose their superiority off the board. That's bullying - flaunting your extra wealth, code for saying "Whatever happens in this game of chess, when I'm grown up daddy will see to it that I get a very lucrative job as an investment banker whereas the best any of you will manage is a teacher. They are advertising the fact that they are posh. Why should we not refer to this ostentatious display of wealth in disparaging terms?
This is so full of misunderstanding, I don't know where to begin.
As for making them cry, it happens in all competitive arenas. If you don't like it, don't compete.
The more I read of you as an educationalist, WB, the more relieved I am that my children are fortunate to be educated in a system that recognises effort and enjoyment.
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What's the alternative?
The alternative is to teach how to be magnanimous in victory. To take pride in achievement in its own right. To have self-respect.
Which is precisely my philosophy.
The posh kids turn up to the matches in pristine blazers and tailored trousers to our lot's sweatshirts, jeans and trainers. Their whole body language - and, indeed, language, was geared to try to impose their superiority off the board. That's bullying - flaunting your extra wealth, code for saying "Whatever happens in this game of chess, when I'm grown up daddy will see to it that I get a very lucrative job as an investment banker whereas the best any of you will manage is a teacher. They are advertising the fact that they are posh. Why should we not refer to this ostentatious display of wealth in disparaging terms?
This is so full of misunderstanding, I don't know where to begin.
Try.
As for making them cry, it happens in all competitive arenas. If you don't like it, don't compete.
The more I read of you as an educationalist, WB, the more relieved I am that my children are fortunate to be educated in a system that recognises effort and enjoyment.
What makes you think I don't?
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At my school it was called bullying.
I think you need to take a step back. This is about a chess match. The head was not inciting physical or verbal violence against the other side, just firing up his own team to win at the game they were playing. I read Wow's comment more as reflecting the likely reaction of the "posh kids" in being thrashed at chess by some oiks, for the reasons Julian outlined so eloquently.
For children from a comp up against the poised self-assurance that private education can bring - it's a bit like the coach of a rugby team firing up his players when they take on a famous side.
It is actually a state primary school but we often played, and beat, selective and fee-paying secondary establishments.
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It's very interesting how bullying takes place in insidious ways.
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At my school it was called bullying.
I think you need to take a step back. This is about a chess match. The head was not inciting physical or verbal violence against the other side, just firing up his own team to win at the game they were playing. I read Wow's comment more as reflecting the likely reaction of the "posh kids" in being thrashed at chess by some oiks, for the reasons Julian outlined so eloquently.
For children from a comp up against the poised self-assurance that private education can bring - it's a bit like the coach of a rugby team firing up his players when they take on a famous side.
And I'm sure the head of the other school will have done a similar pep talk. It's real Psychology 101 stuff to talk up your team before they start. (Just before our GCSEs, our head gave us a talk on how {myoldschool} girls were brilliant at maths & science, had a reputation to maintain etc - it's only now that I realise she wasn't just talking us up, she was priming us to remember that we were an educationally good group & to achieve in line with that expectation.)
The posh kids turn up to the matches in pristine blazers and tailored trousers to our lot's sweatshirts, jeans and trainers. Their whole body language - and, indeed, language, was geared to try to impose their superiority off the board. That's bullying - flaunting your extra wealth, code for saying "Whatever happens in this game of chess, when I'm grown up daddy will see to it that I get a very lucrative job as an investment banker whereas the best any of you will manage is a teacher. They are advertising the fact that they are posh. Why should we not refer to this ostentatious display of wealth in disparaging terms?
I don't suppose the kids thought of it in those terms for a minute. Their thought process was probably "if I don't turn up as required in blazer & trousers our head won't let me compete." If that was a message, it was being sent from one adult to another, using the kids as the medium. And was clearly received loud and clear. :-\
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At my school it was called bullying.
I think you need to take a step back. This is about a chess match. The head was not inciting physical or verbal violence against the other side, just firing up his own team to win at the game they were playing. I read Wow's comment more as reflecting the likely reaction of the "posh kids" in being thrashed at chess by some oiks, for the reasons Julian outlined so eloquently.
For children from a comp up against the poised self-assurance that private education can bring - it's a bit like the coach of a rugby team firing up his players when they take on a famous side.
What is wrong with just winning?
Frankly, I can't see any context in which hoping a losing child cries is anything other than unsavoury, bordering on frankly disgusting. WB approves of this message being passed onto other children because it fits in with his prejudices.
I have taught some very scuzzy kids over the years. How would you have felt, WB, if I'd sent them to some competitive event involving your kids, who are hugely privileged by comparison, and told them that I hoped they made them cry?
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What is wrong with just winning?
Absolutely nothing, and I think that's all what was being suggested. As I say, I read the comment about making them cry as a somewhere between a prediction of reaction and a confidence-booster for the under dog. If it's suggested in all seriousness that making posh kids (or any kids) cry for its own sake (as opposed to them reacting that way when they lose) was a good thing then I'd agree that it's highly unsavoury.
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At my school it was called bullying.
I think you need to take a step back. This is about a chess match. The head was not inciting physical or verbal violence against the other side, just firing up his own team to win at the game they were playing. I read Wow's comment more as reflecting the likely reaction of the "posh kids" in being thrashed at chess by some oiks, for the reasons Julian outlined so eloquently.
For children from a comp up against the poised self-assurance that private education can bring - it's a bit like the coach of a rugby team firing up his players when they take on a famous side.
And I'm sure the head of the other school will have done a similar pep talk. It's real Psychology 101 stuff to talk up your team before they start. (Just before our GCSEs, our head gave us a talk on how {myoldschool} girls were brilliant at maths & science, had a reputation to maintain etc - it's only now that I realise she wasn't just talking us up, she was priming us to remember that we were an educationally good group & to achieve in line with that expectation.)
And that's a perfectly valid message conveying high expectations and confidence in the ability of the audience.
What makes WB's story so unpalatable is that the headmaster is praised because his message to his pupils was "not only did he want them to "beat the posh kids" but that he wanted them to make them cry".
No school in my experience would tolerate this attitude from a child let alone an adult. In fact I know of an occasion when a comment demeaning an opposition team resulted in detention.
I'm wondering if this was ever actually said or whether WB embellished the tale without thinking of what he was saying. The more I think about it, the less credible it is that a headmaster ever said those words.
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At my school it was called bullying.
I think you need to take a step back. This is about a chess match. The head was not inciting physical or verbal violence against the other side, just firing up his own team to win at the game they were playing. I read Wow's comment more as reflecting the likely reaction of the "posh kids" in being thrashed at chess by some oiks, for the reasons Julian outlined so eloquently.
For children from a comp up against the poised self-assurance that private education can bring - it's a bit like the coach of a rugby team firing up his players when they take on a famous side.
What is wrong with just winning?
