An interesting way of looking at things. Do you really mean that if something is not in the National Curriculum that children are not entitled to learn them? I would hope not. In my view, a child is entitled to learn to the best of their abilities.

I’m not sure that the teaching unions would welcome the re-introduction of SATs either.

@ JC

“Do you really mean that if something is not in the National Curriculum that children are not entitled to learn them?”

From context, I assume he means “entitled to learn” in the sense that every child has the right to expect to be taught about the subject in question.

I wish people would stop saying “rigorous” when they mean “difficult” in these discussions. On the correct interpretation of the word (roughly “accurate”), harder exams may well be *less* rigorous because they give less information about the middle and bottom of the grade distribution. Incidentally using words without knowing what they mean usually causes lost marks in GCSE exams.

It’s difficult to believe that anyone was taken in by a party whose meme of ‘roll back the state’ meant exactly the opposite.

From the OP:

“We should decide what we want our children to learn”

This reveals the fundamental error. There is no universal ‘we’. People want different things for their children’s education, and all children are different anyway. Get rid of the bureaucracy and state interference, and let the schools be free.

@ 5 -Trooper Thompson: “There is no universal ‘we’. People want different things for their children’s education, and all children are different anyway. Get rid of the bureaucracy and state interference, and let the schools be free.”

Do you mean this literally? That the state shouldn’t intervene at all in the education of the nation’s children? And that schools should be free to teach whatsoever they see fit?

“Get rid of the bureaucracy and state interference, and let the schools be free.”

A Conservative government introduced the National Curriculum in the late 1980s arising from growing concerns about schooling standards and as to why the pupils of some schools were getting better results in school leaving exams as compared with other schools serving similar catchment areas.

Do you mean this literally? That the state shouldn’t intervene at all in the education of the nation’s children? And that schools should be free to teach whatsoever they see fit?

Can’t speak for TT but that is my view.

Providing of course that parents can choose what school they send their children to.

6. “that schools should be free to teach whatsoever they see fit?”

Can’t see the problem with that. All schools used to teach as they saw fit before the Tories – yes the Tories – brought in the National Curriculum in 1988, as Bob B points out in 7.

I was one that got a free place to an academically oriented school and we were basically taught to the exams set by the Cambridge Syndicate or whatever it was called. For some reason trendy modern educational theorists seem to wring their hands over returning to this idea now, despite the fact that it produced a perfectly good education for all previous generations.

@ pagar #8:

Providing of course that parents can choose what school they send their children to.

On the basis of what information?

“On the basis of what information?”

On the basis of the notorious league tables – which have been abolished in Wales and Scotland?

In large urban conurbations there may be some choice of secondary schools but in smaller towns and villages there is often little or no choice.

For an illuminating historical perspective, Jim Callaghan as incoming Prime Minister made a keynote speech in Oxford in October 1976 about the national importance of education and improving schooling standards:
http://education.guardian.co.uk/thegreatdebate/story/0,9860,574645,00.html

The reasons for the government’s concern were substantive enough – in the mid 1970s half of Britain’s adults had no education qualifications – but unfortunately little came of this during the remaining two and half years of the Labour government, most likely because of the more pressing priorities of the government at the time to rein back rising public spending. The issues went into the political long grass until the late 1980s when Baker, as Mrs T’s education minister, launched the policy review which resulted in establishing the national curriculum.

By the mid 1990s, the percentage of Britain’s adults without any qualifications had dropped to about a quarter.

@ 6

“Do you mean this literally? That the state shouldn’t intervene at all in the education of the nation’s children?”

Err, yeah, pretty much. The prospect of parents, children and schools deciding, rather than bureaucrats and educationalists, is hardly fear-inducing.

@ Bob B

“A Conservative government introduced the National Curriculum in the late 1980s arising from growing concerns about schooling standards”

As I remember it, it was a power grab by the Thatcher government, against the LEAs and other harbours of leftism.

“In large urban conurbations there may be some choice of secondary schools but in smaller towns and villages there is often little or no choice.”

This is how it is under the current system. There would most likely be more diversity and more choice, with the average size of secondary schools coming down, if the state quasi-monopoly ended.

