To ask if parents of secondary school students are aware…

[Curtainsblue]

I’ve seen some posts about the impact of lack of teachers on primary schools and also some discussion about impact on exam classes, but I wonder if parents of KS3 students are fully aware of the situation schools are currently in.

My friend is a science teacher in an oversubscribed, high achieving comprehensive school and has told me that from September around a third of KS3 science lessons will be being taught/supervised by cover teachers.

Maths are losing curriculum time (so fewer lessons every week) in KS3 as there simply aren’t the staff to teach them. He’s said this is a common picture throughout local schools, with maths and science departments in particular being impacted- he knows of 1 school in the areas that are fully staffed in these subjects.

A colleague of his at a different school has said they are preparing for it to become common place for students to be in ‘super-cover’ classes, where if there are staff absences, students will be sitting in exam style venues in groups of 60-90 working silently and independently while being supervised by a senior member of staff.

This isn’t being communicated to parents. I spoke to a teacher at my sons school and she said she doesn’t know what’s happening there yet but they are also incredibly understaffed from September.

Are you aware of staffing levels at your children’s secondary school and how this is going to impact them?

Nope its down to choice and it is as simple as people think
Did you have to do 'A Level ? - No.
What stopped you from applying to vocational college? - You
I had a friend at school (Grammar system) who left with 10 A's at 'O' Level (in old money) and whats he doing now - hes a mechanic. His choice, he's happy.
Yes reform takes money probably a lot less than trying to fix the current system which isn't fit for purpose if kids aren't getting educated.

I'm advocating making an initial offer at the end of year 9 but it would be good if there was an offer FROM year 9 and is available as and when it's right for the child.

Hahahaha ok. Is that what you're going to say to the late bloomers who were academic but you forced down a technical route? It was your choice?
It wasn't my choice. There are a LOT of people in my situation. College wasn't an option. That's why they changed the law around this. That's how big the problem was.

Perhaps we need to make it more widely known education doesn't stop at 18. You can return to any level of education at any age.

Ah how could I forget! Must've forgot that when my mum's housing benefit ran out when I finished school and I needed to pay my way. And no, apprenticeships did not exist at the same scale as they do now and when they did they were reserved for boys. Get your privileged ass out of my mentions.

I couldn’t afford university, my parents couldn’t afford two lots of tuition fees (sibling at Uni) and accommodation for me (only 1 Uni offered the course miles away).
I couldn’t afford it now I have rent etc to pay either

If you want to study you can get a student loan and go to university whenever you want

This is the situation on the ground yet the media continue to peddle the lazy teachers rhetoric and throw money at trainees with no interest in the profession. Strikes are not just about pay.

Ah I must've missed that. Thanks for letting me know. Didn't realize universities offer electrician courses.

Also nothing stopping you going back to college to become an electrician if that is the path you wish to take.

Except for my mortgage, childcare and every other responsibility? You really have no clue do you. It's really not that simple to retrain. For a lot of people the choices they make at 16 are the only ones they get. Please, try to understand that.

And yet hundreds and thousands of working parents manage to retrain every year.

The government has even set up whole support networks devoted to reskilling adults (electrician is an option, in my region at least). I suggest you drop the bitterness and look into it properly, there is a lot of help out there these days.

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/find-a-skills-bootcamp

Can't believe people are still wheeling out the grammar school argument. It doesn't separate kids into academic and vocational, it separates them into well-off and disadvantaged.

It came out the other day that the DfE pressure on grammar schools in England to accept more disadvantaged pupils has made bog-all difference. https://schoolsweek.co.uk/grammar-school-inclusion-plan-had-little-impact-dfe-admits/

And if you're going to talk about the German system, you have to acknowledge that the United Nations condemned it for perpetuating social inequity.

So what is the answer? Comprehensive education has been an abysmal experiment that has ruined many people's education's and in turn employment opportunities.

No. Underfunding the comprehensive system and using grade boundaries that decide half the kids fail before they even begin, has been an abysmal experiment.

I am not bitter about my situation. I am very fortunate. What I cannot fathom is why you think it's so simple to retrain. It boggled my mind that you don't understand why, for most adults, retraining as an electrician in their 30s or 40s is just not possible. Even if the course is free!

