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Post by Progenitor A on Mar 3, 2011 8:54:12 GMT 1
It has been discovered that childern studying for vocational subjects (e.g media studies, tourettesism) are at a disadvantage in comparison to those studying traditional 'academic' subjects (e.g Maths, Science History)
Flummoxes me, must admit. What would a potential employer want with a young person who can write (and speak) grammatically and is capable of logical thought and is partly numerate, when he can have a youngster that has studied and answered multi-choice questions on Eastenders or knows the price of a Ryanair flight to Torremelinos?
I sometimes think that employers (and Universities) are a bit too pernickety and are not attuned to the Great Leap Forward that Blair initiated in education
Could it be that 'vocational studies' (something to do with getting your hands dirty)are just the patronising brain chuld of lefty luvvies who would never dream of putting their darlings on such courses?
Why do I hear a great silent shout of YES?
God our educational system is a real Augean stables run by teachers largely unfit for the job, but is Gove the Hercules we seek?
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Post by abacus9900 on Mar 3, 2011 11:08:42 GMT 1
Not all kids are academically inclined, naymissus, and are never going to be 'clever', so I think more vocational courses should be brought in since at least that way kids will have some practical skills behind them on which to build. It seems at the moment that if a child fails academically, that is basically that and cannot expect much of a future (there are exceptions of course). Perhaps by equipping kids with a set of skills we won't need to look for immigrants to provide us with plumbers, electricians, etc.
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Post by jonjel on Mar 3, 2011 11:22:33 GMT 1
I reluctantly watched the first part of the Jamie Oliver series last night, and very quickly became adsorbed.
True it is a programme made for TV and I don't doubt that the children were picked with care, but I also think they represent a huge sub-culture of which most of us are blissfully unaware.
I am sure that most of those children were of average intelligence, but whether it is due to pressure from their peers, or their environment most seemed to regard it as almost a badge of honour to leave school wiht absolutely nothing.
I have interviewed job applicants many many times, and you can tell the ones that have had their application forms filled in by the school or outside body. You don't expect a 17 year old to be particularly mature. You do however expect them to be able to speak their own native language in such a way that others can understand what is being said. And a very high proportion in that respect are inarticulate. Their peers might understand them, but it is not English as I know it.
And without language skill, and a modicum of numeracy and literacy, together with a reasonable standard of behavior (when needed) these kids are doomed to a life of either benefit, or a low paid unfulfilling job forever.
The slightly better ones get jobs in shops or similar. How many times have you had to ask a young person behind the counter to repeat what they are saying? How many times have you telephoned an organisation and been unable to understand what is being said? And I am not talking about people with English as a second language, but as their first language.
It is high time teachers got a bit of support, were able to sanction children in a meaningful way, and be able and indeed compelled to actually teach those things that matter.
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Post by abacus9900 on Mar 3, 2011 11:48:29 GMT 1
I think one of the factors here is youth culture. Many kids are more absorbed in the antics of celebrities, music, the net, movies and so on, than putting their efforts into education and homework which, from their point of view, simply eats into their leisure time.
For some, it is only when they get older and, perhaps, meet a girl and think about having a family that they seriously think about getting a job and how under-qualified they are.
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Post by carnyx on Mar 3, 2011 12:26:42 GMT 1
Universal state-funded compulsory mass-education of children for 5 to 18 as a social innovation is coming under scrutiny, as it is a manifest failure.
As currently constituted and practiced in the UK, state-schooling is basically a copy of the US system of homogenising second-generation immingrant children into factory workers via peer-group pressure and lockstep procedural progress. Children are forced into commuting-in to these rendering plants. And when they are ejected at the end of a decade or more of being processed, there are no mills or factories or production-lines for them to sit at.
Time this cruel hoax was halted.
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Post by Progenitor A on Mar 3, 2011 14:57:35 GMT 1
Not all kids are academically inclined, naymissus, and are never going to be 'clever', so I think more vocational courses should be brought in since at least that way kids will have some practical skills behind them on which to build. It seems at the moment that if a child fails academically, that is basically that and cannot expect much of a future (there are exceptions of course). Perhaps by equipping kids with a set of skills we won't need to look for immigrants to provide us with plumbers, electricians, etc. I agree with you entirely However as constituted curremtly 'vocational' qialifications are quite, quite useless. It is estimated that 300,000 children are taking vocational qualifications that are of no use to anyone - qualifications that do not equip a child to do anything nor to study anything further - aprropriately a large number of those children are taking a course that advises them on how to claim unemployment benefits! It cannot be stated loudly and clearly enough that schools are not the right places for vocational training. The idea that teachers, many of whom have not worked outside the eduactional system are equipped in any way to guide children toward a vocation is nonsense (indeed the basic competence of many teachers is suspect - I know of primary teachers 'teaching' maths who have only an 'O' level (or less) in that subject But all is no lost This governmeny proposes to make vocational training a reality, allowing childrern to leave school at 14 and then take proper vocational coiurses at Technical Colleges - hopefully interspersed with proper industrial training in a work environment The current system is typical of socialist wishful thinking with the best of intentions leading to an actual disaster because it is patronising and has not been thought through nor properly funded Our educational system reflects the class sytem of our society, where 'academic' subjects are seen as superior (although there is a great hypocritical pretence that they are not). In fact many (most?) of our children are abandoned by the educational system and that is an absolute disgrace. We need to see a major programme of vocational training along the lines propsed by this government and (although I cannot see this happening under the current economic constraints) an expenditure that will make vocational training a reality
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Post by abacus9900 on Mar 3, 2011 20:39:22 GMT 1
I think the modern secondaries have in the past always tried to emulate the best grammar and public schools in an attempt to produce excellence. This is commendable except that a good proportion of students who attended secondary moderns were either educationally 'turned off' or simply had little academic ability, so the only students who gained were those who would have liked to have gone on to grammar schools but didn't quite make it. The other group, I suppose, were those kids who came from a background where education is valued very much more than in the general population, such as, for example, found in the Indian and other minority groups. The advent of comprehensives doesn't seem to have ameliorated this state of affairs much to my knowledge and was brought in I think more as an experiment than a serious attempt to close the gap between achievers and non-achievers. Again, as you suggest, the good intentions of successive governments has imposed a curriculum that was and is more suited to university preparation, or at least some form of higher learning, and that does not favour those pupils who really see little value in an academic education and, therefore, just turn up at school unmotivated and bored. People are different and some have gifts which are suited to academic study, some who have gifts more suited to more practical pursuits and who would benefit more if allowed to express their personal talents. Certainly, it is essential to provide children with a minimum level of education in order to equip them for day to day life in the real world but it is a fact of life, however lamentable, that not everyone can be a high flyer.
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Post by carnyx on Mar 3, 2011 21:27:03 GMT 1
Abacus, the real case of lament is that 'high fliers' are defined purely by the system that is designed to select a tiny minority of 'high-fliers'. It is comparable with diamond mining, which turns whole mountains into useless poisonous slurry in order to get a few bits of glittery ornament.
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Post by abacus9900 on Mar 3, 2011 22:18:55 GMT 1
Abacus, the real case of lament is that 'high fliers' are defined purely by the system that is designed to select a tiny minority of 'high-fliers'. It is comparable with diamond mining, which turns whole mountains into useless poisonous slurry in order to get a few bits of glittery ornament. Good point.
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