@ 10 Robin,

“On the basis of what information?”

On the basis of whatever information would be available, such as visiting the school, its reputation etc. I don’t know why you think there would be a problem with information. It’s certainly not the case that under the present system, parents always feel capable of making an informed choice. In some places it is literally a lottery, in others a bizarre statistical exercise depending on taking a range of abilities, based on the SATs. Plus we have to pay for the vast bureaucracy of the state system, and listen to the endless dispute between the ‘progressives’ and the ‘traditionalists’. Break up the monopoly and we might finally see what works and what doesn’t.

@TT #13:

It’s certainly not the case that under the present system, parents always feel capable of making an informed choice. In some places it is literally a lottery, in others a bizarre statistical exercise depending on taking a range of abilities, based on the SATs.

Exactly. And you say that removing any standardisation of information that currently exists, making it impossible to compare like with like, would improve</em. the situation?

Interesting thought; any chance of you putting some numbers on this vast cost of bureaucracy, and comparing it to the extra administrative and other costs of running a system of individual schools, each using their phenomenal buying power to cut deals with suppliers, with say 20% (to pluck a figure out of the air) over-capacity.

@ Robin,

“Exactly. And you say that removing any standardisation of information that currently exists, making it impossible to compare like with like, would improve the situation?”

I don’t follow your logic. You accept that the present system (which is actually many different systems) is hardly ideal, and then recoil in horror that anyone could think of getting rid of it.

“And what do you do if you decide after a couple of terms you don’t like the school you’ve chosen?”

You move to another school?

“any chance of you putting some numbers on this vast cost of bureaucracy, and comparing it to the extra administrative and other costs of running a system of individual schools”

You should look at how private schools manage. As for purchasing power, there’s nothing to stop schools working together to arrange such things. You’ve got to get away from this craven attitude that everything will fall apart if the Leviathan state stops interfering. The government doesn’t run everything, you know. We manage fine without a Ministry of Food or a Ministry of Shoes and Clothing directing these very necessary parts of the economy.

@ 13 TT

“The prospect of parents, children and schools deciding, rather than bureaucrats and educationalists, is hardly fear-inducing. ”

Maybe not fear-inducing, but definitely worrying. How do you feel about fundamentalists sending their kids to fundamentalist schools so they can learn lessons like How To Spot A Jew, Why Men Are Just Better Than Women, and The Second Law of Thermodynamics Disproves Evolution No Really It Does?

the extra administrative and other costs of running a system of individual schools, each using their phenomenal buying power to cut deals with suppliers, with say 20% (to pluck a figure out of the air) over-capacity.

Governments aren’t actually famous for their ability to make good deals with suppliers. Rather the reverse, because it tends to fall under Friedman’s fourth category of spending.

12 “By the mid 1990s, the percentage of Britain’s adults without any qualifications had dropped to about a quarter.”

And ever since, we’ve had rampant qualification inflation at all levels, with everyone being made to spend more and more time and money getting ever more pieces of paper before being permitted the ‘privilege’ of a job. It’s a complete nonsense, but very lucrative for those in the education industry holding us all effectively hostage – what a racket!

Trooper @13: “As I remember it, it was a power grab by the Thatcher government, against the LEAs and other harbours of leftism.”

The point of my post @12 was to show that: (a) Callaghan as PM had already made issue of the importance of education in 1976 even if the Labour government did little about it, and (b) there were substantive reasons at the time for concern about the sparcity of education qualifications among Britain’s adult population.

For all intents and purposes, prior to the introduction of the national education curriculum in 1988, schools were free to do what they wanted apart from the statutory obligation to begin each day with an act of worship. The sparcity of education qualifications was the outcome of that “freedom”.

Compare the Education Act of 1870 which created administrative structures to provide for universal primary education up to the age of 12. Prior to that schooling had been left to charities and the churches with these consequences:

“We have noted a substantial body of original research . . . which found that stagnant or declining literacy underlay the ‘revolution’ of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. . . Britain in 1850 was the wealthiest country in the world but only in the second rank as regards literacy levels. [Nick] Crafts has shown that in 1870 when Britain was world economic leader, its school enrolment ratio was only 0.168 compared with the European norm of 0.514 and ‘Britain persistently had a relatively low rate of accumulation of human capital’.”
Sanderson: Education, economic change and society in 1780-1870 (Cambridge UP, 1995) p.61

On the hard evidence – in contrast to ideological fantasy – there is much to be said for the state intervening to raise schooling standards.