Frankly, I can't see any context in which hoping a losing child cries is anything other than unsavoury, bordering on frankly disgusting. WB approves of this message being passed onto other children because it fits in with his prejudices.
I have taught some very scuzzy kids over the years. How would you have felt, WB, if I'd sent them to some competitive event involving your kids, who are hugely privileged by comparison, and told them that I hoped they made them cry?
Some, but by no means all. But I don't see how a willy-waving "my school's kids are scuzzier than yours" is a profitable line of debate.
As I've pointed out above, tears after chess games are not uncommon, even amongst otherwise supposedly well-adjusted adults. It can be because one's sense of entitlement is proven to be misplaced (more likely in a junior who doesn't have the experience of the world to be realistic), but it can be sheer frustration at one's own ability to bugger up what seemed to be a winning position. I know that feeling very well indeed.
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OK, I think we can now translate the original statement, which appeared to have unsavoury intent:
When we took chess teams to National Championships, he actually told them that not only did he want them to "beat the posh kids" ...
"posh kids" = kids with more privileges than us, but who are people too, and worthy opponents
... but that he wanted them to make them cry.
kids often cry when they lose at chess. We want to win, and that might make them cry, but everyone will be friends afterwards. Let's go win!
If we leave it there will everyone be happy? :)
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Some, but by no means all. But I don't see how a willy-waving "my school's kids are scuzzier than yours" is a profitable line of debate.
The fact that you said that, and assumed that was my motivation, shows that you are myopic when it comes to issues of class. You are unable to see things from the point of view of the 'privileged', even though in many ways you are in that category.
Now, care to answer my actual question and not one of your choice?
Your original question about winning? Nothing at all, but in chess you don't take any prisoners. You get the upper hand and it's your job to keep it. You don't want to give your opponent a chance to get back in. Ruthlessness in a game of chess looks to the uninitiated to be just the same as bullying: taking advantage of your superior forces and not letting up. The difference is that the participants are there on a voluntary basis.
Winning was all we were setting out to do. During one National Final (1996), which by coincidence (I think) had been arranged for the same day as the County Championships Finals in Birmingham, and just a few yards apart, we had a succession of top players come in and see what was going on. One of them remarked "Hasn't anyone told the Temple Sutton players that they don't have to win every match 5 - 0?"
Am I supposed to apologise for the fact that that particular team was absolutely streets ahead of the opposition that year?
As an edit to the above, it is a great psychological advantage to be able to sit down to play against someone who is already frightened of you. Games can be won and lost by what happens off the board to affect the players' attitudes.
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As winning is so often seen as a 'bad' thing these days, Chess could always go PC (http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWXfO_9CJtc/R-8CsFyURaI/AAAAAAAAB_4/gqJ3bgYhd_0/s400/Kings1.jpg)...
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Private shools in France = catholic schools. I went to one. My parents didn't pay much more than in a state school (we paid a £300 p.a. 20 years ago as opposed to £100). Yes, however, education was better. But, as I understand it, the staff etc. are still paid by the Education Nationale, i.e. the state.
As for the UK, well, I will be deciding where I send my kids. If state schooling is poor, which it is in many areas, then I reserve the right to invest myself in my daugther's future, seeing as the UK is very liberal and has left it for me to decide to do so. Will she become a little pest? well that is also down, in part, to me at home and, with our respective origins and a strong belief in meritocraty, I think she will remain well grounded.
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As winning is so often seen as a 'bad' thing these days,PC (http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWXfO_9CJtc/R-8CsFyURaI/AAAAAAAAB_4/gqJ3bgYhd_0/s400/Kings1.jpg)...
Only if you believe the shite in the Daily Mail
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As winning is so often seen as a 'bad' thing these days,PC (http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWXfO_9CJtc/R-8CsFyURaI/AAAAAAAAB_4/gqJ3bgYhd_0/s400/Kings1.jpg)...
Only if you believe the shite in the Daily Mail
Wow, you really are a humour free zone aren't you.
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Boo hoo :'(
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Are you being bullied, UK?
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Clandy made the posh kid cry. :thumbsup:
;D
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As winning is so often seen as a 'bad' thing these days,PC (http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWXfO_9CJtc/R-8CsFyURaI/AAAAAAAAB_4/gqJ3bgYhd_0/s400/Kings1.jpg)...
Only if you believe the shite in the Daily Mail
Well all three parties did seem to take the winning is a bad thing to hart at the last election. Shame only two came out with prizes though I thought it was PC to have prizes for all these days.
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Having played chess for a local comprehensive against Eton in the Berkshire schools league, I can say there didn't appear to be a sence of entitlement, and yes the match was played in Harry's maths class room.
We were there in our uniform blazers all looking sensibly smart, with our teacher who ran the club but didn't train us. Yes it did feel odd to walk past some of their pupils in tail coats etc. but the wasn't the intimidation we got from some of the other comprehensives who would throw eggs at the bus as we went past. The biggest difference was in the food provided for the matches, most teams would take turns to have your parent provide sandwiches, however for the boarding schools this was a bit harder so the staff would supply biscuits or if we were lucky the canteen would provide an array of sandwiches and cake.
I would agree though that the achievement of the pupil is down to a number of factors including:
1) the willingness of the parents to support/ cajole/ push the child to achieve.
2) the ethos of the school to supprot / cajole / push the child to achieve.
3) the drive of the parents to ensure 2
4) the ability of the school to cope with disruptive pupils so that children where 1), 2), and 3) are there are not held back / disadvantaged.
In choosing private schools 1) is met as the parents are often making sacrifices to achieve this, it can also be seen in the scramble to get into 'top' state schools. 2) is also there in private schools though it was also there in my comprehensive. 3) is about the parents input, often about achieving 4) and 2) and is about the parents opting into activities which will stretch the child or taking an active interest at parents evenings. For private schools 4) is probably achieved via exclusions / letters to parents to achieve 1). For comprehensives it is about coping with those children where 1) is not happening.
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he actually told them that not only did he want them to "beat the posh kids" but that he wanted them to make them cry. Chess, of course, tends to be the domain of the Public Schoolboy. There are very few girls.
Can we replace the word"posh" with "gay" or "black" and see if people are still willing to defend the original statement? They are all words to describe a group of people who are different through birth and/or the genes/social standing of their parents.........
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he actually told them that not only did he want them to "beat the posh kids" but that he wanted them to make them cry. Chess, of course, tends to be the domain of the Public Schoolboy. There are very few girls.
Can we replace the word"posh" with "gay" or "black" and see if people are still willing to defend the original statement? They are all words to describe a group of people who are different through birth and/or the genes/social standing of their parents.........
I don't think that works - you'd need to replace the word 'posh' with 'straight' or 'white' for that to be effective. There are a very few schools where the intake is almost all black (in the political sense) - would it be okay for that headteacher to say "Let's beat the white kids!"
