To not understand why Katharine Birbalsingh is so controversial

Don't be silly.

Well, if it walks like a duck....

I'd love her trust to take over our shitty local secondary and for the education blob to implement her culture and standards in many many schools. Give it 50 years and it would transform our country.

"You give the impression of having an unreasonable and unwarranted dislike of academies and free schools, blinded by a Marxist ideology."

is what Birbalsingh said in her letter to Phillipson. Something about wanting branded ties, which is actually fine, the Labour policy makes additional allowances for branded ties.

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/what-problem-is-the-education-secretary-trying-to-solve/

Because the education complex hates underprivileged minority children being successful. They are meant to remain as failures so they can keep their programmes and conferences and funding and teeth gnashing going. She makes them look bad because the children in her school achieve results that they see as unacceptable. People will start to think the kids they fail to educate should be getting good results too.

I think the whole idea that the only reason girls don’t go into stem is because of sexism is dead. Obviously sexism has been a factor historically, but even in highly egalitarian contexts women choose stem less than men do.

The white working class does the worst in education. I know of a Michaela-style school that does brilliantly in a white, working-class, rural context. Interestingly, as the school is just the catchment school, parents don’t really have a lot of choice about sending them there. Many families do not value education and often they hate the school. But it gets far and away the best results in the area despite having the most difficult cohort.

Exactly. In fact it really calls into question KB’s intelligence as she clearly doesn’t know what a Marxist is!

Obviously it is great to aim for a whole cohort passing maths and English but nationally this will never be 'allowed' as the pass percentage is now norm referenced rather than criteria referenced, so roughly the same proportion of every cohort is allowed to pass each year.

It is frustrating when politicians say 'we need to aim for higher number passing GCSE core subjects' when they prevent this to stop grade inflation.

She was asked a question and gave an honest answer according to her own experience and the research.

Should the question not have been asked? Should she have lied?

I can’t imagine why a 15 year old would be put off doing physics a level because of what she said. I would have thought her own teachers, parents and peers would have more influence.

Obviously because 1 size fits all doesn't work however I live in a rural area and our choice of state secondary schools have abysmally low outcomes + behaviour. Most parents if given the choice would choose Michaela style school over the current offer.
The point is that parents who actively choose Michaela know what they are subscribing too.

It only works when there is a choice of schools though. Import the system to a rural area in a school with the only 6th form for miles, and all you are doing is limiting choices and not stretching the very brightest kids.

But shouldn't the assumption be that kids should achieve maths, rather than writing it off as unimportant. That attitude is why we have fairly low levels of functional numeracy and literacy in large sections of the population. She sets a standard whereby the assumption is that each child will achieve m+e ie high aspirations.

it doesn’t matter to many people. I know this goes against the grain of Mumsnet lore and wisdom. But there are great swathes of people who manage to have perfectly successful and happy lives without them. My sister is a DI in the police force. She never passed gcse maths. She has a degree but no maths gcse.
my son doesn’t need gcse maths to do his job.
People who work in factories and shops and pubs and cleaners and street cleaners and entrepreneurs and business owners and self employed tradespeople. Plenty of them don’t have a maths GCSE.

Challenging Bridget Phillipson is fine. Going on a rant and accusing her of being a Marxist is not.

Loads of schools limit the GCSEs or equivalent that pupils can take, when the coop academy chain started all pupils had to do an Nvq in business (not sure if this is still the case). Many state schools only offer one language - one school near me you can only do Spanish, another only French.

Yeah you can earn money doing stem but we also have tons of people with phds doing minimum wage lab work. Software engineering pays well but it is competitive to get the high paid roles in the big companies. I think making sure all your pupils get the subjects and grades they need to access further and higher education or to get a job is a win tbh, if only all schools could do that for those that have the capability.

I watched an interview with her today and was surprised to agree with her on so many things. She's speaking out against the Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill and has challenged Bridget Phillipson on it so I'm pleased.

Yes I think thats the point, of course there are girls who are interested, thrive at and excel at further maths, thats not in dispute, but its not the choice forefront for most girls, the stats bear that out.

Im on the fence about her I suppose, she sounds a complete horror, but I have long thought the number of GCSEs children take these days is far far too high, its a shame she doesnt encourage a breadth of subjects but to focus down on the most key areas so that there is a deeper knowledge and more streamlined learning experience, seems to be key for children

I also disagree with lots of posters about SEN children not thriving in such an environment, many would breathe a sigh of relief coming from noisy, unpredictable, chaotic, violent, ever changing atmospheres.

To continue, the site standoutcv says that only the fields Medicine and Dentistry, Vet Sci, Eng and Tech and Maths have higher salary ranges for graduates than Computer Science. (CS was not mentioned near the top of the luminate site).

When people say it is hard to get jobs in tech, I think they are usually referring to the computing field. I do wonder whether it is the more specialised degrees in IT, Gaming, etc producing an abundance of graduates, but I don’t know

Disliking FM or anything else intrinsically is fine. When a charismatic, Oxbridge educated woman suggests that real women favour the Humanities, of course some impressionable 15-16 year olds will be put off. That’s the problem.

How can such girls judge what they missed?

Well, of course they would be.

What do all the girls who didn’t take further maths think? Because their take is what matters here, surely.

I don't think anything she posts on X is controversial. I like her.

Hi, @FKAT

That was me. I can’t link on this phone but here is some info.

The site luminate.ac.uk has an article from Nov 2024 saying that the top 5 starting ir graduate salaries are, in order, for graduates in

Medicine and Dentistry
Mathematics
Mechanical Engineering
Chemistry
Modern Languages

Another site I will look for now listed Computer Science right behind Maths. To be cont’d

Quite. All of the students I send off to excellent universities in a range of subjects are more than capable of thinking for themselves. I don’t let them just parrot what I say. And they go on to be hugely successful in a range of roles and fields.