LibCon’s crappy comments system ate my comment. Again.

Try again …

12 “By the mid 1990s, the percentage of Britain’s adults without any qualifications had dropped to about a quarter.”

Yes, and ever since then we’ve had inexorable qualification inflation, meaning that we’re all forced to chase more and more bits of paper just in order to have the ‘privilege’ of getting a job. Ever more time and money wasted by the ordinary Jo but ever more lucrative for the education industry which effectively holds us all hostage now – what a racket!

White Tradh: “LibCon’s crappy comments system ate my comment. Again.”

I sympathise from experiencing that problem a few times. The best tip is to always draft a comment on Notepad or Wordpad and then cut ‘n’ paste that into the LibCon comment box to post.

As for purchasing power, there’s nothing to stop schools working together to arrange such things.

My experience of buying groups is that the additional cost and bureaucracy involved in running them more than eats up any savings extracted from suppliers due to economies of scale. And the end users, forced to purchase from the limited catalogue presented to them, are often unable to buy the product they really require.

It has been the same with all bureaucratic purchasing systems from Crown Suppliers onwards.

Thanks Bob, yes I often do something like that, but you know how it is, you get slack every so often, and that’s inevitably the one that dsappears. Murphy’s law.

The other thing that can happen is that, despite the fact that your comment has disappeared the computer still say no giving some garbage like “sorry you already said that”

So my question is why is LibCon the one blog that seems incapable of running a comments system that actually works? Obviously some very rude answers do pop to mind, or is that just me?

White Trash: “So my question is why is LibCon the one blog that seems incapable of running a comments system that actually works?”

I can recall from over the years similar complaints about lost comments being posted in other online forums. But like you, I forget my own tip about best practice of drafting comments in Notepad or Wordpad and lose a draft comment or two in consequence.

@ 23 White Trash

“The other thing that can happen is that, despite the fact that your comment has disappeared the computer still say no giving some garbage like “sorry you already said that””

In my experience, every time you get that screen, your comment will appear eventually. It’s just that, along with the dropouts etc, comments on LibCon take time to appear, which can range from a couple of seconds to hours.

@TT #’15:

“Exactly. And you say that removing any standardisation of information that currently exists, making it impossible to compare like with like, would improve the situation?”

I don’t follow your logic. You accept that the present system (which is actually many different systems) is hardly ideal, and then recoil in horror that anyone could think of getting rid of it.

It’s hardly rocket science, let alone rocket engineering. There is, currently, an imperfect system for obtaining realtively reliable comparative information about schools. There is therefore some comparative information available.

You wish to do away with thst system. There would therefore be no reliable comparative information. That, you seem to assume, will help the parents to choose a school over the current system where there is some reliable comparative information.

If I am not comprehensively misunderstanding your point, I only have one question on this: What colour is the sky where you live?

“And what do you do if you decide after a couple of terms you don’t like the school you’ve chosen?”

You move to another school?

And if after another couople of terms you don’t like that school? Move again?

You really haven’t thought this through, it seems to me. The disruption to a child’s education caused by changing schools, breaking circles of friends etc etc is such that the new school has to be very significantly better than the existing one to make it worthwhile. Changing schools regularly will hold the child back, not push him/her forward.

“any chance of you putting some numbers on this vast cost of bureaucracy, and comparing it to the extra administrative and other costs of running a system of individual schools”

You should look at how private schools manage.

I thought not. Do you have any figures, or are you simply assuming and asserting that all will be for the best in the best of all possible libertarian worlds?

As for purchasing power, there’s nothing to stop schools working together to arrange such things.

Indeed; there might even be some advantage if they could delegate that work to an agency specifically tasked to deal with these things. That agency could also do things like advise on relevant law; assist in recruitment; consider and set health and safety and safeguarding policies; etc etc etc. Would that be a good thing too?

