Schools/acamedies are actually inhumane for students and staff alike! Long post...

Comments like these honestly ..And that’s why I left teaching …!

“it’s on the board, get started guys ..” as I greeted students and checked everyone was ok at the door . Then we cracked on because there be enough once the last straggler was through the door ! Bell task pfft . Honestly I remember once a guy retiring around 2010in the end of term drinks before everyone dashes off and he gifted us a little clock wheel thing that we had to make out of two circles of card and a split pin. We had to make it whilst he did his thank yous . The template been photocopied from a tes article from the late 70s - it was an educational gobbledegook term generator . Things like differentiated endpoint or learning goal - one preposterous combo was currently in vogue then ! 😂

If by “failed” you mean the only Western education system where children are actually at least keeping pace or improving on their ability in reading and mathematics, then yes, English schools are failing.

I don’t recognise this version of English schools at all. My kids are at a state school secondary and having a fabulous time. Teachers are firm but fair. They have a broad education in a wide range of subjects, good friends and are making solid progress.

The nearest small school (around 600 pupils) is shit. Flexi schooling is a shit idea that would actively damange the outcomes of millions of children to keep some minority of chattering class happy.

But that is small for a secondary! We have 600 students in our sixth form alone! And my DDs primary was 3 form entry and 600 pupils too.

Are you joking? There's so much wrong with what you said. The 'comprehensive' education idea has utterly failed because guess what, not all the kids are same. Abilities, ambitions, skills, SEN, parental support, access to extras..an endless list of why 'levelling' doesn't work and only ever seems to look down, not up. What you call 'pigeonholing' I call 'recognising each child's areas of strength and having a varied curriculum available from y9 onwards with flexibility and guidance to allow students to move across to different pathways or even mix and match. Tricky to manage but not impossible with vision, imagination and funding. But those are the things that have been lacking in education reforms for decades. I have some hope that AB new widening of the curriculum is a step in the right direction.

Massive typo in your title OP.

4/10 Can do better.

A bell task is what pupils do when they enter the room before everyone is there. A starter is what everyone does after the register.

Personally I wouldn’t have that sort of faith in technology to work. Not if my life depends on it. I want a manual over-ride.

I do agree that smaller secondary schools are better. Chose our house because it was in the catchment of a one of the smaller secondaries ( though they are now extending it due to massive new housing developments).

I went to secondary school in the early to mid 80s and some of what you say was the same then. We got half an hour ( well 35 min) for lunch. And after queuing there were days we got literally 5 minutes to eat it before the next lesson started. This is not a new academy thing OP!

We also had to walk between classrooms from one class to the next. Surely this has always been normal?

I see your point and I don't find it as bad as the op describes. The trolley life description was accurate though. Thats me several days a week.

Doesn’t half feel like and read one of those back in the day FB posts random endless slop posts though . Yes I know , starter has gone through several incarnations - bell work is very American.

They are called that is some places. We have had several names for the starter task over the years.

Hmmm “ bell task” - which American academy chain did you work for ? Never heard that parlance & I heard a lot in my UK career . They were called “ starters” for a very long time when they first appeared as a prescribe lesson structure.

I think that academies are getting the blame for there not being enough funding for schools and wider social changes.

Although some chains are more centralised and corporate feeling than others, and a number have overpaid ceos, many of the things you describe are due to not enough money so they try to balance the books which they legally have to do. They cant just spend whats needed, they spend their funding. The Academy Trust Handbook and other legislation has a massive list of things they have to do from complicated procurement processes to health and safety law to cyber security and so on that arent front facing like a TA but is a requirement. LAs used to do these services, no cheaper just differently but the ATH has grown year on year sin e a lot of schools converted.

I worked for a small LA school until it joined an academy chain last year. It has no money, no support for school improvement, redundancies and faced closure. The academy has saved the school for a community. It has put some funds to repairs the LA wasnt covering, sourced an executive head when the school couldnt afford a head at all, and given a school improvement partner to help standards.

Also my secondary in the 90s had 2100 pupils my sons academy was 500.

I completely agree OP. Schools have lost the way and academies are the absolute worst. It’s so sad when you know what teaching could be and how far it’s sunk. I left teaching in the end. I couldn’t be the teacher I trained to be and I was just so fed up of watching what the school environment was doing to children.
I’m so glad that where I live has held out against academisation and my own DC didn’t go to academies (although their school also had its issues). I would like to think someone would put a stop to it but unfortunately I think the genie is now out of the bottle and anything that’s making the rich richer is likely to stay…

That’s really sad OP. There’s a whole thread on people not getting a chance to eat at schools.
I feel a bit sad that my DC’s experience of school will be so much more oppressive than mine was. We’ve only just switched to secondary. I had this assumption that sanctions were for children who were regularly late, broke uniform rules, messed around in class, didn’t do their work etc. It’s been a sobering experience learning that sanctions are freely given, even for things completely out of a child’s control - not knowing where a classroom is, answering a question wrong in class, hands in the wrong position, not sitting up straight enough. Some of it seems tyrannical, with children trying to learn the ropes and goalposts moving. I feel like I’m being paranoid asking this, but do you know if some schools give staff quotas for sanctions? It feels so arbitrary. There is a consequence model listing criteria and punishments, but it doesn’t list humiliation which is used as a tool, it doesn’t state that the wrong hand position is disruptive behaviour, it doesn’t state not knowing where a particular classroom is when you’ve just joined is a detention. I don’t really understand why children are being treated like this, what the purpose is, why so much time and effort is spent on things that have nothing to do with behaviour or education.

