The claim was that the study disagreed with the idea that teacher qualification affected student outcome. It clearly doesn’t.

Admittedly, we don’t know enough about teacher licensing for the teachers in question to have any idea how big this effect is relative to the difference between teachers (one standard deviation in the scores of those who *passed* the test could be tiny) but the difference in student scores was big enough to show up in the data as significant. I wouldn’t put it forward as great evidence in favour of Cameron’s policy but it is clearly not, as claimed, disagreeing.

You are mistaking Cameron’s motive for the 2.2 limit.

It isn’t because he thinks that teachers with a 2.2 will necessary teach better or obtain better results from children than teachers with thirds.

It is because he aspires to make teaching a high-prestige profession in order to make it attractive to the maximum number of talented people.

This move is a signal, or ‘nudge’.

A difference of 1-2% of a standard deviation in test scores is worth, on a normally distributed sample of results from a test in which the maximum score was 100, amounts to something of the order of a tenth of a mark, i.e. next to fuck all in real terms.

Anyway, the first showed a mix of effects from the cognitive ability of the teacher, some positive, some negative. It’s not clear what that says about Cameron’s claims but it does not disagree, and it certainly doesn’t give us grounds for ignoring teacher charateristics.

The second study observes that: “with respect to teacher licensure scores, a one-standard-deviation increase in scores increases predicted student achievement by 1 to 2 percent of a standard deviation” which would suggest that the level of a teacher’s qualifications *do* affect student results. Not a huge effect but a positive one and statistically significant. This is agreement, not disagreement, with Cameron.

Neither of the two studies that Chris Dillow cited agrees with Cameron.

You might try reading what the studies actually say and not what you’d like them to say to fit your own agenda.

You might try actually following links rather than just assuming that anybody who agrees with you is honest.

One of the two pieces of research shows a mix of effects from well qualified teachers, including some positive ones but suggests that it depends on the pupils. The other one shows the exact opposite of what you are claiming and agrees with Cameron.

I hadn’t used the words ‘on itself’

a certain amount of unfairness might be desirable if a completely fair system doesn’t work.

I apologise for being OT but reading Those currently sitting GCSEs were just starting school in 1997 makes me feel so old. And I was born under Thatcher…

Just to get back on topic: I’d get rid of private/fee-charging and religious schools (of any hue – Catholic, Muslim, CofE etc) as a first step towards better social cohesion.

Being a little harsh there.

The 50.7% figure is for 5 good GCSEs *including English and Maths* – the unconstrained 5 good GCSEs figure is far high.

And in 1996-97, the equivalent figure was 35.9% getting 5 good GCSEs including English and Maths. That’s a 14.8 percentage point increase. Or – to put this more simply – a 50% increase in the number of children in a given Year 11 cohort who are achieving at this level.

In my view, this is not appalling – especially when you consider the long time period required for the full impact of education policies to trickle through e.g. it will be ~2020 before the big resource increase to fully filter through to GCSE results. Those currently sitting GCSEs were just starting school in 1997 – the funding increases generally came post-2001; early years policies will take even longer to show any impact

Most people will inevitably rely on subjective judgements derived from their own position and experience such that if the advantage is one from which they have benefited, or from which they expect their children to benefit, then its likely to be judged fair.

If you want something closer to an objective method of assessing fairness then the nearest I can think of would be to consider the kind of choices you might make from behind a ‘veil of ignorance’ as per Rawls’ theory of justice.

If a particular advantage is one you would willingly choose to have exist, even if you had no possible notion of whether it would work for or against you in your own life, then that would be considered to be fair (just) in relatively objective terms.

Yes. Please name one example where unfairness is desirable in itself (rather than being the by-product of some other good, which would make it undesirable but necessary)

In regards to the whole business of parents conferring advantages (or disadvantages) on their children, there is at least one sense in which that is simply unavoidable.

If nothing else, your children will have inherited 50% of you genes and have no choice but to make the most of what they’ve got from you, whether that turns out to be advantageous or not.

Beyond that, we’re into making value judgement about the legitimacy or otherwise of any advantages a child might obtain from their parents and that, for the most part, will come down to a question of whether the type of advantage that a child enjoys is seen to have been obtained by fair means or foul.

I’ve given my kids various advantages in life should I do my best to take them away again before it is too late and a social injustice has been committed?

Mark Thatcher would be cleaning the bogs at Maccy D’s were it not for who his parents are…

Mark Thatcher would not be Mark Thatcher were it not for who his parents are.

Mark Thatcher’s personal net worth has been conservatively estimated at £60 million.

I’ve got this bridge I’m looking to offload to the right buyer – interested?

Mark Thatcher would be cleaning the bogs at Maccy D’s were it not for who his parents are…

which largely seem to have been having the phone numbers of his upper class mates, and organising failed coups in African states

I saw 30% bandied round a year or so ago, which seems high.

12,000 leave estates that are taxable above the £325,000 threshold.

So the Tories want to hand a tax break to the 12,000 richest estates in the country? When telling the rest of us that spending needs to be slashed to curb the deficit?

I don’t think my original sloppiness really undermines my core point.

Fair point. It should be compared to the number of estates being passed on each year, which obviously will be lower than 25million.

Pretty daft on my part. Have noted this in the blog.

Thanks for the sharp eye.

Yes Mark Thatcher isn’t the sharpest knife academically. He even failed his accountancy exams and got lost in the Sahara.

His dear ol’ mum might have done him the odd favour to keep the wolf from the door back in the 80s.

But for the past 20 years Mark has been thrown back on his own talents and his own devices.

Mark Thatcher’s personal net worth has been conservatively estimated at £60 million.

Not bad for a dunce.

Can you beat that?