Education and social mobility - John Humphrys is coming on for a discussion, Fri 29 Jan, at 11.30am

[GeraldineMumsnet]

John Humphrys is filming a documentary about education for BBC2. He is embarking on a journey around Britain to meet parents, teachers and students.

His task is to examine the relationship between education and social mobility - why is it that education cannot close the attainment gap that exists between children from the poorest and wealthiest backgrounds?

Government education advisor David Woods has accused parents of being prejudiced against their local state secondary schools. Dr Anthony Seldon, Master of Wellington College, calls the current independent sector an apartheid system. Professor Stephen Ball, from the Institute of Education, concludes that grammar schools, parental choice and faith schools have all been responses to middle-class concerns.

John is coming to Mumsnet this Friday (29 Jan) at 11.30am to hear your experiences. Are you benefiting from parental choice in education? Is it at the expense of others? Does the current system put too much responsibility on parents to make the right choices? Is it too stressful? Do you feel you have to top-up your children's education eg home-tutoring, learning an instrument, employing a lawyer? Are they worthwhile investments, or necessities that cause resentment?

Please post your thoughts here. Thanks in advance.

I went to a truly dreadful comp in the 80's where teenage pregnancy, violence and madness was the norm.

Whilst I went totally off the rails it fortunatly dawned on me that my only way out was to pass my exams and go to university.

There was no help from the school, no help at home but I did it.

I often look at my children today who are in a spectacularly lovely private school where opportunity is limitless and they have our support and who will never understand how bloody lucky they are.

Education is everything in my book, I am aware everyday of what is lacking in mine, even with a degree, and am proud to give it to my children, to me it is the best thing I can give them.

However if the child that was me then was the child that lives today, there is no way I would go to university. The system has got out of hand, the debts are too big and the employment possibilities in what I studied have gone out of the window.

I am not prepared to play games over this, I am not giving this government the chance to play roulette with my children.

I know I have opted out of the state system and I have friends who castigate me for it. Where we live schools are good up to primary but secondary is a disaster.

But what is good? The primarys have the basics but music, sport etc, these don't happen. The dumbing down is startling.

I want a traditional solid system where every child can achieve to the best of their ability and the state doesn't do that. It plays games, scores points and experiments with peoples lives.

Professionally I work with education departments and often sit in meetings that make me want to cry at the sheer pointlessness of some of the programmes that are discussed.

So stop the crap, get on with the basics and encourage every child to achieve.

I think it would be worth the programme considering the importance of accent in social mobility/success in modern Britain. I come from a very working class background (but did relatively well academically), and because I am from overseas (with a less easily assessable accent) I think I have a definite advantage - in the City - over British people with similar backgrounds and qualifications, but recognisably regional / working class accents.

Hi claig,

I wasn?t trying to suggest anything about your support for home education or lack there of. Personally I wouldn?t suggest anyone take it up unless the entire family is committed. It can be a big life style change although a positive one for our family.

My only point was that it is our responsibility as parents to ensure our children receive an education. If we tell the government that this burden is too great they will be all too happy to curtail those responsibilities.

For those choosing school I believe they/you have every right to expect high standards but I think it unrealistic to believe a school can actually deliver it regardless of the money pumped into it. Of course it?s not reasonable to do half the work for the school but if the teachers don?t or can?t do their jobs what choice do you have?

A lady at work was complaining to me about how here daughter?s school was failing to teach her to read. I suggested several books which our son had great success with. Her response was, ?why should I do it, that?s why she goes to school?.

Although I understand this perspective I find it a bit alien. It was as if she was refusing to pay for a damaged TV but instead of TV it was her daughter.

Missouri I've had similar conversations when people find out we're going to home educate and I'm always suprised at how powerless the parents I've spoken with seem to feel - as though because they see the school and teachers as the experts in education they don't feel they have anything to add - and if their child is failing to master something the problem is seen to lie with the child. So they never say 'The way the school teaches X doesn't suit DD' they say 'DD doesn't get X'.

I wonder how much this factors into social mobility because I can see how this could be more pronounced if the parents aren't well educated themselves.

