To think that a pupil premium should be paid for children who live in home where none of the parents have qualifications

[ReallyTired]

I think that the education of the parents has a more significant outcome on a child's attainment than income. (Especially as many working poor don't have much more money than those on benefits.)

I feel that children who live in households where no adult has five GCSEs or equivalent should get extra support at school. Often these families aren't entitled to benefits because the parents do work so currently don't get the pupil premium.

It is harder for uneducated parents to support their children with homework than someone with a degree. Better eduated mothers are better at getting their children's needs met as they are often more articulate. For example making sure that statemented child gets what they are legally entitled to. (Getting a child assesed by an ed pych so that the child's dyslexia is spotted.)

Unskilled people often do physically hard work for very long hours for very little money. I believe that a child with unskilled working parents is at a major disadvantage as their parents are time poor as well as cash poor.

Simply arguing over standards devalues qualifications.

So what should we do? Leave poor-quality qualifications in place in order to avoid upsetting people? That's exactly the problem that the poster who was cross about poor information was complaining about: the rise of non-equivalent qualifications that "everyone" knows aren't actually as valuable as is claimed, apart from the people who end up taking them. Stopping discussion of the fact that A Level Law is barely acceptable as a qualification for any useful purpose doesn't magically make it acceptable, it just returns that fact to the shadows inhabited by people who actually understand the system.

Arguments about the relative merits of qualifications go back to the dawn of time. O Levels were derided at the time they were introduced. Everyone wants to believe that the qualifications they took, and that their adult children took, were in some sense superior to those taken by young whippersnappers. Bring back school certificate.

He has an IT degree from a Red Brick university. Gained entry through HNC, HND etc

I bet he has a computer science degree, if it's redbrick.

And the route via HNC and HND doesn't exist any more, for practical purposes.

And yet again, you're confusing "people in post today" with the "the world as it's going to be". A lot of traditional IT jobs are ceasing to exist. The highest paid, and best, jobs in IT are (for example) working for Google, who mostly recruit people with good PhDs.

O Levels were derided at the time they were introduced. Everyone wants to believe that the qualifications they took, and that their adult children took, were in some sense superior to those taken by young whippersnappers.

A good point to remember. I don't think what I learnt at school was superior. However I think my parents actually were able to worry less about being involved enough. They certainly did not feel pressured to help with homework every evening, like I have done.

frday No it is I.T. He sneered at Computer Science, rightly or wrongly.

Sorry friday. Typing too fast.

My husband has also recruited very recently and has been involved in recruitment now, although it is not his core responsibility. The majority did not have PHDs. Google is not the only employer. Every organisation requires IT.

Of course traditional IT jobs are ceasing. However new jobs replace them. This is because IT changes very rapidly with new and changing technology. My husband has to constantly retrain to keep up. He seems to like this aspect.

Arguing about the validity of GCSE / degree equivalents is irrelevent when 20% of primary school kids leave year 6 with poor literacy skills.

Lots of jobs require constant retraining. Our children need to learn how to learn for themselves.

"Cultural expectations"?

I know that code. Black kids, white chavvy kids... Believe it or not, being born working class/benefit scrote doesn't magically switch off the bits of the brain.

You know, some members of the previous generations, who did well without qualifications, passed the 11+ but weren't allowed to go by their parents, because their parents felt grammar school wasn't for their class.

However, those routes without qualifications are no longer there. No longer there. You need a degree and its soft skills to work in a call centre!

20% of primary school kids leave year 6 with poor literacy skills.

But is this because their parents are not educated? Or because too much of education is left to the parents...Certainly English is a core subject.

TheBigJessie My parents were working class. I come from the north. I went to a Comp. I remember my Dad been terrified there was going to be another strike because we were already in debt..

My brother left school at 16. He was sponsored to do his degree and MSC by his employer.

"Not quite. I think it is just as viable option for the Upper Classes to choose to work in a trade, or craft. It can be extremely satisfying and lucrative"

Yep. That's why so many plumbers and chippies have public school educations.......

curlew I can see you've never read Country Life. The 'Upper Classes' are often farmers. Some apparently do take up wood work, admittedly more of the hand crafted furniture variety. Our plumber is better off than his brother, I think there might be a Public School background, except his brother went in to the forces and he did not want to. He is the 'black sheep' though and seems to relish the fact!

Ok- now I know there is no point in further discussion.

My brother left school at 16. He was sponsored to do his degree and MSC by his employer.

The past is another country. They do things differently there.

Education gives a person choice. If a child can read and write well then the entire world opens up to them.

Someone with good numeracy and literacy skills can still learn a trade. (Infact you need to be able to read, write and do maths to learn a trade.)

friday My brother only got his MSC last year!

He did his MSC straight after his degree.

Infact you need to be able to read, write and do maths to learn a trade
gosh really you need to be able to read and write to be a builder or electrician or farrier?

do you know how insulting that comment is?
I would far rather my child trained up to a good trade than went to some crappy uni for a worthless degree and a pile of debt!

ReallyTired

Someone with good numeracy and literacy skills can still learn a trade. (Infact you need to be able to read, write and do maths to learn a trade.

Never said any different. Although it is possible the same people doing the trade never achieved that well at school because they did not see what they were learning as relevant. Certainly my maths improved greatly once I started working in Graphics for a commercial organisation.

The 'Upper Classes' are often farmers.

I agree with curlew, this is pointless. The "Upper Classes" do not spend all day in the yard in blue overalls, coming in smelling of manure. They employ people to do that, people who are paid extremely badly. Long ago on this thread, someone referred to the precarious life of an agricultural labourer. It has always been bad, and is getting worse.

Upper class farmers are land owners. Driving around in a Land Rover with a Purdey on the passenger seat is not "farming" in the sense of getting up at four to milk the cows. They have qualifications in estate management and accountancy and fiddling subsidies not sticking their hand up the back of cows.

And as if by magic, let's look at the post universities league. In at Number Two, ahead of Oxford and Cambridge, we have The Royal Agricultural College, 53.7% independently educated! At number 34, just behind RHUL the posh girl's Oxford we have Harper Adams, 18% privately educated. I wonder what they all go on to do?

Estate Management? something like that?

The Land Owner / Farmers I know (I come from a rural area) certainly did work with their animals in overalls. They certainly did own a lot of land too. Not necessarily much disposable income....well not much evidence of it anyway, but that is not saying much. They did have Land Rovers, though not of the shiny variety. They did get up tom milk the cows.

In fact any Young Farmer's social event felt like a cattle market! No Purdey would have lasted the distance...wife material was something quite different.

"Never said any different. Although it is possible the same people doing the trade never achieved that well at school because they did not see what they were learning as relevant. Certainly my maths improved greatly once I started working in Graphics for a commercial organisation."

A primary school child is not going to learn maths through vocational experience. Certainly vocational learning is good for older children.

The competition for jobs is fiece and is only going to get fiecer. Competition for jobs is international. Many unskilled jobs are being taken by Poles who are better educated and frankly have a better work ethic.

There aren't the openings for people without basic skills anymore.