You’ve got to get away from this craven attitude that everything will fall apart if the Leviathan state stops interfering.

The state’s involvement made universal education possible in a way that private enterprise and charity never did nor would have done.

You have got to get away from this arrogant attitude that the private sector will in all cases and for all time work better than government.

You have ignored completely the fact that if education is provided entirely by independent schools setting their own policies and competing for pupils, there will have to be very significant over-capacity, which has to be paid for. It doesn’t matter if government buys everything at 10% over the odds, if taking government out of the equation means that you need 20% more of everything.

One other point I didn’t pick up from your #13:

There would most likely be more diversity and more choice, with the average size of secondary schools coming down, if the state quasi-monopoly ended.

Thus increasing administrative costs per pupil; and reducing curriculum choice. Why exactly is this a good thing?

It really seems to me that these learned debates about education are missing something.

Ask yourself why it is that the UK has been pumping billions and billions into public education over decades and yet educational levels amongst those passing through the school system seem to be dropping year on year according to employers, universities and others? Yet at the same time children in other countries, say China, or others in Asia or Africa achieve fantastic results and educational levels on tiny, tiny fractions of the budget poured into UK schools, and in very simple schools without hardly any of the physical comfort, swanky classrooms and high technology that our designer-clad youth now takes for granted.

I’d suggest it’s mainly to do with motivation, and that, at bottom, young people in this country (the majority that is, not those in the elite classes with top jobs and high “remuneration” to look forward to, obviously) are quite simply completely unmotivated to learn.

Part of this is because we are constantly facing propaganda that education is “uncool” or “for snobs”, and partly also because we know quite well that for most of us under the current socio-economic system there can inevitably either be only dull, low status, low wage jobs, or unemployment and harassment in a pool of surplus labour maintained to keep the rest as keen as can be expected.

Hardly surprising then if quite a few young people just aren’t willing to spend their time doing something that will bring them no return that means anything to them or their parents.

@ Robin,

It’s ridiculous to ask ‘what if a child doesn’t like the school?’ and then object to my answer ‘find another one’ , and start banging on that the child may not like the new school and his education will be disrupted. It’s a hypothetical child. If you want a detailed answer, then give some details. Tell me how old the child is, whether he has any siblings, if so, where do they go to school, what are the reasons he doesn’t like the school etc. Basically, write me a report on exactly who this hypothetical child is, and the whole situation, and then I’ll get back to you with what my advice would be.

@TT #28:

My point was, I thought, a simple one.

Education is not a commodity. It is an investment – and a long-term one at that – both on the supply and demand side.

The way to improve a school is very rarely to set up another one next door and rely upon competition for children to raise standards in both, while saving money. There are realistically one or perhaps two chances to select the “right” secondary school for your child; moving a child from one school to another has a cost in educational terms that will impose a huge drag on the market. Even if you do get significant enough numbers to move to make a difference, the education that even the movers receive will be heavily impacted by the move.

If you are relying upon competition to imrpove standards and reduce cost (ha!), you need reliable comparative information so that parents can make a rational decision. But you propose removing the only access to even moderately reliable comparative information – such as it is – that exists.

If you rely upon competition between schools to raise standards, then you will have to operate with a very significant built-in oversupply – ie waste – of resources, which eats up cash.

So what exactly is the advantage, other than in ideological terms, of your solution?

Interesting to see that Philip Booth over at Con Home seems to take a similar view about the proscriptive effect this would have on the curriculim.

@pagar#8 & @TrooperThompson#13

Thank you both for responding to my previous question. I have a couple of supplementaries.

You both believe that the state should not intervene in the education of the nation’s children – literally. Does this mean that you are opposed to any state funding for education, on the grounds that such expenditure is interventionist by nature? And that the present legislation which makes education compulsory for all children should be withdrawn (there can surely be no greater form of intervention than legal compulsion)?

@ 16 Chaise,

“How do you feel about fundamentalists sending their kids to fundamentalist schools so they can learn lessons like How To Spot A Jew…”

I think such things should be seen and dealt with as exceptions. The same issues exist under the current system, in any case.