I know that there will always be parents who fail. But I do think that if the emphasis wasn't on 'choosing the right school' and parents were more aware that they hold full responsibillity for their children's education and school is only a part of that would it empower them to take more action. Because regardless of social class the vast majority of parents want their children to do well.

But I don't see that message getting out with this government, who would rather manage everything themselves.

The level of education a mother has is an indicator of how her child will achieve at school - this surely tells us we have to concentrate on raising girl's achievement at school as well as their aspirations. Giving girls ambition to stay in education beyond 16 has to be a goal to raise educational standards. And that it's going to be a long time we're at this. We've got to stop worrying that boys don't perform so well at school - they do better later in life in the working world, earning more than women and not having to take ill paid, part time work to fit around kids.

Also, raising the performance of all state schools to the level of the best has to be an aim of any government - there are some outstanding state schools, including in what might be viewed as deprived areas. How can that not be achievable in all areas? Because the quality of teaching and leading in schools is variable. A good headteacher makes a difference by having an extraordinary vision for the school and dragging staff, parents and children along with them. Sadly we have too many mediocre teachers and headteachers.

I live in Kent, where there are still grammar schools. In the main they seem to take children who have been to independent schools to pass the 11+ - their intake from state schools is way below their intake from private schools. That is a joke. Parents here know they pay until their child is 11 then they're off to a grammar for free. to get a child at a state school into a grammar you pay for tutoring for at least a year as state schools aren't allowed to "coach" and many don't "believe" in the 11+.

Parental choice of schools has forced less popular schools (that is the ones that don't score so well on the league tables so aren't so desirable for the aspirational middle class parent who can drive their kids miles to school - if you've got no car you're going to the nearest school, like it or not) into all sorts of trouble - falling rolls means less money so you have to choose what you can't provide on top of basic curriculum topics that other more popular schools can. That is the single worst decision a government ever made for primary schools. The next worst is the constant tinkering with the curriculum, national strategies and all sorts of other directives that seem to change every other year and take teachers away from teaching.

We also need to pay better to teachers to attract really good talent. You can say the same about nurses and other key workers - why do we allow people who really look after us - unlike bankers - get paid so poorly? We are taking advantage of people who feel a vocation.

here in rural co durham we have basically no choice. DH and I are both state sector teachers and firmly believe in it, but despite this are seriously considering private when DTs are secondary age because the (only choice) local school isn't currently up to it - however new head, new build and things should change just in the nick of time...

Don't know if this has been mentioned yet, but one thing that seriously damages the education system and those passing through it, is the lack of consistency from the Government. There has to be an investment in ALL sections of the education system.

Currently, after pushing Higher Education as the be all and end all for the majority, the Government are now cutting spending on HE. So what message does that give to society and particularly children/young adults?

It says that HE is okay for everyone during prosperous times, but when money becomes tight, HE budgets get chopped. It perpetuates the view that higher learning is a 'nice to have' in a perfect world, rather than a crucial factor in economic growth and a skilled population.

I am actually not in agreement with the Governments policy of more people into HE, but I am also not in agreement with them highlighting it as unimportant, which IMHO they are doing by slashing the already tight budgets.

There would be uproar if they did that with Schools.

I was sent to private school age 11 against my wihes, just so my sister wouldn't argue about being sent there too (local comp had drugs problem). Nice my parents could afford it.
I certainly can't afford to put either child through private (unless they get scholarships), but I actually don't want or need to, as local state isn't too bad..
But we're only at the point of sorting primary for DS at moment. Unfortunately the catchment primary isn't great, but the next nearest is brilliant (but they're over subscribed, so we might not get in). Applied to nearest church school, where we were refused cos we applied too late...even though we have a strong case for a place otherwise..
We just want the nest for DS, as every other parent does, and sometimes you have to fight for it.
[and - why do schools chuck children out at 3-3.30??? I never finished any school day earlier than 3.45 from age 5-18??? ]

We call work that is usually done by women a vocation and work that is usually done by men a career. This is why nurses and teachers get paid so poorly and why concepts that are important in business or other organisations, like leadership and organisational culture, don't trickle into schools.

