“We fail students by indulging their fragilities” - Libby Purves in the Times

[CruCru]

I read this thing by Libby Purves in the Times: [[We fail students by indulging their fragilities

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/5dbf29f2-857e-41ce-8c78-028a513ab8f9?shareToken=c41320dec7bfb802e039b5c8bc3b513f

I found it very interesting. “Whatever the failings of postwar stiffness - it had plenty - at least that generation was more prepared than most modern children for the shocking fact that once education’s over, the wide world really doesn’t care about your feelings. Rules and systems should prevent bullying, but preserving your comfort zone is of interest only to parents and faithful friends. As far as everyone else is concerned, it’s up to you to be useful.”

I remember at work being taken aback at how much harder work some of the new graduates were than when I started. I wonder, though, if part of that was that they’d had to do so much more to get the job. My A levels were respectable but my old university wouldn’t give me a place these days. So much is expected of young people.

And they didn't even help particularly. The Dr just kept saying but you would feel worse not on them. Well I felt exactly the same before as taking them.
I think it was because I did not need them. It was situational. And when the situation got better my mood got better.

I see this all the time on Mumsnet, particularly with slightly tricky family dynamics and friendships. So many people on here are encouraged to (for example) never see their MIL and just let DH see her. Or to cut friends off or block them just because they've had a row. It seems incredibly childish to me. But this is adults displaying childish behaviour. The desire to never be slightly uncomfortable or to put oneself out is over-riding - but ultimately not helpful in teaching you how to negotiate the ups and downs of life, and accept the rough with the smooth.

It's entirely unsurprising that there's a correlation between SEN diagnoses and income/wealth.

The SEN system has been privatised by the back door.

We've spent around £5k on obtaining diagnoses and support for our daughter over the last three years that ought to be available in the public sector but aren't.

I've spent hundreds of hours doing unpaid admin and legal work in the attempt to get an EHCP.

There are lots of people, mostly mums, in that position.

It's victim blaming to imply we're all doing this for kicks. We're not the ones breaking the law...

As Ben Goldacre likes to say, "I think you'll find it's a bit more complicated than that."

Well l couldn’t cope with my grief 3 times. And unfortunately l had children to raise and jobs to do. I had to take them otherwise l couldn’t have got out of bed.

This through and through. It’s like the world has forgotten that feeling anxious and worried about things which are daunting is perfectly normal and very much part of being human.

I see this all the time on Mumsnet, particularly with slightly tricky family dynamics and friendships. So many people on here are encouraged to (for example) never see their MIL and just let DH see her. Or to cut friends off or block them just because they've had a row. It seems incredibly childish to me. But this is adults displaying childish behaviour.
The desire to never be slightly uncomfortable or to put oneself out is over-riding - but ultimately not helpful in teaching you how to negotiate the ups and downs of life, and accept the rough with the smooth
I agree with this. There's an awful lot of posts where people are quick to flounce, go non contact, not do anything that inconveniences them, complain that something doesn't suit them and instead of being mildly irritated or getting over itz they're bloody furious.

Then the big problem is that situations like this and situations where someone DOES have SEN or long term illness and disability end up getting muddied together.

There are a huge amount of issues in SEN and disability adjustments. The navel gazing self-obsessed everyone validate me and cater to my preferences group really muddy the waters in my opinion.

When people start selectively co-opting parts of other people's struggles then I find it irritating (which is how I feel when people who talk about bit "a bit OCD" when they mean preferring things tidy, or having anxiety when what they mean is normal nerves appropriate for a situation, or they've seen something on Tiktok and self diagnosed as neurodiverse, or the use words from the ME/CFS/chronic illness community about having fatigue when what they mean is they're tired).

But it depends on your emotional make up! I get knocked off balance really easily. I always have. Grief swamps me to the point of not being able to function. So can aspects of anxiety.

You are talking about your personality here. But everyone is different!

What a terrible article, it’s quite rare that someone with prejudices like that actually gets in print these days. Thank goodness.

Does she think people with hypermobile fingers should have to suffer the consequences of having illegible writing? She might as well say ‘Make way all ye with minor disabilities, dyslexia, dyspraxia, neurodivergence so all of us neurotypical types can have all the jobs. And while we’re at it, if you are a bag of nerves, also go to the back of the class,’

As regards it being about wealth etc. If our primary years experience of a private school environment and it’s clueless inability to distinguish between a physical and an emotional difficulty was anything to go by it most certainly isn’t. It was going to a state school that saved our DC from underachieving and got him typing everything, a state school that had the correct approach to referral to appropriate assessments rather than the private setting where they would have written him off.

Wow that was a complete load of absolute bollox. I really wish people who know fuck all about neurodiversity would stop writing about it.

What kind of asshole would celebrate disabled people (apparently) 'proudly preferring' not to tell anyone about their disability? More likely disabled people in the past feared being judged and looked down upon - or even worse, felt themselves that it was something to be ashamed of.

It seems that clueless Purves considers dyslexia and physical disabilities as 'real' acceptable disabilities where as ADHD is made up by the parents and ASD is reduced to 'quirks'.

I work in exams and I can tell this imbecile that no, a half of students don't have special arrangements - and no not even a quarter. Out of 300 students doing exams we have about 30/35 with special arrangements.

