Sound good?
One of the claws in the velvet glove is that the shorter programmes of study will be more academic and written, and practical subjects may not be as practical anymore. This could mean as you progress through the national curriculum and into KS4, music, Arts, CDT, and so on will end up being assessed by a single written paper…
Computer Science is going to be the first subject that is added to the eBacc since it’s introduction, as reported on the BBC here.
I must say congratulations to the computer industries for their lobbying and persistence, I’m happy to see the subject classed as a real science and getting the recognition it deserves. Geeks rejoice. It is pretty sad though for RE and the Arts who are once again snubbed and relegated to the bottom of the class, they have been lobbying just as hard and just as forcibly. I’m guessing this is true evidence that the Government still think the arts and RE are pointless.
In related news Good egg Kenneth Baker has just published his book “14-18 – A New Vision for Secondary Education” which questions the policy of forcing learners to stick to academic subjects until they are 16. I never thought I would agree with him but I quite simply do. Learners with a passion at 14 should be able to specialise…
Now I’m not sure yet on the mechanics of adding computer science to the eBacc and if that means you can drop the other science subjects or mix and match disciplines, so I will check on it and get back to you. I’ve also got Ken Baker’s book on order and will review it as soon as it arrives.
10 For x = 1 to 100000
20 Print “Just what on Earth is he playing at”;
30 next x
What do schools, teachers, students and parents want from universities to support kids to get to University?
Milburn expresses clearly, as the social- mobility guru, that there is much Universities can do targeted at students from under-represented groups such as disabled students, students from areas where there is traditional low participation in higher education, ethnic minority students and students from families where no one has been to university. While Universities are digesting Milburn’s report, OFFA has set out its vision and expectations for widening participation in its annual guidance for the HE sector and a page devoted to sanctions if a HEI fails to meet its HE access agreement. Now that many HEIs are charging the maximum fees they are increasingly accountable to ensure that their widen participation and access agenda is robust and takes on board the strong steers from external influencers especially OFFA.
The OFFA guidance quotes Milburn several times in a 40 page document, so the pieces of the jigsaw are coming together. What should HEIs do to widen participation and help the social mobility agenda? After all the research, including the Leach Report (remember Leach?), shows that a degree is a passport to better economic stability for the individual and supports the national skills requirements to successful participate in a global economy. Universities need to form strong links with schools, provide after school homework support facilities, set up subject study days, provide IAG on admissions processes, use contextualised data to inform admissions processes, run summer schools, provide mentors and in the main raise aspiration and attainment at KS 2, KS 3, KS4 and KS 5 and try to do this in collaboration with other HEIs. All of these activities targeted at students and schools that at the moment are under-represented in the undergraduate population – otherwise it is unaccountable by OFFA.
What do schools think about this? The independent school sector has strong links with selective universities and often these go back hundreds of years, if not more. They have a head-start, but now is the opportunity for state schools to say, in the absence of a national careers service, universities can provide my students with… Your voice needs to be heard?
I tend not to comment much on HE as there are others on here who have a lot more insight and experience than I. But the last post, at the end of last year, was on free schools and how I thought they had, by and large, not achieved much. A news story on the BBC today reports than the group behind the New College of the Humanities, in effect a rich kids private university, are to have a go at doing the same thing for secondary education.
The story is currently here.
The HE version is headed by a gang of well known professors, authors, ex-politicians and TV personalities and is recognisable by charging £16,000 a year as opposed to the usual £9,000. They can get away with it at HE because their degrees are ‘franchised’ from a different university and they don’t have to go through the rigmarole of setting up their own quality systems, they use their parent’s systems and procedures. In effect a private arm of a university with big name lecturers turning up once in a blue moon. The £16K doesn’t surprise me though. If you look at the fees charged by overseas establishments you might be surprised. I heard recently of Berklee School of Music being $60,000… not sure if that’s a year or for the entire course though.
The thought of a secondary school version of it makes me uncomfortable because what we’re basically doing is setting up a private school, not a free one. Setting up a private school is fine, if that is what you say you are doing, but setting one up with public money and calling it free when it is anything but, sounds like fraud.
I do still think that the current vision of education is completely flawed and I am desperately worried for learners, the arts, progression and the country as a whole in ten years’ time. I do like the idea of disruptive principles and challenging the curriculum. But there are only going to be rich kids benefitting from this, and that is not fair, honest or helpful.
Very interesting to see the engineers fighting back and arguing to keep their engineering diploma in face of the race to academia currently underway in English schools. If you missed the article it’s here.
Engineering was in the very first phase of diplomas that were introduced, at huge expense, by the last Government and sadly wherever I go I hear of schools and colleges dropping them and learners not wanting to take them. The diplomas were complex, weird, government designed, unusual, and new, not a single redeemable feature. Except, well, they were a breath of fresh air, they had great sector support, full employer buy-in, university progression, a modern approach and were a genuine alternative. It’s only natural, therefore for them to get squished.
Now, full disclosure, I was the director of a diploma development project and although ours never even had the opportunity of being launched, it had all the positives in place and was well on the way to being a great addition to the rather staid and bland A level curriculum. There was much talk of rescuing the bulk of each diploma and turning it into a separate stand alone qualification, we even had an offer from an awarding body, but the government now own the IP and it’s going to be stored in Warehouse 13 for evermore. Right next to the Ark of the Covenant and Edgar Allen Poe’s pen.
