Is this the end of Latin in state schools?

[Edmontine]

Depressing news:

The Guardian

Vocational* subjects.

It’s a pity. I had to study Latin as part of my medieval history studies and it would have been useful to do as a child. Both my children did Latin. Grammar school to GCSE and comp just one year and dropped it.

DC who did Latin had friends who went on to Classics at Oxbridge. DC did a vet degree and yes it is useful and also good for languages generally.

realistically though income tax raises would never raise enough to the level needed to match private school funding (which is what is needed let’s face it). So ultimately isn’t it time to say that education should be far more flexible and certain, less popular subjects, can have a parental contribution. Perhaps the subsidised cost of other children can be factored in so it’s a win win. I’m actually very positive for this route because it is more like a direct tax on the people whose children are using the schools and the money can’t be diverted elsewhere.

Yes, so much of what labour have done badly in their first 6 months is rushing, across so many policies.

Agree @TempsPerdu it's never been a worse time for trying to funnel children towards an overly standardised basket of what the govt thinks is useful...we should be promoting excellence, drive and determination not forcing people down paths they have no interest in for some half baked motion of what future employment might look like.

Vocational subjects can at least be done to the same, if not higher, standard outside school with relative ease.

I suspect very, very few children heading for a career in music, drama or dance are relying on the two lessons a week at GCSE.

The huge emphasis on STEM also means that those children better suited to vocational, or more literature based subjects are also massively restricted in their GCSE choices.

I did 3 languages for GCSE which have been a lot more useful in life than Chemistry would ever have been.

Perhaps it is a huge deal though for the children who are loving studying Latin and now won’t be able to do to anymore.

So does this mean if a school teaches Latin they get no funding for the teacher - or just no extra/special funding? Same as other subjects?

And that's the other thing Labour keep getting wrong 'oh it's only 40 schools/1000 kids/8000 kids/a small number of farmers' etc etc.

Pretty painful if you're one of them! Too bad eh!

All of this. I wish people would read the article properly before commenting.

If schools want to continue to deliver Latin they can still find the teaching staff themselves. But realistically, Latin probably won't and indeed shouldn't be prioritised over other things they could be spending on.

Same argument that Labour, and many on MN, use for VAT on school fees.
In their ideological hunt for mythical equality they actually end up making any other than the most basic provision entirely elitist.

No extra funding. They were getting extra funding to allow them to put on Latin lessons. They're now not.

In general schools don't get funding "for X number of teachers" or whatever - they get a whole pot based on pupil numbers and have to decide what to fund out of that.

Vocational doesn't necessarily mean the arts though. My school offered a BTEC in construction which had a huge uptake. It was worth 4 GCSEs which meant the lads who took it ended up with 80% of the grades they needed to go to college/start an apprenticeship. The neighbouring school offered BTEC health and beauty. Not to everyone's taste but again, a huge uptake.

Why shouldn’t it? Why is Latin less important than chemistry? Who determines the relative merits of each subject? Surely to have a balanced society we need people with different skills and interests. No one subject should be prioritised over another.

It’s only Some old people ffs!!

(shameful)

I was at a private school where Latin was compulsory for 2 years. The school started French in Y6 (I joined in Y7), Latin in Y8 and one of German or Spanish in Y9. You could do all to GCSE if it fitted other options.

I found Latin very useful as an introduction to how inflected languages (German/Russian) worked, general vocabulary especially in science but also romance languages and it is the main foundation of my English grammar knowledge too (to be fair I'm old enough that I was in the period that formal grammar wasn't a thing at state primaries...). It's also a pretty cool period of history to study...

I'm sure it is. Like I said the timing is shambolic and should not have been announced part way through their year but that doesn't change the fact I believe it shouldn't be funded going forward.

My grammar school offered it in the early 80s. Good for those taking languages and helpful for sciences.

Rachel? Is that you? Don’t worry we won’t let a rich private school boy hurt you again.

Also if you wanted to do science

My state secondary school taught O level Latin as an after school class in the mid 80s. I dropped it after a year, when it became clear that I wouldn't need it for university entrance on any subject.

I didn't realise anywhere still taught GCSE Latin.

But why? Why is it less valuable than physics or maths if this is the subject that those particular children excel in and could lead to a meaningful and lucrative career for them?

Amongst my friends and acquaintances I number a few lecturers in and professors of both ancient languages and archaeology. They’re increasingly finding it necessary to dumb down their curricula because students are arriving with so much less basic / general knowledge than used to be the case. (They put it more elegantly than that.)

I’m guessing in fifty years time new archaeological discoveries will only be able to be interpreted by our AI overlords …

Well if this is the case, we shouldn't prioritising Latin by giving schools extra funding for it then!

Some schools will choose to still deliver it. Great. But most probably won't because realistically it is not particularly useful in day to day life or for 99 percent of job roles.

Surely barely any offered it anyway? My massive state school (in a fairly posh area) didn't. We could go to 'Latin Club' but that was over lunchtimes (and didn't lead to a GCSE anyway) so there was very low take up

I haven't said it's less valuable than physics or maths, I've openly said I think we focus on too narrow a view of subjects and let others fall by the wayside.

Does Latin at GCSE lead to lucrative careers? If so, can those same careers come from Latin at A Level, or a Classics degree?

I believe what schools need to focus on at GCSE level is "what do we need to teach assuming not every child goes on to do A Levels or a degree." A good grounding for life, not necessarily all for further study which can come later at HE and FE.

one of mine would have loved to do Latin (love of botany and animals), only offered at the grammars unfortunately. Which seems a shame when you can’t choose grammar