We are also now not allowed to let someone 'just' suffering from anxiety in a small room, let alone a room to themselves. This is actually a disaster as far as I am concerned as we have had students who after years of struggling to keep it together finally fall apart when the real exams hit - and then finally get diagnosed as a result.

Not being able to tolerate an exam hall is also absolutely nothing like going to a disco. I don't even understand the comparison so I don't really know where to start - it's like comparing apples and hippos. In an exam hall you have rows of eyes boring into the back of your head. You have invigilators watching your every move, you have to be still and silent. Every slight noise sounds like a siren. You are under huge pressure from teachers, parents, yourself. You only have a certain amount of time and you do not know exactly what is going to come up in the exam or if you are going to remember everything that you need to. If you don't get the results you need then you might not be able to stay at school, you might not be able to do the subjects that you want to at A-level or the degree course you want. At a disco you dance around hoping people think you look hot - often with some alcohol to help.

This is someone whose poor child killed themselves after suffering from a depressive illness. You'd think that instead of arguing that kids need toughening up to face a harsh world, she'd be saying that the world needs to be a gentler place where children who are struggling get proper, early, intensive help and support they need.

What she should be doing is arguing for proper mental health services that are actually able to help children and adults before they are in complete crisis. Many more SN schools and units attached to schools to properly cater to differing levels of SEN - and early diagnosis of SN. We need anyone who is struggling at school for whatever reason to be really picked up at school and given intensive help in whatever area they need. Dyslexia needs to be diagnosed on the NHS and all struggling kids should be screened at 7. We need Children's Centres and Youth clubs everywhere offering huge amounts of real help and support.

Or we can pretend the problem is the kids and that everything would be just fine if only they'd toughen up.

I think all kids should be screened for the ‘D’ things as part of general screening.

Middle class children who are diagnosed are of course over-represented amongst SEN children, because those parents often have greater resources especially financial and are able to speed things up by going private.

Prisons, young offenders institutes etc. have so many people with undiagnosed disabilities and subsequent years of trauma. Homeless teens, children in care, who is advocating for them? Even with the resources to follow through on all referrals etc. it's a battle.

I’d no idea about her own son until I looked her up. It’s difficult to understand the seeming lack of sympathy for exam candidates in her article. I now feel sad

I think Libby knows the difference then

Isn’t Libby Purves the one whose son committed suicide in his mid-twenties after dropping out of a postgrad? I would have thought she of all people would understand the impact of mental ill-health on young adults. Or maybe her brisk ‘get-on-with-it’ attitude was part of the problem there?

I get her point that young people need to be able to handle the challenges of a difficult world. I don’t accept that finding this painful to navigate is a sign of weakness or inadequacy. Being squeezed through exactly the same educational sausage machine regardless of need is not ‘fairness’. A cut-throat and frequently exploitative job market, where it’s winner takes all, devil takes the hindmost, is not so much healthy competition as hostile environment. I’m not surprised so many find it stressful and damaging.

Absolutely this ^^ 100%

Yep!

Doubg an EhcP application for Dd was like writing a post grad thesis. 58pieces of cross referenced evidence. All highlighted. And endless persuasive arguments.

I’ve got a post grad, Dh has a degree. We were fuckjng exhausted! And hated that document. But it had to be done. The current system is only accessible by the middle class unless it’s a really obvious disability.

All kids should be screened as part of national health checks. Maybe the prisons wouldn’t be as full if these things were picked up earlier.

Her son had depression and took his own life. She knows about mental health issues.

Yep! It’s deliberate surely? To make help as hard as possible to access!

I beg to disagree. I think even if she turns out to be ill-suited to the primary school environment, and has a rough few years because of it, she could well carve out a niche for herself in helping ND children who, like her, find the social side of school difficult to navigate. It could mean that she ends up in more of a one to one tutoring role, or as a SENCO, or even in a specialist school. Not everyone walks into their ideal job straight away and she’ll have picked up a lot of useful skills.

Yeah, she could get help through Access to Work too. Which would pay for an assistant some of the time.

One of the greatest lessons in life I learnt was that the world rewards those who meet its needs - it's not the other way round. And everyone needs to learn that, preferably at school, through minor defeats in things which twenty years later will seem inconsequential, so that when you're an adult, you can fit in.

I don't think it's an either/or situation between resilience vs ND, confidence vs anxiety. Rather, that everyone has to learn these skills but they may look different in everyone. So someone with ADHD has to learn organisation - they may never be perfectly organised, but they'll need to learn enough to get by in their own life. Same with resilience - it will appear differently and in different degrees in everyone, but everyone still has to have some resilience if they are going to go out into the world and do anything at all.

@Speedweed absolutely- as I said below whilst companies do have to make allowances these days and quite rightly in many cases- at the end of the day the best companies to work for still can pick and choose and if someone is very unreliable or just cannot cope in situations that others can then they will struggle in life or work - whether that's fair or not is another thing- but it is the reality. I worked in HR for quite a while at one point and some people simply didn't pass probation or were let go before 2 years because they were just not a good fit or poor timekeepers or didn't phone in when sick or whatever and when there didn't seem to be extenuating circumstances and I have to be honest and say it was mainly under 30s .

Access to work is over subscribed. It can't give support people to everyone with a disability who works.

I got it. It was easy, no problems or any evidence if over subscription.

In fact l thought it was undersubscribed.

Maybe it depends on your area.