Isms are privilege plus power. This is why people who talk about "reverse racism" and "reverse sexism" are usually talking out of their bottoms.
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he actually told them that not only did he want them to "beat the posh kids" but that he wanted them to make them cry. Chess, of course, tends to be the domain of the Public Schoolboy. There are very few girls.
Can we replace the word"posh" with "gay" or "black" and see if people are still willing to defend the original statement? They are all words to describe a group of people who are different through birth and/or the genes/social standing of their parents.........
I don't think that works - you'd need to replace the word 'posh' with 'straight' or 'white' for that to be effective. There are a very few schools where the intake is almost all black (in the political sense) - would it be okay for that headteacher to say "Let's beat the white kids!"
Er, no.
And doubly no to say "lets not just beat the white kids - I hope you make 'em cry as well".
It's just not they way to bring up children. It's vile.
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Curiously, it does seem to be okay for primary schools to divide kids into 'boys' teams' and 'girls' teams' and to urge each one to 'beat the boys / girls.'
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...people who talk about "reverse racism" and "reverse sexism" are usually talking out of their bottoms.
Up to a point. If feminism taught us* anything, surely it is that we need to carefully examine our own prejudices, whatever they may be, and try to overcome them?
* me
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Curiously, it does seem to be okay for primary schools to divide kids into 'boys' teams' and 'girls' teams' and to urge each one to 'beat the boys / girls.'
Do they encourage them to make the other team cry?????
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Curiously, it does seem to be okay for primary schools to divide kids into 'boys' teams' and 'girls' teams' and to urge each one to 'beat the boys / girls.'
Can't say I've come across this.
But if that is the case, then it's fine to encourage competition provided it's also done in a way which encourages mutual respect. That's what being sporting is all about; being able to give all your effort and to still respect yourself and your opponent whatever the outcome.
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Curiously, it does seem to be okay for primary schools to divide kids into 'boys' teams' and 'girls' teams' and to urge each one to 'beat the boys / girls.'
Really? My mother is a primary school teacher, and at no time in her 28 year career was she witness to this.
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I'm still intrigued as to why it was that the thread was trotting along quite happily and uncontroversially and suddenly, and almost as though a command was given, two or three pages and two days after I made a long post, one particular sentence in it has unleashed the attack dogs.
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...people who talk about "reverse racism" and "reverse sexism" are usually talking out of their bottoms.
Up to a point. If feminism taught us* anything, surely it is that we need to carefully examine our own prejudices, whatever they may be, and try to overcome them?
* me
Which is why I said "usually" and not "always." ;)
The usually part refers to Privilege Denying Dude (http://jezebel.com/5691457/privilege+denying-dude-knows-that-deep-down-youre-bisexual) and his ilk.
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Curiously, it does seem to be okay for primary schools to divide kids into 'boys' teams' and 'girls' teams' and to urge each one to 'beat the boys / girls.'
Really? My mother is a primary school teacher, and at no time in her 28 year career was she witness to this.
I'm surprised someone so unobservant is allowed to teach.
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Curiously, it does seem to be okay for primary schools to divide kids into 'boys' teams' and 'girls' teams' and to urge each one to 'beat the boys / girls.'
Really? My mother is a primary school teacher, and at no time in her 28 year career was she witness to this.
I'm surprised someone so unobservant is allowed to teach.
I've met a lot of teachers and, frankly, I'm not.
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Isms are privilege plus power. This is why people who talk about "reverse racism" and "reverse sexism" are usually talking out of their bottoms.
Ah yes, that old chestnut. So TV ads proclaiming 'So simple even a man can do it' are just friendly banter are they? TV ads depicting men as hopeless and unable to deal with a cold are just 'friendly banter' too I suppose? When if the same ads were aired saying the same about women there would be an almighty stink created by feminists.
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Curiously, it does seem to be okay for primary schools to divide kids into 'boys' teams' and 'girls' teams' and to urge each one to 'beat the boys / girls.'
Really? My mother is a primary school teacher, and at no time in her 28 year career was she witness to this.
I'm surprised someone so unobservant is allowed to teach.
I'm surprised someone so blinkered and biased and up their own unshaven feminist arse is permitted to practice law, but hey-ho. Btw, thanks for insulting my mother, someone you have never met and know nothing about.
I will add to my post on this issue that in my entire time at school as a pupil, not once were we divided into boy and girl teams and made to compete against each other.
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Curiously, it does seem to be okay for primary schools to divide kids into 'boys' teams' and 'girls' teams' and to urge each one to 'beat the boys / girls.'
Really? My mother is a primary school teacher, and at no time in her 28 year career was she witness to this.
That would surprise me greatly. I have experienced it in my own schooling (1970s to mid-80s) and that of my children (mid-90s onwards).
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Isms are privilege plus power. This is why people who talk about "reverse racism" and "reverse sexism" are usually talking out of their bottoms.
Ah yes, that old chestnut. So TV ads proclaiming 'So simple even a man can do it' are just friendly banter are they? TV ads depicting men as hopeless and unable to deal with a cold are just 'friendly banter' too I suppose? When if the same ads were aired saying the same about women there would be an almighty stink created by feminists.
Humour arises from the unexpected. Therefore it is supposedly funny to have an advert saying something is so simple even a man can do it - because in real life, men do the difficult things (running the country, being high court judges, fixing technical things). Funny. Lol. (Well, no, but you get the idea.)
If women are portrayed as stupid, that is not unexpected, because cultural meme has it that women are a bit weak, simple minded, etc. So there is no humour.
I dislike the ads very much, because they draw on unpleasant gender stereotypes, but to suggest that they are reverse sexism is bottomgravy.
Would you now like to do "why it is that we don't have a White Police Association, surely that's reverse racism?" followed by "But What About the Able-Bodied Direct Action Network"?
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Curiously, it does seem to be okay for primary schools to divide kids into 'boys' teams' and 'girls' teams' and to urge each one to 'beat the boys / girls.'
Really? My mother is a primary school teacher, and at no time in her 28 year career was she witness to this.
I'm surprised someone so unobservant is allowed to teach.
I'm surprised someone so blinkered and biased and up their own unshaven feminist arse is permitted to practice law, but hey-ho. Btw, thanks for insulting my mother, someone you have never met and know nothing about.
I will add to my post on this issue that in my entire time at school as a pupil, not once were we divided into boy and girl teams and made to compete against each other.
Few women shave their arses, Clandy. If you've encountered any who do, you should also check for testicles.
My experience has been different to that of your mother, both in my own education (at a mixed primary) and then when I've done one-to-one reading at a mixed primary. Indeed, there was a recent TV programme where they separated out the boys and then made them do a debating competition and some other competition against the girls.
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Isms are privilege plus power. This is why people who talk about "reverse racism" and "reverse sexism" are usually talking out of their bottoms.