@ 31 Churm,

speaking for myself, I certainly entertain such thoughts, but we’re nowhere near such a place. What I’m saying here is that schools would be better if we dumped the centrally-controlled monopoly, and allowed schools to be different.

@ Robin,

*“And what do you do if you decide after a couple of terms you don’t like the school you’ve chosen?”

You move to another school?

And if after another couople of terms you don’t like that school? Move again?*

So, what’s the answer, smarty pants? If you don’t like my suggestion, what should you do? Grin and bear it? Seek counselling? Bunk off? Get a prescription of Ritalin?

“So what exactly is the advantage, other than in ideological terms, of your solution?”

You paint my views as ideological. How I am being more ideological than you, I don’t know. The advantage is; you don’t put all your eggs in one basket. You allow diversity amongst schools. You save all the money spent on the quangos and the commissions and all the other bureaucracies which surround education. We can all escape the unending debate about ‘the right way’ to educate the children of this nation, and agree to differ.

BTW, in my job I deal with a lot of young people who have come through the state system and many of them can barely read and write. Whether such people would do just as badly under a free market system cannot be known, but they couldn’t do any worse. You seem to focus on what is good for the system, and not the people within it. You talk about ‘the way to improve a school’, as if the kids exist for the school’s benefit and not the other way round.

@ Robin, furthermore,

“The state’s involvement made universal education possible in a way that private enterprise and charity never did nor would have done.”

Oh really? And where did the money come from to pay for state education, if not from the taxes leveled on private enterprise?

@TT #32:

Let’s try again, then.

So far as your financial advantage goes:

You save all the money spent on the quangos and the commissions and all the other bureaucracies which surround education.

Which you still haven’t quantified – but in any event – having saved it, you then spend it on the oversupply inherent in relying upon competition to raise standards.

You have no proper mechanism to allow effective competition to raise standards; because you have destroyed any possibility of reliable comparative information between schools, so the only way to find out is to suck it and see. The very mechanism of competition that you rely upon to improve your child’s education – suck it and see, or moving the child to a better school if the current one doesn’t measure up – actively damages your child’s education.

@ 34 Robin,

“Let’s try again, then”

Oh, let’s!

“Which you still haven’t quantified …”

There’s nothing I can write, and no link that I can post which will convince you, is there? It’s a comment thread on a blog, not a Royal Commission.

“having saved it, you then spend it on the oversupply inherent in relying upon competition to raise standards.”

Who’s this ‘you’? You’ve got to get away from the idea of a Leviathan entity which is doing everything. If a school cannot pay its way, it goes out of business, like any other enterprise. If I set up my Christian Anarchist School, and find, alas, there aren’t many customers, yes that will be oversupply, but it won’t be perpetuated any longer than I have money to pay the bills. The free market adjusts much quicker than the state. Besides, I believe that one of the big problems of state secondary schools is that they are too big, and that there are dis-economies of scale. Can I prove this to your satisfaction? I doubt it.

“You have no proper mechanism to allow effective competition to raise standards; because you have destroyed any possibility of reliable comparative information between schools”

Nature abhors a vacuum, you know. There will be comparative information, schools will of course be compared, just as products and services, from red wines to insurance, are compared now.

“The very mechanism of competition that you rely upon to improve your child’s education”

You’re missing a major point. Children are different, they do not all benefit from the same approach. Is an academic education better than a practical one? There’s no right answer, it depends on the child. Stop looking at the issue from Whitehall.

@ 32 TT

“I think such things should be seen and dealt with as exceptions.”

That’s a dodge. Do you or don’t you think that schools should be allowed to teach racist or anti-science lessons if the parents approve? Because if so you have to accept it as a flaw of your system, and if not you have to explain the limits you’re prepared to place on parental choice.

“The same issues exist under the current system, in any case.”

Only because your system already sort-of exists in private schools. But under *my* preferred system they wouldn’t; it would be against the law to exploit mandatory educational time for brainwashing.

Churm @31

Does this mean that you are opposed to any state funding for education, on the grounds that such expenditure is interventionist by nature?

In principle, that would be the ideal, but in reality I favour the UK moving to a state funded voucher system. I believe many of Gove’s reforms, free schools, lack of imposed curriculum etc.are a prelude to just that.

