Mailwatch(ed) Forum

They’ll amend the Equality Act to allow them do their bollocks.

Tubby Isaacs wrote: ↑Thu Jul 20, 2023 11:08 pm They’ll amend the Equality Act to allow them do their bollocks.

Do you mean the trans kids stuff?

It won't just be the Act, there is a huge train of guidance, legislation and policy which would also have to be rewritten.

I agree, but the Act is going to be rewritten before the election. Labour want to turn your kids tranny.

In other news.

I could say something about the skill sets needed at FE and HE levels being rather different, or the EDI aspect meaning students have more flexibility in how they express their knowledge at HE...

Interesting

In 2022, council-maintained schools also outranked academies, with 92% rated “outstanding” or “good” by Ofsted in January and 85% of academies graded the same since they converted.

The study also found only 57% of academies that were already an academy in August 2018 managed to improve standards from “inadequate” or “requires improvement” to “good” or “outstanding”, compared with 73% of council-maintained schools.

The findings bring the longstanding dispute over what school leaders have called “forced academisation” into the spotlight, as the government announced ambitions for all schools to join multi-academy trusts (Mats) by 2030 as part of the main policy for school improvement in the schools bill.

About 73% of academy schools voluntarily chose to become academies. However, schools which have received an “inadequate” rating from Ofsted are also legally required to become academies, and schools that have received two or more consecutive ratings below “good”, known as “requires improvement”, could also be converted into academies.

Paul Whiteman, the general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers, has previously said the move towards academisation could penalise the nearly 50% of all pupils taught in locally maintained schools who already receive a good education. The government should instead focus on properly funding and resourcing all schools, he added...

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2 ... ed-ratings

Between August 2018 and January 2023, 72% of council-maintained schools retained their “outstanding” rating, compared with 60% of “outstanding” academies that did not inherit grades from their former maintained school status.

About 40% of academies which did not inherit a grade fell by at least one grade, compared with 28% of maintained schools, which the LGA said showed councils should be seen as effective education partners.

In spite of the evidence...

A Department for Education spokesperson said: “Academy reforms have played a major role in increasing the proportion of ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’ schools from 68% in 2010 to 88% last year.

From this I gather that, teaching staff to one side, if you employ people who care more about education you get good schools, and if you employ people who care more about money you get crap schools. Who could have guessed?

In one.

Simple question: is critical thinking taught in schools and if so, at what level?

I'm not aware of any school which teach critical thinking as a specific subject. At mu school they do teach something called 'Life' which incorporates lots of stuff that used to be called citizenship or PSHE. Students often look at a diverse range of topics including racism, homophobe, bullying etc as well as Internet safety and road safety. Students only look at most of these topics very briefly so there really isn't much time for in depth analysis. I know that Katharine Birbalsingh has invited a number of high profile philosophers into her school like Jordan Peterson to speak to her pupils but I think this was nothing more than a publicity stunt aimed at bolstering her standing with right wing journalists.

Most schools these days especially academies are completely focussed on getting pupils through exams so they are unlikely to provide much time on the curriculum for lessons that don't contribute to better exam results.

I was a champion for CT withing Gifted and Talented programmes, and I used Philosophy for Kids and Communities of Enquiry in history lessons. All gone now since 2010...

Communities of enquiry are interesting, as they follow a very careful sequence of CT:

1. What does the question mean? (Often this took the whole lesson)
2. What would an answer to the question look like/contain? Long discussion...
3. What do we have to find out/ascertain/understand (FOFO)
4. What is the answer to the question.


Sample question: "Was Harry Truman justified in using nuclear weapons against Japan in 1945?'

Kids sit in a circle, usual etiquette.

Thanks for the replies so far. I'm getting my arse kicked elsewhere (no surprise there) for suggesting that the steady decline in educational standards and the lack of teaching students critical thinking skills is why we get people so easily taken in by claims made in the media, in whatever form it takes - people don't stop to think "hang on a minute - is this really true?"

My main detractor is saying "you're wrong, you don't know what you're talking about, do some research - it's all down to social media."

I suspect he'll not be very happy at my suggestion that a lesser-educated public is easier to manipulate by actors acting in bad faith.

I feel I've learned something today, which is always a good feeling.

and this is how education and an educated population is now viewed in this country

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... ments.html

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... -them.html

Quoting some of the text to give us a clue wouldn't go amiss.

I strongly suspect that the number of teenagers hanging on the words of fuckwit Tories and / or arseholes like Clarkson is miniscule.

Watchman wrote: ↑Thu Aug 17, 2023 1:33 pm and this is how education and an educated population is now viewed in this country

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... ments.html

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... -them.html

The relevant headlines are

Education Secretary Gillian Keegan claims students shouldn't fret about their A-level results because 'no one will ask about your grades in 10 years' time' as Labour slam her 'rude and dismissive' comments

and

Happy Jeremy Clarkson day to those who celebrate! Ex-Top Gear star posts annual A Level tweet reminding students it's 'not the end of the world' if they miss out on their grades

I think this is the most damning indictment of all; the kids can't even levitate properly these days.

Rosvanian wrote: ↑Thu Aug 17, 2023 2:24 pm I strongly suspect that the number of teenagers hanging on the words of fuckwit Tories and / or arseholes like Clarkson is miniscule.

Middle-aged people stay younger for longer these days. Young people don't think they do. If you're 18 Jeremy Clarkson, if you've heard of him at all, is that sad bloke your dad watches on cable TV.

soulboy wrote: ↑Thu Aug 17, 2023 2:25 pm I think this is the most damning indictment of all; the kids can't even levitate properly these days.

I mean, what is that shit? Surely the sub-ed on that knows the rules by now: One token boy (max) and all girls to be in short skirts. Shocking dereliction of duty.

She's not wrong - in a sense.
I used to do a lot of this stuff with kids coming up to GCSE - revision classes and seminars etc.

Your GCSE results are an entrée - after a few years they are irrelevant. Employers want to see other qualities; team membership, initiative, leadership, creativity. We used to research this by looking in the Sits Vac columns of the Guardian - what did they ask for when paying the then huge sums of £75k pa. It was those things, not GCSE A* in geography.

But, and it's a big but, you have to get on the ladder, become part of the team, get in the flow with the big kids, and to do that you need either those GCSEs or some other marker of talent.

(I do wonder if she knows and understands any of the above. I doubt it, it's something she's half-heard and half-understood)

soulboy wrote: ↑Thu Aug 17, 2023 2:25 pm
I think this is the most damning indictment of all; the kids can't even levitate properly these days.

Worse than that ... some of them appear to have willies.
MAILAGEDDON is iminent.

I’m sure one is someone who is a member of the Labour Party

I didn't realise that there was a Bad Law Project.