Ah yes, that old chestnut. So TV ads proclaiming 'So simple even a man can do it' are just friendly banter are they? TV ads depicting men as hopeless and unable to deal with a cold are just 'friendly banter' too I suppose? When if the same ads were aired saying the same about women there would be an almighty stink created by feminists.
Humour arises from the unexpected. Therefore it is supposedly funny to have an advert saying something is so simple even a man can do it - because in real life, men do the difficult things (running the country, being high court judges, fixing technical things). Funny. Lol. (Well, no, but you get the idea.)
If women are portrayed as stupid, that is not unexpected, because cultural meme has it that women are a bit weak, simple minded, etc. So there is no humour.
I dislike the ads very much, because they draw on unpleasant gender stereotypes, but to suggest that they are reverse sexism is bottomgravy.
Would you now like to do "why it is that we don't have a White Police Association, surely that's reverse racism?" followed by "But What About the Able-Bodied Direct Action Network"?
So basically in your warped PC world misandry is fine and tickeyboo, but mysogeny is punishable by death.
Fuck. Off.
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My experience has been different to that of your mother, both in my own education (at a mixed primary) and then when I've done one-to-one reading at a mixed primary. Indeed, there was a recent TV programme where they separated out the boys and then made them do a debating competition and some other competition against the girls.
If it's the same one I'm thinking of, that was a programme whose raison d'être was attempting to fathom the difference in reading ages between boys and girls in a particular school in Harlow, IIRC, where the boys' scores were even lower than the national averages in comparison to the girls'. The girls won.
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I think you've totally missed the point about prejudice and power, Clandy. Without the power, the -ism is pretty irrelevant.
As to bottom shaving, Julian is being a little disingenuous in taking your words literally.
Julian waxes.
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Isms are privilege plus power. This is why people who talk about "reverse racism" and "reverse sexism" are usually talking out of their bottoms.
Ah yes, that old chestnut. So TV ads proclaiming 'So simple even a man can do it' are just friendly banter are they? TV ads depicting men as hopeless and unable to deal with a cold are just 'friendly banter' too I suppose? When if the same ads were aired saying the same about women there would be an almighty stink created by feminists.
Humour arises from the unexpected. Therefore it is supposedly funny to have an advert saying something is so simple even a man can do it - because in real life, men do the difficult things (running the country, being high court judges, fixing technical things). Funny. Lol. (Well, no, but you get the idea.)
If women are portrayed as stupid, that is not unexpected, because cultural meme has it that women are a bit weak, simple minded, etc. So there is no humour.
I dislike the ads very much, because they draw on unpleasant gender stereotypes, but to suggest that they are reverse sexism is bottomgravy.
Would you now like to do "why it is that we don't have a White Police Association, surely that's reverse racism?" followed by "But What About the Able-Bodied Direct Action Network"?
So basically in your warped PC world misandry is fine and tickeyboo, but mysogeny is punishable by death.
Fuck. Off.
No. I think your self-admitted 20 years on the puff has intefered with your comprehension skills.
That advert would not be "funny" if it weren't for the fact that men currently hold most positions of power and influence. Saying they are stupid is self-evidently impossible.
In an equal world, there would be no humour in the ad. People would look at each other and say "eh? What's that about then?" It is only supposedly funny because it draws on
a) the humour of the unexpected (a man needing something to be 'simple' - well, that's ridiculous, men clearly do most / much of the most difficult work globally)
b) the humour of reversal (that being the traditional set up of a man patronising the 'little woman' who does need things to be simple)
It is a sexist ad. But not for the reasons you seem to think.
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Curiously, it does seem to be okay for primary schools to divide kids into 'boys' teams' and 'girls' teams' and to urge each one to 'beat the boys / girls.'
Really? My mother is a primary school teacher, and at no time in her 28 year career was she witness to this.
I'm surprised someone so unobservant is allowed to teach.
I'm surprised someone so blinkered and biased and up their own unshaven feminist arse is permitted to practice law, but hey-ho. Btw, thanks for insulting my mother, someone you have never met and know nothing about.
I will add to my post on this issue that in my entire time at school as a pupil, not once were we divided into boy and girl teams and made to compete against each other.
Few women shave their arses, Clandy. If you've encountered any who do, you should also check for testicles.
My experience has been different to that of your mother, both in my own education (at a mixed primary) and then when I've done one-to-one reading at a mixed primary. Indeed, there was a recent TV programme where they separated out the boys and then made them do a debating competition and some other competition against the girls.
So you went to a crap primary school and saw a TV programme. That warrants insulting my mother does it?
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Would you now like to do "why it is that we don't have a White Police Association, surely that's reverse racism?" followed by "But What About the Able-Bodied Direct Action Network"?
It's a digression but I still think that's wrong. An "association for stopping discrimination against black police officers" fine but one you can't join unless you are black that wrong. How black do you have to be by the way ?
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My experience has been different to that of your mother, both in my own education (at a mixed primary) and then when I've done one-to-one reading at a mixed primary. Indeed, there was a recent TV programme where they separated out the boys and then made them do a debating competition and some other competition against the girls.
If it's the same one I'm thinking of, that was a programme whose raison d'être was attempting to fathom the difference in reading ages between boys and girls in a particular school in Harlow, IIRC, where the boys' scores were even lower than the national averages in comparison to the girls'. The girls won.
And the boys cried. Yes, that's the one. I thought it was a horrible programme - the boys clearly did flourish in a context of more focused attention and higher expectations with their literacy, but why the need to keep going on about the "boys team" and "you've got to beat the girls" etc. (Well, the need was for the telly cameras, but it was still unpleasant.)
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Would you now like to do "why it is that we don't have a White Police Association, surely that's reverse racism?" followed by "But What About the Able-Bodied Direct Action Network"?
It's a digression but I still think that's wrong. An "association for stopping discrimination against black police officers" fine but one you can't join unless you are black that wrong. How black do you have to be by the way ?
Actually you don't have to be black to join it. White officers can join if they like. Which makes it even funnier that it's the most often cited as an example of 'reverse racism.'
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Isms are privilege plus power. This is why people who talk about "reverse racism" and "reverse sexism" are usually talking out of their bottoms.
Ah yes, that old chestnut. So TV ads proclaiming 'So simple even a man can do it' are just friendly banter are they? TV ads depicting men as hopeless and unable to deal with a cold are just 'friendly banter' too I suppose? When if the same ads were aired saying the same about women there would be an almighty stink created by feminists.
Humour arises from the unexpected. Therefore it is supposedly funny to have an advert saying something is so simple even a man can do it - because in real life, men do the difficult things (running the country, being high court judges, fixing technical things). Funny. Lol. (Well, no, but you get the idea.)
If women are portrayed as stupid, that is not unexpected, because cultural meme has it that women are a bit weak, simple minded, etc. So there is no humour.