And that the present legislation which makes education compulsory for all children should be withdrawn (there can surely be no greater form of intervention than legal compulsion)?

Yes, of course it should.

@ 37 pagar

“Yes, of course it should.”

Wow. That’s heartless even by libertarian standards.

Wow. That’s heartless even by libertarian standards.

Really?

I’m not suggesting that children should not be educated, only that they should not be coerced by the state to be so.

It’s a strange world where a suggestion that citizens should not be subjected, by force, to act according to the will of others is seen as heartless.

“I’m not suggesting that children should not be educated, only that they should not be coerced by the state to be so.”

Always providing they are not also coerced into taking unemployment benefits should they become unemployable.

@ 40 pagar

“I’m not suggesting that children should not be educated, only that they should not be coerced by the state to be so.

It’s a strange world where a suggestion that citizens should not be subjected, by force, to act according to the will of others is seen as heartless.”

It’s a strange conversation when someone is talking about children without recognising that they’re not the same as adults. The heartlessness is that you are prepared (to save tax money, pursue an ideal or whatever) to let people’s lives be ruined by decisions they made when they were far too young to be truly responsible. “OK, you’ve ruined your life, but you should have decided to go to school when you were five, sucks to be you.”

It’s a strange conversation when someone is talking about children without recognising that they’re not the same as adults

Ah.

So you agree it is unacceptable for the state to coerce its adult citizens, but you do not allow the same rights to children who are smaller, weaker and can offer less resistance?

Still seems a rather strange stance to me.

@ 43 pagar

Unless you explain why you disagree with the generally held opinion that children are not capable of taking full responsibility for themselves, I’m going to assume you’re trolling.

Unless you explain why you disagree with the generally held opinion that children are not capable of taking full responsibility for themselves, I’m going to assume you’re trolling.

No of course I don’t disagree with that opinion.

My contention is that responsibility for children should be assumed by their parents, not by the state.

@ pagar

“My contention is that responsibility for children should be assumed by their parents, not by the state.”

Oh, so you DO think it’s acceptable for children to be coerced. You’ve just been lying about it for shits and giggles.

I love the way you started that post with “Of course”, by the way. Like obviously I should just assume you mean the opposite of what you say. Yeesh.

“My contention is that responsibility for children should be assumed by their parents, not by the state”

Basically all that changes in Chaise’s comment then is “. “OK, you’ve ruined your life, but you should have decided to go to school when you were five, sucks to be you.” becomes ““OK, you’re parents ruined your life, but you’re parents should have decided to send you to school when you were five, sucks to be you.”

@36. Trooper Thompson

Right, you said that we should rely on competition rather than regulation to keep school standards up.

My question is simple. For how many schools/children is this failure acceptable while competition is doing its thing?

Oh, so you DO think it’s acceptable for children to be coerced. You’ve just been lying about it for shits and giggles.

That’s rubbish.

I think it is acceptable for decisions to be made on behalf of children by the people who love them and who have their interests at heart. Those people are normally their parents, not the state or the instruments of the state.

The compulsion written into statute law for children to be educated according to its edict is motivated by the interests of the state, not the interests of the individual children.

@ 49 pagar

“I think it is acceptable for decisions to be made on behalf of children by the people who love them and who have their interests at heart. ”

So what’s the difference between coercion and other people making decisions for you? You’re gonna have to do better than just coming up with a nicer-sounding phrase that means the same thing. That’s some very bad libertarianing.

And it’s a total assumption that parents have their children’s interests at heart. Many don’t. What’s more, many parents DO have their children’s interests at heart but don’t know what’s good for them (obese kids being fed pizza every day etc). If neither of the above were the case then there’d be no problem and we wouldn’t be having this conversation.

“The compulsion written into statute law for children to be educated according to its edict is motivated by the interests of the state, not the interests of the individual children.”

How do you know? Genetic fallacy in any case. The motivations of the law-makers don’t directly tell us how good the law is.

“I think it is acceptable for decisions to be made on behalf of children by the people who love them and who have their interests at heart. Those people are normally their parents, not the state or the instruments of the state.”