We will have to agree to disagree on this. Plenty of adults feel they were failed by this awful social experiment and don't want it repeated for our children. A radical change is needed or we will all be homeschooling our kids!

Because it is that simple these days!

Ok maybe I'm missing something. Kindly tell me where I'm going to find the money for my mortgage, food, bills, childcare in the meantime? I have a Level 3 qualification already ahem my A Levels, so I'm not eligible for the free tuition, but let's say I am. Where am I getting the money for everything else? UC won't cover it. It would take me the best part of 6 years as an electrician to get my salary up to what it is now, and that's if I find am electrician to give me on the job training, which you need.

But it's so simple to retrain as an adult? You're saying it was completely up to me to not do A Levels. But you're also saying plenty of adults were failed by this awful social experiment. So which one is it? Because you're currently contradicting yourself. If you're so unhappy with your eduction, just retrain! It's so simple these days!

What about children who choose to, eg, veer towards a more practical technical path at 13, but fail to make the grade and can’t convince any plumbers, or electricians, or engineers, or whoever, to take them on to finish off their vocational training and employ them? How flexible have their choices enabled them to be? Is there a way back into a more academic/analytical pathway, or have they risked becoming unemployed, semi-trained, semi-technical, inadequately-academic and analytical people?

Just what level of basic education is necessary for everyone before we give up continuing to push them down one educational path and start shoving them in the direction of another? What are we training/educating the academics for? Is it still assumed they will make the better managers and leaders? Or do we need lots of analytical, academic people for other reasons?

How do we assess and develop people’s emotional literacy, physical fitness, resilience, kindness, etc, for paid roles involving a greater caring element?

How do we prevent encouraging inappropriate hierarchies of desired talents, where the end result is a lack of respect for some highly valuable skills and attributes, because nobody has worked out how to train people to possess them, if even possible, meaning nobody has paid them any attention?

Just what are we expecting from our education system? Is it to create future employees and workers? And/or to broaden minds, encourage creativity, aspiration, community spirit, enthusiasm, tolerance, etc? When should we give up on the latter and just focus on employability? Should schools butt out of anything beyond reading, writing and arithmetic?

Just what are we expecting from our education system? Is it to create future employees and workers? And/or to broaden minds, encourage creativity, aspiration, community spirit, enthusiasm, tolerance, etc?

why not all of the above? Society needs workers as much as it requires deep thinkers the "get everyone packed off to university" experiment has also failed an entire generation. Education isn't just books.

Surely to broaden minds and encourage creativity and community spirit you'd want kids to be actively involved in their community, working for local businesses etc?

This makes me wonder if our kids go to the same school! I've never known a head with the courage to be as open about the struggles they're currently facing. He is an amazing and excellent head and always manages to find the most perfect words for everything.

I agree. I disagree that separating children into different schools, with different fixed pathways at age 11 or 13, will provide an education that achieves these aspirations for all, as it has not been shown to do so in the past, particularly not when it happens at age 11. People talk an awful lot about grammar schools, but nobody spends nearly so much time talking about the education of the majority of children. Even when state grammar schools were set up, there were also supposed to be secondary technical schools and secondary moderns, not just secondary moderns, but it’s amazing how quickly the idea of technical schools was left by the wayside. I don’t think there is any clarity of thinking on how to educate the majority of children, or what, how and by whom they should be taught.

"Can't believe people are still wheeling out the grammar school argument. It doesn't separate kids into academic and vocational, it separates them into well-off and disadvantaged."
The real question is whether (most) grammar schools were abolished because too many middle class children got in at the expense of the children of the working class, or maybe it was the other way round, and that too many working class children got accepted, thus forcing out those precious middle class kids, who then maybe were sent to private schools.
Anthony Crossland, the politician mainly credited with ending (most of the) grammar schools was, of course, privately educated himself.

Nowadays, the well-off versus disadvantaged is more pronounced, as the well-off move to a catchment area of a good school.

Having passed the 11 plus myself, I was ,when young, fully supportive of the system. However, as I grew older, i realised my older siblings were late developers, and the system, such as it was, failed them. They all did much better AFTER they left school, and dveloped their skills via different means. (night school, day release, etc). (Or maybe they just went to a bad school?)