I dislike the ads very much, because they draw on unpleasant gender stereotypes, but to suggest that they are reverse sexism is bottomgravy.
Would you now like to do "why it is that we don't have a White Police Association, surely that's reverse racism?" followed by "But What About the Able-Bodied Direct Action Network"?
So basically in your warped PC world misandry is fine and tickeyboo, but mysogeny is punishable by death.
Fuck. Off.
No. I think your self-admitted 20 years on the puff has intefered with your comprehension skills.
That advert would not be "funny" if it weren't for the fact that men currently hold most positions of power and influence. Saying they are stupid is self-evidently impossible.
In an equal world, there would be no humour in the ad. People would look at each other and say "eh? What's that about then?" It is only supposedly funny because it draws on
a) the humour of the unexpected (a man needing something to be 'simple' - well, that's ridiculous, men clearly do most / much of the most difficult work globally)
b) the humour of reversal (that being the traditional set up of a man patronising the 'little woman' who does need things to be simple)
It is a sexist ad. But not for the reasons you seem to think.
My comprehension skills are fine thank you very much, and obviously a lot better than your own. The mere fact that you think there is 'reverse-sexism' and 'reverse-racism' proves that. There is only sexism, just as there is only racism. TV ads that go out of their way to denigrate men are just as sexist as they would be if they were denigrating women.
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Back on topic surely the reason why public school boys rule Britain is because they think they can. They are given the confidence and aspiration to do such things and combine that with better than average grades getting them into the best universities and the network of like minded and well connected friends that school and university gives them they end up with a much higher chance than average of making it to the top.
Imagine being at one of the top public schools and saying that you wanted to be PM. It wouldn't seem ridiculous or a flight of fancy to your peers or teachers, now try that thought experiment with an average comprehensive.
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Would you now like to do "why it is that we don't have a White Police Association, surely that's reverse racism?" followed by "But What About the Able-Bodied Direct Action Network"?
It's a digression but I still think that's wrong. An "association for stopping discrimination against black police officers" fine but one you can't join unless you are black that wrong. How black do you have to be by the way ?
Actually you don't have to be black to join it. White officers can join if they like. Which makes it even funnier that it's the most often cited as an example of 'reverse racism.'
Thanks Julian. I didn't know that and it's never mentioned in the media. It should be. You learn something every day.
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Isms are privilege plus power. This is why people who talk about "reverse racism" and "reverse sexism" are usually talking out of their bottoms.
Ah yes, that old chestnut. So TV ads proclaiming 'So simple even a man can do it' are just friendly banter are they? TV ads depicting men as hopeless and unable to deal with a cold are just 'friendly banter' too I suppose? When if the same ads were aired saying the same about women there would be an almighty stink created by feminists.
Humour arises from the unexpected. Therefore it is supposedly funny to have an advert saying something is so simple even a man can do it - because in real life, men do the difficult things (running the country, being high court judges, fixing technical things). Funny. Lol. (Well, no, but you get the idea.)
If women are portrayed as stupid, that is not unexpected, because cultural meme has it that women are a bit weak, simple minded, etc. So there is no humour.
I dislike the ads very much, because they draw on unpleasant gender stereotypes, but to suggest that they are reverse sexism is bottomgravy.
Would you now like to do "why it is that we don't have a White Police Association, surely that's reverse racism?" followed by "But What About the Able-Bodied Direct Action Network"?
So basically in your warped PC world misandry is fine and tickeyboo, but mysogeny is punishable by death.
Fuck. Off.
No. I think your self-admitted 20 years on the puff has intefered with your comprehension skills.
That advert would not be "funny" if it weren't for the fact that men currently hold most positions of power and influence. Saying they are stupid is self-evidently impossible.
In an equal world, there would be no humour in the ad. People would look at each other and say "eh? What's that about then?" It is only supposedly funny because it draws on
a) the humour of the unexpected (a man needing something to be 'simple' - well, that's ridiculous, men clearly do most / much of the most difficult work globally)
b) the humour of reversal (that being the traditional set up of a man patronising the 'little woman' who does need things to be simple)
It is a sexist ad. But not for the reasons you seem to think.
My comprehension skills are fine thank you very much, and obviously a lot better than your own. The mere fact that you think there is 'reverse-sexism' proves that.
C- for comprehension; see above (first bolded passage). I called it 'bottomgravy.' That means I don't think there is such a thing.
There is only sexism, just as there is only racism. TV ads that go out of their way to denigrate men are just as sexist as they would be if they were denigrating women.
See above; bolded passage 2. "It is a sexist ad."
What was that about your comprehension skills again? ;D
As to the one-size-fits-all understanding of -isms, I agree with Ural Kunst here:
I think you've totally missed the point about prejudice and power, Clandy. Without the power, the -ism is pretty irrelevant.a
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Back on topic surely the reason why public school boys rule Britain is because they think they can. They are given the confidence and aspiration to do such things and combine that with better than average grades getting them into the best universities and the network of like minded and well connected friends that school and university gives them they end up with a much higher chance than average of making it to the top.
Imagine being at one of the top public schools and saying that you wanted to be PM. It wouldn't seem ridiculous or a flight of fancy to your peers or teachers, now try that thought experiment with an average comprehensive.
Pretty much, yes. There are several factors at work but one of the most important is class size. When the classes are down to a dozen or so then you can do a hell of a lot of work. Every kid is on task all the time, marking and preparing/tailoring the work for each individual becomes simple and you haven't got a rump of 10% or so of the class playing up because you can't give them huge amounts of attention, as you generally have when classes are 30 or more kids.
There are some teachers who are good enough to be able to cope with a class as big as that, but I couldn't do it to my satisfaction. It's terribly demanding and a huge proportion of those who can either get promoted to a situation where they don't have to do it so much any more (my daughter's a case in point here: she teaches mostly 6th form when she's not on maternity leave) or they burn out.
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As to the one-size-fits-all understanding of -isms, I agree with Ural Kunst here:
I think you've totally missed the point about prejudice and power, Clandy. Without the power, the -ism is pretty irrelevant.a
I don't. Twenty-five years as a union man (T&GWU 1107 branch) taught me that racism is racism, and sexism is sexism, if it wasn't then no white person would ever have won a race case and no man would ever have won a sexism argument, and there were plenty.
There are no degrees of sexism or racism.
To agree with you and ural would be to say that some sexism and racism is ok, and that equality is wrong.
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Can we replace the word"posh" with "gay" or "black" and see if people are still willing to defend the original statement?
Only if we're going to argue that posh people are a disadvantaged section of society who are discriminated against and may consequently find it difficult to establish their place in the world. I'd suggest: no, not directly.