There are a sizeable minority – particularly in some small sections of society – of parents who do not value education and have low expectations of their kids (my father in law is one – if he could take my nephew out of school he would). Some simply don’t see education as valuable, others simply need the kids as labourers to earn more income for the family, see a woman’s place in the home, or simply spend all day looking for their next fix and don’t care.

The state ‘forcing’ people to have an education guarentees 99.9% of kids get one, with the parents of the remaining 0.1% of kids criminalised (rightly – it’s a form of child abuse). Abolishing this requirement based on nothing more than dogma would increase that percentage of kids not getting an education substantially.

51/Planeshift: The state ‘forcing’ people to have an education

And it’s worth noting also that while the state does legally require parents to ensure that their children receive education, it does not mandate any particular mechanism for doing so – it merely provides for convenience one which is deemed to be adequate, which the majority of parents “choose” [1] to use.

The “national curriculum” and all the rest only affects the running of the state education system, not any other education systems which people may choose to use. By definition the state must regulate the education it provides, though obviously the detail of that regulation can vary.

I would be opposed to the state attempting regulation of education it does not provide beyond the very basic requirement that there should be some and it should be appropriate to the child’s needs.

[1] In some cases through lack of knowledge that alternatives exist, and in some cases because the state system is the only one which is practical for them to use, of course, rather than necessarily as an active and free choice.

There are a sizeable minority – particularly in some small sections of society – of parents who do not value education and have low expectations of their kids (my father in law is one – if he could take my nephew out of school he would). Some simply don’t see education as valuable

Perhaps they’re right.

Given much of what currently goes on in the name of education I’m not at all sure they’re wrong. The point is that it is really none of your business and certainly not the business of the state to compel them to subject their children to the educational system devised by it. (In fact they don’t, there is still the “concession” to allow children to be educated at home despite that affront to the Stalinist mindset).

In fact, I don’t believe that abolishing the coercive element of state education would have any meaningful effect on school attendance rates, particularly if we move to a voucher system.

@ 53 pagar

“The point is that it is really none of your business and certainly not the business of the state to compel them to subject their children to the educational system devised by it.”

I think it’s very much our business if helpless children are having their lives ruined by stupid or uninformed parents.

“In fact, I don’t believe that abolishing the coercive element of state education would have any meaningful effect on school attendance rates, particularly if we move to a voucher system.”

Based on what rationale?

@ 37 Chaise,

I’m not trying to dodge, it’s just that extreme examples which are exceptions to the rule are often cited as evidence against the rule, and if we lose sight of the fact that they are exceptions, we distort the true picture, which, I would say is that the great majority of parents want their children to get a pretty standard, rational, scientifically uncontroversial education, even those who want it to be taught within a school with a religious affiliation.

The fundamental question is this: who decides, the parents or the state? For me, the general rule must be; the parents. You have grasped this much, I’m sure, hence your comment: ” you have to explain the limits you’re prepared to place on parental choice.” It’s a tricky question, I don’t deny that. I think it can only be given a general answer, in the way that the somewhat elastic term ‘reasonable’ crops up many a time in the law of the land.

Therefore, if the duty of the parent (as now) is to see that his child receives an education (which, as now, does not necessarily mean attending school), there is scope to take action where this is neglected, either through failing to provide any education or by providing something that a reasonable person would not consider an education. I would not want to go much further than that, and would wish to trust to a jury to decide what crosses that line.

Besides this, you will know that there are other laws which have an impact on what can and can’t be said publicly, with regard to race and sexuality etc. You will also, I hope, recognise that I can level the same question back at you, with regard to the state, and what limits you would wish the state to be placed under. Many examples of the state abusing education for indoctrination can be provided on request. Your comment about prohibiting ‘brainwashing’ could be accommodated within my limitation above (i.e., punishing someone for neglect of their parental responsibility), however I would be concerned that you would wish to take a far more activist approach to the matter and lay out with specifics what it is illegal to teach a child, which I would not support at all.

The answer I give here, I expect, falls short of what one would see in a libertarian paradise, but I’ll worry about that when we get there.