The diplomas were a wonderful first step, version 2, which was already being planned, would have been better still and version 4 or 5 could have made a real impact on education in England. So I salute the engineers and look forward to a similar response from the other 16 sectors.
No? Anyone? Dust….?
I try not to jump onto here and rant about the latest headline, it’s often dodgy information presented in a sensationalist way. I think this story is a good example of that. Apparently there are no girls studying A level physics, unless you are in a girls’ school.
The thing I want to mention is subjects and gender bias, rather than if this story is true or not. In my experience it’s not true, I see plenty of girls doing science subjects wherever I go, maybe not enough, but that’s another matter.
What is true though, is that there are many subjects that show gender bias. I went to a conference on it back in 1996 and I don’t see much change since then. Not enough girls do technology subjects, not enough boys do arts subjects, not enough girls do engineering, not enough boys do healthcare, travel and tourism etc. Despite work and effort though it seems to be a strightforward issue. So how do you get around it?
Maybe its the subject that is wrong. Perhaps purist approaches to subjects bring with them a long established and deep settled gender bias. We can do lots of work on it and try to resolve it, but it doesn’t simply go away for ever. Perhaps if the subject was recast in something that was relevant across the genders the student intake would be equal. Perhaps subjects have had their day and we should be looking at new designations of curriculum, such as problem solving, materials technology, wearable electronics, and the like which bring currency and purpose and newness. That’s a lot of “perhaps”… I know.
But nevertheless, maybe subjects have had their day.
You may be interested to see that Sir Kenneth Baker is the Chair of the Edge Foundation, there are lots of pics of him at the Six Steps for Change launch on their flickr feed http://www.flickr.com/photos/edgefoundation/ Yes, that Kenneth Baker, tory minister under Thatch, he who gave us “Baker Days”, the National Curriculum and SATs. Having said that though he also deeply understands the vocational world and is doing a great job at Edge. Some Conservatives do understand the real world, I was sorry to see John Hays go from his post in charge of FE and Skills in the last re-shuffle and worry deeply about his replacement.
He’s not my favourite Ken Baker though, that is Kenny Baker, the actor who was inside the R2-D2 costume in Star Wars.
On a similar line to Edge’s initiative is Free Education, http://free-education.org who are trying to wrestle education from the hands of the politicians and are currently fund raising and mobilising. As long as education is in the hands of people who don’t understand it we will never really make any true progress.
All good stuff.
I’d like to welcome “No Full Stops in Education” to our team. You will immediately spot that she is far more intelligent than I because she’s keeping her identity secret. Very wise. So just to say she’s in a senior position in HE, with a deeply impressive and knowledgable history in education, policy and qualifications behind her. I look forward to her posts.
What a summer! I was lucky to be able to watch and attend the Olympics, what a privilege! I am still reflecting on the skills and talents of the athletes; what was it that made these people not only be good enough to get to the Olympics but for some of them to actually be the best on the day and get either a bronze, silver or gold medal and a few more than one? This was a celebration of people that had gained skills and became the best in the world.
So what has the DfE learnt from this summer of the excellent displays of vocational and knowledge-based skills in perfect balance? Oh yes, there was some awkwardness around school playing-field statistics and policy, and competitive sports was being debated again! For me this was an opportunity to say yes, children can benefit from a balance of academic and vocational study, both of which they will need in the work place along with personal skills.
Is the debate for this tripartite of essential skills over as we move into Autumn and the demand for academic rigour is met? Or will the placement of David Laws in the corridors of Sanctuary Building make a difference?
If someone was to ask me about football and how to turn around England’s chances of winning the world cup any time soon I would have an opinion. It wouldn’t be a good one, it would probably go something like…
These ideas are the sort of thing that the average bloke in the pub would say. People with an interest, a view, an opinion but let’s face it, no clue. The England manager would be a better person to ask, I think his name is Roy something. Now Roy might have a more informed and considered approach. He might even be able to suggest a strategy with targets and timescales. Unfortunately it isn’t going to happen because Roy is employed by the people who set up the premiership and they are all making an absolute mint at the moment. Roy is probably paid to say nothing and do his best.
In general the question about sport in schools is very similar. If you ask a politician they will ride the wave of success when it is successful and enjoy the despond when it is not. Boris’s suggestion that school should provide a compulsory 2 hours a day will sound stupid when the standards decline in everything else. Dave is probably hoping that we will be super fit, win everything and be able to open up new revenue streams selling our medals on ebay.
What all politicians are, though, is clueless. Remember, Dave is a PR consultant and Boris is a magazine editor. Neither of them know a thing about curriculum, education or sport and the news story which is all over the BBC’s website and elsewhere is tosh.
QTS has been a hard won victory for teachers over many years. The “professionalisation” of the industry was something which the unions have been after and also something parents have demanded. Quite right. The thing is though, here’s the thing, the thing that will get the million angry comments and threats of unsubscription, the thing is though, that it doesn’t necessarily mean anything.
Teachers are not made excellent by having QTS. Many QTS teachers are excellent. Many not-qualified teachers are excellent. Some QTS teachers are awful.
This news item highlights the independent status of academies and kisses bye-bye to the QTS closed shop. A good thing. It also brings in further challenge and threat and pressure onto teachers who are largely doing a brilliant job. A bad thing. You can do this good thing, bad thing for ever though. I’m looking forward to a measured and calm debate on what qualifications truly mean, what are required for what tasks and what skills teachers should have to actually teach. Any chance of that? I doubt it.