"We need elitism in schools" Do you agree with Dave?

[Pantone]

www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/8751220/David-Cameron-we-need-elitism-in-schools.html

What do you think of this?

HandOffOurLand- I stand by what I say- intelligence per se is of no value. It is what you do with it that is of value. And I speak as someone who has been told that I am one of the "elite", on our first day at Uni. I laughed. Unbelievable. And what was more unbelievable was to look around and see people smiling smugly at this proclamation!

Intelligence is a gift- it is what you do with it that has any merit. It is not something to be proud of, because it is not something you have achieved. (To me, elitism suggests a pride element) Your achievements are different. provided you make the most of the innate intelligence you have been gifted with, then you can be proud.

Of course intelliegence has value. Just as other qualities have value.

AFter that, it depends on what you mean by achievement. Studying and getting a good exam grade is an acheivement. JUst as successfully managing a new project is an achievement.

IMHO in the secondary school i attended, the kids with 'troubled' backgrounds got to go on courses at college, like hairdressing and childcare and cookery, wood tech etc. They also got money to go, oh and money to study. If they dropped out they got money for doing shite all, I think they called it benefits.

However the hard working students who took pride in achieving got nothing apart from the joy of the achievement. Oh and the bullying and teasing from the kids who did nothing and got everything.

Pile of shite, they need to go back a decade or two where uni meant something as few had degrees and were apprenticeships were not shameful things the thick kids or the underprivileged kids did because they aren't capable of achieving degrees but something you did to get a good solid job; oh hang the over-privileged git Cameron made sure they have all disappeared.

I am sorry this has touched a nerve I hate David Cameron he is a complete prick, he talks bollocks and he doesn't understand the country or the people he is meant to govern, oh and no-one really voted for him or his stupid policies. I will stop now or I may wish to invoke mnet junta of sorts.

Only 4 years to go of this shithead.

ONLY 4 years...?!

4 years by the end it will be like the mess Thatcher got the country in but much worse, cunting bastard stupid tories, sorry they are all bad but bloody politics just rack off and leave us be.

I just hope Nick Clegg grows some and brings the coalition down.

I am a secondary teacher and in no way a fan of DC. However my school, which has a good reputation for pastoral care etc, is guilty of this. Last year in one year group one of the naughtiest pupils in one year group had the most reward points. This pupil is always late, disrupts lessons, never completes work etc. But he will get bribed with points to sit still, finish work etc.

It is wrong. I want all children to succeed, but most money and time is spent on disruptive difficult pupils and those on the C/D borderline for English and maths. It isn't fair.

I have read only a few posts on this thread, but here is my "two-penneth":

The cane should be brought back to deal with recalcitrant pupils (or those with the potential to become feral type rioters.

Rigour should be brought back with vengeance, (including setting from an early age. Rigour will only be achieved if the government ups the ante and focusses on raising attainment (by investing in educational standards), making the curricula more challenging and paying more to ensure we get a better calibre of teacher in the classroom - than we have now.

"the over-privileged git Cameron made sure they have all disappeared."

I don't think you can blame Cameron for this. It was Labour's stupid idea to get fifty percent of teenagers into universities. This was the final nail in the coffin of university education (I resigned from it at that point).

You could arguably blame Margaret Thatcher for turning polytechnics into 'universities'. And I say that as a staunch Conservative voter. But you can't blame Cameron.

I have told my 12 and 14 yr olds that they were deprived in primary school because they short of stickers and similar academic laurel wreaths. Ds1 looked up briefly from residing a robot and said 'yeah mum, I know' . DD said that she did have stickers - she had one for a healthy snack once

'elite' is a tricky word. Having just watched 'Sound of Music' for the nth time with dd1, I have to say 'elitism' has unpleasant echos...

I grew up in a family, community and city, riddled with intellectual snobbery. What so many of us fail to realize (till too late) is that communities (including school communities) - need all sorts of intelligence to function in a healthy way. Some of which are not normally recognized as valuable, sadly.

My dc's current school is not perfect, but its probably the healthiest community I have come across for a while. It has a good mix of all levels of intelligence, emotional know-how, physical health, skills....and no elite. Long may it last.