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Private shools in France = catholic schools. I went to one. My parents didn't pay much more than in a state school (we paid a £300 p.a. 20 years ago as opposed to £100). Yes, however, education was better. But, as I understand it, the staff etc. are still paid by the Education Nationale, i.e. the state.
As for the UK, well, I will be deciding where I send my kids. If state schooling is poor, which it is in many areas, then I reserve the right to invest myself in my daugther's future, seeing as the UK is very liberal and has left it for me to decide to do so. Will she become a little pest? well that is also down, in part, to me at home and, with our respective origins and a strong belief in meritocraty, I think she will remain well grounded.
Thanks, Frenchie. That sort of answers a point I tried to establish a day or two ago with Pancho, before the entire thread blew up. It would appear that there is not the same availability in France or Germany as there is in this country to the £12000 p.a. privilege which a remarkable number of British parents seem to be able to afford for their children.
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I think you've totally missed the point about prejudice and power, Clandy. Without the power, the -ism is pretty irrelevant.
As to bottom shaving, Julian is being a little disingenuous in taking your words literally.
Julian waxes.
But having been to a posh school, she'd never Wayne. O:-)
OK, that's my tail-coat over there. And the topper, please.
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Private shools in France = catholic schools. I went to one. My parents didn't pay much more than in a state school (we paid a £300 p.a. 20 years ago as opposed to £100). Yes, however, education was better. But, as I understand it, the staff etc. are still paid by the Education Nationale, i.e. the state.
As for the UK, well, I will be deciding where I send my kids. If state schooling is poor, which it is in many areas, then I reserve the right to invest myself in my daugther's future, seeing as the UK is very liberal and has left it for me to decide to do so. Will she become a little pest? well that is also down, in part, to me at home and, with our respective origins and a strong belief in meritocraty, I think she will remain well grounded.
Thanks, Frenchie. That sort of answers a point I tried to establish a day or two ago with Pancho, before the entire thread blew up. It would appear that there is not the same availability in France or Germany as there is in this country to the £12000 p.a. privilege which a remarkable number of British parents seem to be able to afford for their children.
There are very few £12000 p.a. schools in France but if you go to one of these, people will assume that you are thick. There is even a derogatory name for these: "boite à bac"
I went to a Catholic school too from the equivalent of year 3 until my A level. My dad used to dislike them as he had a really bad experience so I started at the local "comprehensive" but the teachers were not the most open minded, the teacher unions were politicised and my parents sent me to the local Catholic school after a couple of years.
There definitely was stiff competition between the two schools and I think this is one of the reason why academic results are better in Western France. With insight I think that was good choice, out of my primary class a third ended up doing well academically and several have done very well professionally, the vast majority are in stable relationships and rather happy. Most people travelled to Paris to find a good job but I am not the only one who went abroad, people are starting to head back to Brittany though. You don't need to be posh to go to a Catholic school, in some cases the fees are adjusted depending on the means of the parents.
Btw there were girls vs boys games and it never crossed my mind that this was sexist. You didn't need to pretend to be Catholic to be admitted, tolerance was quite high on the agenda, discipline was enforced. My class once got into trouble as the headteacher felt we weren't making an effort to integrate a new gipsy kid. Although relatively calm I ended a few times in detention. Racism was a non issue as very few foreigners (apart from the Brits) come to live in Brittany. Political activism (by teachers or pupils) was a definite no no once you had crossed the school gates.
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I think that's a bit harsh on the public school kids. Yes, children cry when they lose, but to say it's mere sense of entitlement is to lose a lot of the background there.
Kids at private school - as I know, having been to one, as ESL has kindly pointed out - don't have as much of a sense of entitlement as you suggest. (Possibly at Eton / Rugby / Harrow, but not at places like the one I went to.) Yes, the parents have to pay, but they don't just push the money in like a parking meter and leave the kids doing nothing.
To get in, you pass some hideously difficult exams (our 11+ paper was based on a GCSE text). If you are willing to work hard enough, there are amazing opportunities there - peripatetic music lessons, a huge art lab, playing fields for miles, drama clubs, teachers who are always willing to spend morning break going over work with you. It's an atmosphere in which it's difficult nott to learn.
There are peripatetic music lessons in state schools. I know because my mother was one of the teachers, and my sister recently had an interview to teach the violin in a state school.
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We do have in our presence somone well qualified to comment on Grammar Schools and social mobility. The programme was bemoaning the fact that it was now unlikely that anyone from a less moneyed background could now do PPE at Oxford.
But some counties do still have selective Grammar Schools, and their results are good. One factor is that they atrract a high standard of teaching staff. Essex and Kent spring to mind. I remember reading a thread about a debating competition held at Maidstone Girl's Grammar, and the two privately-educated women wo went along to help with the judging of it seemed quite impressed by the standard, as was the proud father of the Head of History at that school.
Oh, fantastic! Straight 10s for that personal attack, ESL. Do you actually make notes on ancient threads and posts so that you can use them years later to attack people? You sad individual! (Edited on advice)
I've really riled the right-whingers today, haven't I? ;D
I would expect a Head of History in a State Grammar School to have watched a programme about the effect on social mobility of the abolition of State Grammar Schools in many areas across the country, and to have an an opinion about it. We hear a lot about her position from you. I'm curious if she shares her Father's opinion of Grammar Schools, as she works in one.
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Isms are privilege plus power.
I coudn't help thinking when I read that, "Communism is Soviet power plus the electrification of the whole country." Ism is power plus power! :D
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We do have in our presence somone well qualified to comment on Grammar Schools and social mobility. The programme was bemoaning the fact that it was now unlikely that anyone from a less moneyed background could now do PPE at Oxford.
But some counties do still have selective Grammar Schools, and their results are good. One factor is that they atrract a high standard of teaching staff. Essex and Kent spring to mind. I remember reading a thread about a debating competition held at Maidstone Girl's Grammar, and the two privately-educated women wo went along to help with the judging of it seemed quite impressed by the standard, as was the proud father of the Head of History at that school.
Oh, fantastic! Straight 10s for that personal attack, ESL. Do you actually make notes on ancient threads and posts so that you can use them years later to attack people? You sad individual! (Edited on advice)
I've really riled the right-whingers today, haven't I? ;D
I would expect a Head of History in a State Grammar School to have watched a programme about the effect on social mobility of the abolition of State Grammar Schools in many areas across the country, and to have an an opinion about it. We hear a lot about her position from you. I'm curious if she shares her Father's opinion of Grammar Schools, as she works in one.
I don't know why you are so fixated about my "social mobility" as you call it. My grandmother was a teacher. My dad was a teacher. I am a teacher and my daughter is a teacher. Where's the mobility in that?
And I suggest you re-read the long piece I wrote for your benefit about my view on the entire business of selective education. You are clearly a slow learner.
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Can we replace the word"posh" with "gay" or "black" and see if people are still willing to defend the original statement?