Schools are at the mercy of almost every ideological wind that blows -- rare is the sociological experiment or wild idea or theory of society or psychology that has not affected any given school. Every fear we have about our children specifically and society generally is projected onto schools. In addition, the issues surrounding education are constantly politicised, to the detriment of actual teaching and actual learning in actual classrooms. The idea that schools should somehow become a means of upward social mobility is itself an indication that we are burdening schools with too much responsibility for the future of society.

You can see in the OP where the terms used to describe the current state of schools show clearly the bias of the commentators: 'prejudiced' is an assumption that certain schools are disdained by certain classes, 'apartheid system' assumes deep divisions, assumes this is bad, maybe assumes all schools should be fine for all students? 'Middle class concerns' -- well, they matter because the middle class pays the taxes that support the state schools, but maybe the commentator thinks middle class is synonymous with pretentious? Parental choice seems to me to be a buzzword without any real meaning unless there are places available for all who want to exercise that right. It sounds good at election time, but how can there be parental choice if there are catchment areas at the same time, in the same areas, no school transport available to make getting to a good school possible, and third level tuition bills awaiting those who have managed to climb the greasy pole?

What should be faced is that school as it is now known is basically irrelevant to some populations -- the traditional Victorian idea that schools and schools alone would save the children of the drinking classes from their horrible parents was a bad one from the start. A more holistic approach is badly needed for a lot of children and families.

Free music tuition for all was the only thing that ever encouraged social mobility!

Poor schools encourage spoon-feeding to get the best results whereas the best schools make the child responsible for their own learning (effectively the same skills learnt through music).

Schools need to teach independant thought, responsibility & pride in achievement to be successful. Unfortunately, too many teachers are far to worried about what ofsted will think rather than what is best for the child.

I came from a run-down inner-London comprehensive and would still be where I started if it wasn't for free music tuition which taught me all the life-skills I would otherwise have missed at my school. I would love to see statistics as to how many high class professionals had instrumental lessons as a child. Success in music, is success in life- practise, review, change and try new things to get results.

Hi Missouri,
thanks for that. I didn't want you to get the wrong impression and think I was not on your side. I can imagine how hard it is for the home-schoolers who also have to jump all the hurdles that are put in their way.

I think we are entitled to expect that the
politicians, in between filling their expense forms in, at least provide an education system that can teach the 3Rs, without requiring the parents to be part of it. The reason is that they know full well, that many parents will not put the time in and that some are not capable of doing so.
Yet that doesn't seem to worry them.

Generations of children have not been taught to read at school. Most of these children grow up thinking they are not clever. Many of them learn to read as adults. They learn because they are taught by people who understand how different people learn and how complicated reading the English language is. There are 26 letters in the alphabet. 44 distinctly separate sounds and over 200 ways of writing the sounds down. In addition to that, one letter or letter combination can have different sounds depending on the word. The letter 'a' for example says 'or' in ball, 'ar' in balm, as well as the long or short 'a' sound as in bale or balcony. Dyslexia friendly schools' where all children are taught in the ways they learn, are necessary if today's children are to grow up to be confident adults. If you wouldn't trust your car being serviced by a careful driver, who is not a qualified mechanic and only has a hazy notion of what goes on under the bonnet, why trust childrens' learning to read to people who can read well but don't understand the complexities of reading and are not able to teach reading in the way your child learns?

Mollyroger do you know where your nearest dyslexia friendly school is? Did you know dyslexia covered by Disability discrimination act?

It boggles my mind that there is such a thing as a dyslexia-friendly school (and by implication, schools that are dyslexia-unfriendly?) Also still trying to get over the idea that a school could not "believe" in the 11+ (as if it was the Tooth Fairy) and could get away with this blinkered approach. There seems to be hyper-control over some parts of the school experience (lunch box contents, for example), while other important areas are left entirely to the judgement of people with no common sense or idea of what they are supposed to be doing, even when it comes to basic teaching of basic skills (phonics for example), and in the face of all evidence that is screaming that this is completely ineffective and ill-advised, much of the early learning that children must have under their belts by age 7 or 8 is still left in the hands of parents.