The speech (listen to it on the first post) is sensible. Very few people could disagree with it. He says it is clear what works and what doesn't.

?The trouble is that for years we?ve been bogged down in a great debate about how we get there. Standards or structures? Learning by rote or by play? Elitism or all winning prizes??

Mr Cameron makes it clear that he is in favour of elitism and not prizes for all.

He will add: ?These debates are over ? because it?s clear what works. Discipline works. Rigour works. Freedom for schools works. Having high expectations works.

?Now we?ve got to get on with it ? and we don?t have any time to lose.? "

Who would disagree with any of that?

He went to Eton, what would anyone expect.

Hang on a minute, isn't this 'elitism' he is on about similar to the drive of the last government to bring in a 'gifted and talented' list to track bright/ arty/sporty kids to see if school managed to fulfil their potential by getting 3 A grade A levels or encouraging arts/sports.

It was slated as being pointless and seemed to got forgotten about.

When mine was in primary school they had 'star of the week' DD never got it, she really wanted it and waited with great anticipation every friday, thanks teacher! Her mate got it for managing not to hit any kids that week.

Said this on another thread but he's a fine one to start talking about education and wanting to compete with developing world contries churning out scientists. Seeing as his governemnt has cut funding in Higher Education. What a hypocrite.

Higher education funding needs cutting (when I has a university job, I was constantly astonished by the amount of money wasted on bureaucrats and bureaucracy). The problem is, however, that the number of students needs cutting too, to about half the current number. Then the money saved in universities (as half the admin staff could be pruned) could be used to provide a viable alternative to university for less academic children. University education should be for the intellectually elite. Now it is largely worthless.

Exactly, xenia, who would disagree with any of that? Because it is a load of Means All To Everyman platitudes.

It can neither be proved or disproved that this isn;t happening already.

The move to allow variety within schools to a greater extent than before is a good one so parents have a choice. We need less not more dictacts and we need parents to be able to exercise market forces in choosing the education they want for their children.

Some parents will want a school for the academically gifted. Others will want a school where children dont' have to attend lessons like Summer Hill. Others will home educate. Some will want fundamentalist Christianity , Islam. Some orthodox and some reform judaeism and we have a hindu state school near me as well. I like the fact there is choice because that is a libertarian and free market forces view.

However in much of the country there is not much choice, just one or two local schools so it does differ hugely around the country.

I can think children at 4 who are very clever do really well in schools only with other clever children and I have been happy to pay for that but other parents will have different views.

The economic issue is that we are no producing children on the whole who can compete in some areas that some in other countries are better at which long term might threaten our status as the 5th biggest nation for GDP or whatever we are on this planet. Although 5th or 6th is pretty good we can't be complacent.

Also, to be able to compete in all areas we need people who are well-educated at all "levels of society" (can't think of a good way of putting that).

What I mean is that yes, we need our lawyers and doctors and academics and inventors and engineers and economists and bankers (etc etc, list not meant to be exhaustive) to be well educated. However, for maximum economic success we also need our nurses and plumbers and teaching assistants and skilled factory technicians and accounts clerks etc etc to be well educated to make the most of their abilities too. it is not enough just to educate the very clever to do jobs that require you to be very clever. As a country, we need to educate everyone to take their full part in the economy.

And the answer is not to segregate from 4 or even 11 into 'clever' and 'not clever' - it wastes such a huge pool of potential. It is to ensure as far as we can that every child's education allows them to make the maximum progress they are capable of.

By the way, to the poster who said that there is a culture of shunning academic attainment in schools - I can only speak for myself really. I celebrate academic attainment, but with a strong focus on progress. So an able child will get an award for 'working really hard on their story writing to show that they can use a 3rd party narrator effectively'. A less able one might get one for 'working really hard on their story writing to create a story with a clear beginning, middle and end'. The child who is less likely to get an award is the 'X has written another good story but it is no better than the one they did at the beginning of term because he / she has not been working hard to achieve the next target' type - the perfectly able child who is coasting.

Kerry two options: I) scholarships/bursaries or ii) stop teachers impeding the advancement of intelligent pupils because it goes against their misguided ideologies.