Only if we're going to argue that posh people are a disadvantaged section of society who are discriminated against and may consequently find it difficult to establish their place in the world. I'd suggest: no, not directly.
So does this mean that instilling prejudice and class hatred is okay as long as you don't do it against an already vulnerable group?
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No. Happy to help :thumbsup:
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We do have in our presence somone well qualified to comment on Grammar Schools and social mobility. The programme was bemoaning the fact that it was now unlikely that anyone from a less moneyed background could now do PPE at Oxford.
But some counties do still have selective Grammar Schools, and their results are good. One factor is that they atrract a high standard of teaching staff. Essex and Kent spring to mind. I remember reading a thread about a debating competition held at Maidstone Girl's Grammar, and the two privately-educated women wo went along to help with the judging of it seemed quite impressed by the standard, as was the proud father of the Head of History at that school.
Oh, fantastic! Straight 10s for that personal attack, ESL. Do you actually make notes on ancient threads and posts so that you can use them years later to attack people? You sad individual! (Edited on advice)
I've really riled the right-whingers today, haven't I? ;D
I would expect a Head of History in a State Grammar School to have watched a programme about the effect on social mobility of the abolition of State Grammar Schools in many areas across the country, and to have an an opinion about it. We hear a lot about her position from you. I'm curious if she shares her Father's opinion of Grammar Schools, as she works in one.
I don't know why you are so fixated about my "social mobility" as you call it. My grandmother was a teacher. My dad was a teacher. I am a teacher and my daughter is a teacher. Where's the mobility in that?
And I suggest you re-read the long piece I wrote for your benefit about my view on the entire business of selective education. You are clearly a slow learner.
Did you watch the show?
Its central thesis was that is is more difficult for those from, non-moneyed backgrounds to aspire to high political office for two main reasons. The abolition of Grammar Schools in most areas has meant a flattening of educational achievement in the state sector. At the same time it has become more difficult to enter politics without having studied at Oxbridge, preferably PPE, followed by a spell in a think tank.
Essex and Kent would seem to be exceptions which might shed some light on whether state selective provision provides more opportunity for those from unmoneyed backgrounds to progress to Oxbridge, and to get good results in subjects such as PPE.
At the same time I have an interest in the long standing problem of parents earnestly believing in the comprehensive system, but not for their own children. You have stated that you own childrens' grammar school careers were a sort of accident, and that primary school was more important. I'm scratching my head somewhat over that, and so is everyone who has had to pay for selective education.
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Just read it.
https://yacf.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=41784.msg808068#msg808068
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Oxbridge, preferably PPE, followed by a spell in a think tank.
I agree this is important as well. MPs used to come from business or the unions as well as from those who just wanted to be in parliament from an early age.
These days the unions are not so strong and most aren't so politically driven as they were (a good thing for unions but a bad thing for parliament) or as powerful (hence they dont attract the same class of driven individuals they used to (though perhaps they do attract more those who wish to serve their fellow man rather than to lead). As for business unless you have a sudden road to Damascus moment and develop a burning desire to run for parliament you aren't going to give up a successful business career to be an MP - loss of earnings, no chance of real power for years if ever why would you ? If you have already made yourself a millionaire then you might want to try politics.
I think media scrutiny has a lot to do with it as well. Who in there right minds bar those obsessed with politics (rather than the ends it servers) would want to be an MP when the media will try and pull apart every aspect of your life, Unless you are some kind of saint you aren't safe. I really think we need to re evaluate what we consider acceptable standards for MPs. Corruption is wrong obviously and should be punished mercilessly but I really don't care if my MP is having an affair or is gay or likes dressing as a gimp every third Friday so long as he or she does the job well and represents the constituency and the country to the best of their abilities.
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I think media scrutiny has a lot to do with it as well. Who in there right minds bar those obsessed with politics (rather than the ends it servers) would want to be an MP when the media will try and pull apart every aspect of your life, Unless you are some kind of saint you aren't safe. I really think we need to re evaluate what we consider acceptable standards for MPs. Corruption is wrong obviously and should be punished mercilessly but I really don't care if my MP is having an affair or is gay or likes dressing as a gimp every third Friday so long as he or she does the job well and represents the constituency and the country to the best of their abilities.
Completely agree. But have f-all idea how we go about it
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It won't stop unless the media see no sales/ratings in it. So one way to stop it would be not to watch programmes like this!
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More on R4 in a minute:
BBC - BBC Radio 4 Programmes - How to Get into Oxford (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00y2bwx)
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Update on the second round of the public speaking comp this evening:
Younger age group: independent school wiped the floor with all comers. Hands down win for confidence, style and content.
Senior age group: state school wiped the floor with all comers. Hands down win for confidence, style and content.
So, we'll call it a draw. Next round in a month's time.
Edit: no one cried.
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I wonder what impact the internet and political discussions such as this will have on recruitment into political life. They provide an easy hit of the manipulation of ideas without the physical context and the networking afforded by the real world. There's no need to jpoin a political party to articulate an ideological viewpoint, and no need for the interpersonal skills so essential to political success, and which the higher echelons of the public school system specialises in providing. It's unlikely that anyone can be groomed for power via a VDU.
Meanwhile the steady flow of raw opinion provides a niche for voluntary or low-paid political apparartchiks in the structures of the main parties.
I wonder if the logical conclusion might be virtual constituencies for citizens of the internet to vote in.
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I don't know. I used to have high hopes for the internet and places like this to be a recruiting ground for greater involvement in public live.
You might remember my frequent call on transport matters suggesting that people got involved in local politics and be the policy setter rather than just mank about it here. I don't think anyone did.
Instead of trigger for mass participation, it's become a substitute. "I'm politically involved because I clicked a button on Facebook supporting a cause".
So, yes, ESL, I'm afraid that politics and the public arena in general will be left open to those educated in the skills and with the right connections. As for a flow of raw opinion - I am yet to be convinced that public opinion has any bearing on what politicians do.
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Somebody will be sat in Millbank looking at Mumsnet as a reward for their 1st in PPE, which has to be worth a laugh.
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I'm not convinced, sorry.
The depoliticisation of public intercourse was in place well before the internet, and the biggest barrier to involvement of the amateur is the managerialism that has largely replaced poliitics. Forums are not drawing people away from sitting on parish councils & stuff - the sorts of people who get involved will always do so in The Real - they're more of an adjunct. In their absence there would be less discussion, not more.
In the same way that this forum has facilitated people coming together to ride together, it's also seen people arrange to meet to do other stuff - some of it even vaguely political
You might remember my frequent call on transport matters suggesting that people got involved in local politics and be the policy setter rather than just mank about it here. I don't think anyone did.
There remain tremendous barriers to just getting involved in local politics. One generally has to do the drudge work in a party to be able to stand on their ticket (and if the prevailing party in your area is not to your taste you're stuffed) and local council seats tend to be hotly-contested by quite dedicated people. That's probably as it should be, but it does mean that one can't just roll up and get a seat on the transport committee.
