In article , Andy Hall
wrote:
On Tue, 08 Nov 2005 12:53:34 +0000 (GMT), John Cartmell
wrote:

In article , Andy Hall
wrote:

Public schools are but a small part of the private education sector.

I know. That's why I use the term publc school and private school
appropriately.

... and why I was talking about the private sector in general, and not
particularly about public schools.

In that case I'd better mention that the public school/private school overlap
is quite large and the former is almost entirely a sub-set of the latter. But
I didn't think I'd need to spell it out.


I was talking about the individual and the educational benefits. Unless
you have actually experienced use of both sectors personally, it is
difficult to appreciate those.

I have.

In the sense of having paid to have a child educated in one?



Other benefits come from the freedom available to private schools to
exclude pupils and have other sanctions not available in the public
sector.

All schools should have the ability to exclude pupils under certain
circumstances. This is how things work in adult life.

Private schools have it much easier in general. And never have to pick up
the pieces.

That isn't quite true. They still have to deal with a lot of unnecessary
state interference.

In terms of pastoral care when needed, that is certainly a significant
aspect. There is also the time to make sure that the child is equipped to
deal with how to think and how to approach issues rather than just dealing
with curriculum.

Only then do the benefits of small classes and better equipment step in.

The benefits of small classes are apparent from the outset in terms of
the attention that each pupil gets and the accelerated speed of
learning. Again, unless you have been involved in and seen the results
personally, it is not easy to appreciate the benefits.

I have.

Then I am sure that you will understand the benefits.

I'd like to see all private schools closed because everyone appreciated
that the public sector schools were clearly better;

Who is this "everyone"? The trouble is that public sector schools
have been in decline for a generation or more. Not their fault by any
means, but as the result of being dicked around by the political and
social experiments in education carried out by successive governments.

The benefit of private sector education is that it has, to some extent,
been insulated from some of the worst excesses of that.

Exactly. Some might say that the National Curriculum was designed to cause
as much damage as possible to public sector schools in order to boost
private schools.

Some might, but that is something of an extrapolation.

I don't believe it. I think it was designed by an ex-public schoolboy who got
his job because of his school rather than his competence.

It's framework was designed by an ex-public school / private school twit
with no apparent understanding of the reality of public sector school
teaching at the time and undermined many good developments.

Public sector schools were semi-reasonable when there was proper selection
into appropriate schools for the child. Comprehensive education and the
National Curriculum together have screwed that up quite effectively.

The only thing wrong with selection was the state of the schools that the
majority of pupils attended. And the fact that most authorities didn't select
but used a scholarship system. It was all based on a pernicious lie.

the mere existence of private schools puts a charge on the public purse
that is difficult to calculate but is probably very high - it has
certainly contributed to the bad state of management in UK industry.

The existence of private schools (and I mean in general, not public
schools) has been to retain a quality in education despite the worst
efforts of successive governments to destroy it.

Certainly some retain *a* quality - and not necessarily a good quality.
Again from personal knowledge.

I know. The sad thing is that a lot more used to before the setup was
meddled with by the educational theorists.

The bad state of UK industry has been for numerous reasons,
predominantly related in one way or another to government interference.

High profile cases may be exceptions but the major problem has been
extremely bad management sourced using the old boy network.

I know a lot of people in middle and senior management in a variety of
organisations and very few come from the "old boy network".

Certainly less than there used to be.

Ultimately, if what you say is true, then natural selection will resolve
the problem.

Sometimes 'ultimately' is too late. In this case it is too late.

--
John Cartmell john@ followed by finnybank.com 0845 006 8822
Qercus magazine FAX +44 (0)8700-519-527 www.finnybank.com
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