@ 48 Mark Austin

“Right, you said that we should rely on competition rather than regulation to keep school standards up. My question is simple. For how many schools/children is this failure acceptable while competition is doing its thing?”

I think this is a somewhat silly question. Of course, under a free market system there would be good schools and bad schools, just as there are now. The schools that exist now would largely continue to exist, but the responsibility would rest much closer to home. New schools would open. Poorly-performing schools would shut down. Again, these things happen now.

I work with many young people who have come through the current system and can hardly read and write. There are complex reasons for this. You can’t just blame the schools, but they have not benefited from state education. Would a free market system make all these problems disappear? No, but it may be able to respond in a more flexible and original way to problems where they exist – in the case in point, the streets of South London – compared to whatever the problem looks like to the bureaucratic planners in Whitehall.

” I would not want to go much further than that, and would wish to trust to a jury to decide what crosses that line.”

Thats pretty much my position too. And I think we’d be losing all sense of perspective to describe that as oppressive.

@ 55 TT

Thanks, that’s clearer. Extreme examples are valid as evidence against a rule, although in this case it’s more that the rule is more complex than first described.

I certainly don’t want to give the state power to indoctrinate. In fact, I’d be very happy for an anti-indoctrination law to be introduced, banning teachers from relaying political and quasi-political views as “factual” or “correct”, and creating a structure to deal with matters where parents think that a school is subtlely trying to pass on its views (e.g. by choosing reading material that is heavily liberal).

It should also be mentioned that the state’s power in this case really doesn’t extend past the school gates, aside from things like anti-hate-speech law. If a parent doesn’t like what their kid learns at school, they can tell the kid about the alternative view at home. However, if a parent picks their kid’s school, activities, entertainment and friends based on politics, they have something approaching complete control. Hand that rocks the cradle and all that.

Also, I don’t want to make anything illegal to teach. I want to make things illegal to teach *in mandatory school hours*. If parents want to give their kids night classes on antisemitism or whatever then that’s up to them.

I think our point of contention comes down to what we call “reasonable”, as you imply. I don’t think that telling kids what party to vote could be called a reasonable education. I don’t think teaching kids factual lies along the lines of evolution being untrue is a reasonable education – in fact it’s diseducation. Ultimately that sort of thing is not fair on the child.

@56. Trooper Thompson

No, I don’t think it’s a silly question. In fact it’s crucial. At present, we have a system that attempts to, and largely succeeds at, keeping all state schools at the same standard (this is not to say that all schools will produce similar results). With a relatively small private sector, this has the effect of keeping them honest at the same time.

Remove this, and you give an incentive to cheapen the product. I do not believe you can rely on the market to quickly sort this problem.

So. the question arises: what failure rate is acceptable?

I am going to make a prediction.

Michael Gove will fail in his attempt to drive up standards.

He will fail for the same reason that every Education Secretary since the National Curriculum was introduced has failed.

There is a very simple reason for this.

All have laboured under the illusion that there is out there, somwhere, a perfect system that will magically improve standards.

There is not.

The sad fact is that, by and large, schools do not have much effect on educational attainment.

Class dominates. You can start measuring ability at about 2-3 (not well enough to predict individual attainment, but good enough for mass statistical work). By about 5 middle and above class children are well above those, identically ranked initially, from lower classes. By 9 lower ranked middle class children overtake their peers.

There are two pieces of research that demonstrate this (I don’t have references: I’m at work)

Studies of the Chicago lottery system (every student is guaranteed a place at their local school, but can enter a lottery for a better one, if places are available) showed that winners did somewhat better (statisticallly significant) at the percieved better schools. However, losers, who went (presumably) to worse schools did just as well. The difference seems to have been not down to the school, but to better motivated parents/students.

One US state sets the standard test not just at the year end, but at the start. The year end figures show the usual depressing outpacing of the lower by the upper and middle groups. However, compare the improvement during the year 9the difference between the year start and end figures) and you get the surprising fact that the lower group performs as well, by this measure as the middle and better than the upper. What is happening is that those from the middle and upper groups continue to improve over the long summer break, whilst the lower group stagnates.

There are two conclusions. First, concentrate on the pre-school situation. Second abolish the long summer break.