It’s in a NW London suburb, so a residential area, with under 1,000 pupils originally. Over time it’s merged with two other local schools, pupil numbers have doubled, but I don’t think the building space has increased proportionally and it also operates over capacity. I’m sure there must be other schools in similar situations. It also results in less actual choice in choosing a school. They need a one way system to accommodate this. Obviously if a lesson is a door or two away in the opposite direction, pupils have to trudge round the whole school with their bags and PE kits and additional football boots and kit as they don’t know in advance which sport they’ll be playing. This all adds to the congestion. The lunch period hasn’t increased to accommodate the pupil growth, so children don’t have a genuine choice about whether to eat a school lunch or bring a packed lunch as they can only serve a certain number of people. Some children end up with neither as they don’t want to spend a significant amount of their lunchtime queuing.

They have daily uniform checks. They have daily equipment checks. I don’t know when or why this became popular in schools.

People often comment on threads like these, telling people to move as though that’s affordable to many, they’ll say homeschool, they’ll say change schools as though other schools in this area aren’t operating in a similar way. There was a trend for similar-style schools in America. They eventually backtracked, with some major players apologising that they’d got it so wrong. There is an assumption that these schools get results, even though many of the schools got good results before zero tolerance policies.

I think that idea is very valid and has upsides, but also downsides. So I suppose it depends how they are weighed up.

I think the education scientists have some data now too after covid. My DD, for example, had extended periods of virtual classes. So I expect there will be plenty of papers about it in a few years when outcomes are known.

On a big downside though. UK schools and Governments have been working for decades now to try to "level" education for all. No one left behind and no one left out due to circumstances beyond the child's control. And the system is not quite there yet. So be a shame to abandon that. Although of course plenty of people are for selective education.

But no matter what system is used, without a doubt, in my opinion, what we don't want is a system where kids are pigeonholed. As in, your parents are manual workers, therefore you will go to the manual work school.

I'd love it if in the future flexi-schooling became way more common as I think it can combine the best aspects of school and home ed, and maybe that would better prepare students for different work options. But I suspect it won't ever really take off because (most) parents now need to both work.

Tell us more about these 'small local schools'. Mine (1970s-80s) was 750 pupils (4 forms per year) and that was considered quite small. I doubt any teachers knew every pupil...

Yeah. I really don't see where your post fits.

My reply to @NeverDropYourMooncup was more about the OP apparently not being aware the doors will unlock in the event of a fire. And although I do not expect teachers to know what the fire regs are, it does maybe show a lack of enquiring mind. Because if OP is supply teacher and come across these doors and this situation of being trapped in the event of a fire, it really only takes a few seconds to ask a full time staff member " What is there is a fire?". And once explained, it is the sort of thing one remembers.

For sure it something that can be missed in a super quick induction. But full timers will know, because it is one of these things that would be brought up in H&S meetings, the minutes of which are usually published.

It's a bit like working in a factory, and someone props open a fire door with a "keep closed" sign on it. Often they prop it open with the handy fire extinguisher. There will usually be an H&S rep comes along, and says "no, not allowed". And once one learns of it, it is usually not forgotten. And if someone says " But it's too hot in here with the door closed", there will likely be a discussion about fitting electro magnetic door stops that are wired into the fire system.

So in a way, its an observation about how people pick up knowledge, without actually being directly involved. Yet the OP put it in their post, as a failing of the system.

Does my logic make sense ?

You know where has extremely good fire regs? China. As someone who likes facts, it may also interest you that the majority of global cyberattacks are perpetrated by actors in the US. Look it up. I learned it in an AP textbook (USA advanced course) last year. Russia is second, IIRC. I know we aren’t talking about cyberattacks here but perhaps there’s a correlation. The US right really does like Farage.

Maybe Communism is the answer you seek ? You know, take the commercial aspect out, and make education about "the greater good".

As a matter of interest, when you talk about school being like a goldfish bowl, have you ever worked in a factory, or have you always been a teacher ? And we can add big open plan offices too. The ones with partitions, and without.

Because if a large part of school is to prepare kids for the workplace, I think it is important they partially replicate it. To prepare them. And that can also apply to toilet breaks. If working on an assembly line, you can't just go to the loo. Because that stops the line.

But, if you think schools should be preparing kids for a work from home society, then you make lots of good points. But unfortunately, society can't function with 100% work from home. So really then we might need separate schools. Those for WFH, and other for "factory and shop". But really, exploring that, surely the best way to prepare for WFH, would be to home school.

But that model is getting potentially dystopian. Because that would be like a hermit society. One with no real social interactions.

Also, it would be creating new classes of society. Where a person's future is dictated by what school system they are allocated. And for equal opportunities for all, which I believe in. I don't think that would be any good.

Yup. I noticed that and it sort of put me off. This assumption that there are no fire regs in place to prevent people getting trapped. When there are actually loads of fire regs.

i agree on the overall size and the benefits of moderate sized secondaries. the personal connections and knowledge of the community.
i certainly would advocate for a smaller more personal school even if it meant less "clubs".
but i don't see parents having the necessary energy to challenge the system especially when the rating system are somewhat rigged to give the illusion of success.