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You might remember my frequent call on transport matters suggesting that people got involved in local politics and be the policy setter rather than just mank about it here. I don't think anyone did.
I've tried - God, I've tried.
The net result of my efforts was to be taken to court maliciously by my local council.
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You might remember my frequent call on transport matters suggesting that people got involved in local politics and be the policy setter rather than just mank about it here. I don't think anyone did.
There remain tremendous barriers to just getting involved in local politics. One generally has to do the drudge work in a party to be able to stand on their ticket (and if the prevailing party in your area is not to your taste you're stuffed) and local council seats tend to be hotly-contested by quite dedicated people. That's probably as it should be, but it does mean that one can't just roll up and get a seat on the transport committee.
I've spent a great deal of time trying to bring these barriers down because I believe that not only is it democratically unhealthy at a local level to have such a demographically limited local representation but, also (and relevant to this thread), access to local decision making can serve as a gateway to MP, MEP etc.
This whole thread (aside from the meanders) has talked about education and the programme cited John Major as an example of grammar school entryism - but his (and many others') apprenticeship in local politics is often forgotten.
The biggest single barrier to wider involvement is the low pay that councillors receive. This effectively limits any meaningful "career" to those who can afford it through personal wealth (pension pots in the main which why chambers have an average age of Noah).
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You might remember my frequent call on transport matters suggesting that people got involved in local politics and be the policy setter rather than just mank about it here. I don't think anyone did.
I've tried - God, I've tried.
The net result of my efforts was to be taken to court maliciously by my local council.
I don't know the details of the court case (another thread) but if you've been fighting against something you disapprove of - then you've made a difference. If whatever protest group didn't exist would it be (a) easier or (b) harder for the council to have done whatever and will it be the case in future?
Involvement involves a lot of losing - trust me on this!
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Oh, I know about the losing bit. But, 10 years after the Council proposed a dual carriageway taking a chunk of local park, they still haven't.
Julian wrote a good piece on her blog about the court case 'cos she came to offer us her support (as a spectator rather than representing us, sadly).
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Back on topic surely the reason why public school boys rule Britain is because they think they can. They are given the confidence and aspiration to do such things and combine that with better than average grades getting them into the best universities and the network of like minded and well connected friends that school and university gives them they end up with a much higher chance than average of making it to the top.
Imagine being at one of the top public schools and saying that you wanted to be PM. It wouldn't seem ridiculous or a flight of fancy to your peers or teachers, now try that thought experiment with an average comprehensive.
Yes, aspiration. And the will and means to do so. These are important. I sometimes feel people give up a bit too quickly and choose the path of absolute least resistance, not helped by what they see and hear at home or the quality of their schools sadly. Education and aspiration start at home and must be taken up and further developed & enabled via schooling; I can provide the former and may need to help the latter by choosing private education.
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My experience has been different to that of your mother, both in my own education (at a mixed primary) and then when I've done one-to-one reading at a mixed primary. Indeed, there was a recent TV programme where they separated out the boys and then made them do a debating competition and some other competition against the girls.
If it's the same one I'm thinking of, that was a programme whose raison d'être was attempting to fathom the difference in reading ages between boys and girls in a particular school in Harlow, IIRC, where the boys' scores were even lower than the national averages in comparison to the girls'. The girls won.
If it was Harlow then I'm mildly surprised either the boys or the girls had got further than "eight pages with a hero who's a dog called Ben". >70,000 inhabitants and no bookshop. The irony of working for a publishing company in Harlow is, er, ironic.
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Oh, I know about the losing bit. But, 10 years after the Council proposed a dual carriageway taking a chunk of local park, they still haven't.
Julian wrote a good piece on her blog about the court case 'cos she came to offer us her support (as a spectator rather than representing us, sadly).
Unfortunately while everyone was looking at Priory Crescent, planning permission was granted for an industrial estate on Gunners Park.
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There remain tremendous barriers to just getting involved in local politics. One generally has to do the drudge work in a party to be able to stand on their ticket (and if the prevailing party in your area is not to your taste you're stuffed) and local council seats tend to be hotly-contested by quite dedicated people. That's probably as it should be, but it does mean that one can't just roll up and get a seat on the transport committee.
But one can, often, just roll up to a council debate and ask questions. I know because I have done this. A whole once. It still requires information of where and when, and the time to turn up.
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Oh, I know about the losing bit. But, 10 years after the Council proposed a dual carriageway taking a chunk of local park, they still haven't.
Julian wrote a good piece on her blog about the court case 'cos she came to offer us her support (as a spectator rather than representing us, sadly).
Unfortunately while everyone was looking at Priory Crescent, planning permission was granted for an industrial estate on Gunners Park.
Yes, I know. There's a limit to what a small but dedicated group of campaigners can do.
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I don't know. I used to have high hopes for the internet and places like this to be a recruiting ground for greater involvement in public live.
You might remember my frequent call on transport matters suggesting that people got involved in local politics and be the policy setter rather than just mank about it here. I don't think anyone did.
Instead of trigger for mass participation, it's become a substitute. "I'm politically involved because I clicked a button on Facebook supporting a cause".
So, yes, ESL, I'm afraid that politics and the public arena in general will be left open to those educated in the skills and with the right connections. As for a flow of raw opinion - I am yet to be convinced that public opinion has any bearing on what politicians do.
The problem is navigating round the Chicken Littles. 'The sky is falling', and the Father Jacks, 'That would be an ideological matter'.
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It's unlikely that anyone can be groomed for power via a VDU.
Blimey, that was a blast from the past ! It's so long since I heard them called one of those that I just had to look it up on Wiki to remind myself what it was. :)
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The problem is navigating round the Chicken Littles. 'The sky is falling', and the Father Jacks, 'That would be an ideological matter'.
and, of course, the wading through of copious amounts of unsubstantiated bullshit crying out for a decent Occam's razoring.
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The problem is navigating round the Chicken Littles. 'The sky is falling', and the Father Jacks, 'That would be an ideological matter'.
and, of course, the wading through of copious amounts of unsubstantiated bullshit crying out for a decent Occam's razoring.
You read the Monbiot article then.
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Wasn't Father Jack's matter ecumenical, rather than ideological?
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Wasn't Father Jack's matter ecumenical, rather than ideological?
I was about to post that but couldn't be arsed to check because I'm having an attack of teh lazies. I believe it was.
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A sort of Posh and Posher Part2 programme on tonight :thumbsup: BBC - BBC Two Programmes - Who Gets the Best Jobs? (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00yb5kv)
Seems to be a recurring theme
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Wasn't Father Jack's matter ecumenical, rather than ideological?
Yes. Hairy Japanese bastards.