I don't have a child in education yet so can I ask a question?

What's the one question you REALLY wanted answering but never got answered.

SorryToHijackTheThreadButIHeartJohnHumphrysTiggaxx

Hi there,

The team making this documentary have asked us to post the following ahead of their visit tomorrow:

John Humphrys is very appreciative of all the contributors to the thread and is heartened by the level of response. He is fascinated by the range of users' experiences: from the personal struggles of BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny to the academic insights of Lenni.

He is very much looking forward to talking live on Friday at 11.30am.

dysgran, have you heard of the Maple Hayes School in Nottingham? If so what do you think of it?

David Woods needs a lesson in real life! Of course parents are often prejudiced against their local state secondary schools, with good reason.

If you are lucky enough or financially comfortable enough to live in the catchment area of a good state school then all in the garden is rosy. Sadly for many parents this is just not the case. All too often parents are priced out of the market and find homes, be they rented or owned, in the catchment of decent schools out of their reach.

I challenge David Woods to make some impromptu visits, posing as a "Joe Bloggs", to some of our poorly performing schools, especially those known to have problems with behaviour. Let him see for himself what "choices" we are faced with. For many, where the local school is dire and the next acceptable but over-subscribed, there is no choice. Then ask him if he would send his children there!

My sister appealed for a place in an out of catchment school, and when, during one of her many tussles with the LA's Education manager, she informed the LA that she'd witnessed the children in her local school spitting on the corridor floors, calling the teacher a wanker and refusing to work, disrupting the entire class, she was told that "All our schools are good schools".

It was as much as she could do to refrain from telling the LA that they were talking cobblers!

So, is Mr Woods up to the challenge?

I think there does have to be some genetics at work here too.Intelligent parents are more likely to have intelligent kids. As ,generally speaking, the more intelligent someone is, the better educated they are likely to be and the better job they are likely to have.

Too much opinion on social mobility is based on solutions thst sound right without looking at the empirical research that could identify the outcomes for working class children.

I think that rather than listen to people's prejudices we should just admit that education in this country is inadequate and that none of the political parties know how to resolve this issue. We need to fund numerous major research projects into successful systems of education in other countries and how they could be adapted to fit this country. We need researchers and teachers from other countries to come into our schools and try and come up with some solutions.

If we want to have social mobility, we have to accept that it is not just a case of people moving up, but that some people will have to move down. There are many middle class people who are utterly miserable working in office jobs and would rather be in manual jobs. Unless we make sure that working class jobs are desirable, secure and have reasonable wages, mediocre middle class children will be pushed into the best universities and professional occupations by their parents. These students will take places away from more competent working class students.

So if we want social mobility, we have to stop talking about working class culture as something that everyone should try and avoid and/or escape from.

On a practical level, teachers at my local comprehensive school does not correct children's grammar and spelling mistakes in work for subjects other than English; that is the school's policy. Why can't that be sorted out?

Studies are increasing showing the genetic component of 'intelligence' is only a small part.

We should be concentrating on believing that intelligence isn't fixed and believing that all students aren't working anywhere near their ability ceiling. Research has proved this.

Reason I mention it is that 'streaming' happens as young as 5 in year one. There is apparently movement between 'abiity tables' but often you see children at the 'top tables' moving further and further ahead in terms of ground covered. In reality mindsets can be quite fixed about 'bright' and 'slow' children and any movement between groups quite limited. Eventually - from what I am currently seeing - a gulf opens up and those at the 'bottom' can't catch those at the top.

Not only that but those at the 'bottom' BELIEVE they can't catch those at the top which is worse. Some of my kids in their primary school will not possibly be able to get the SATS score they truly deserve in my opinion, the playing field just hasn't been level enough from the start. I dislike the way SATS score can 'label' and 'define' children - they are used to determine which sets the children go into and the 'lower' sets get the worse resources allocated (not worth the investment it seems).

I'd like to see much smaller class sizes ideally between 16-20, teachers and teaching assistants paid much more generously and any streaming being truly fluid, flexible and happening later than year one.

Won't be able to take part in the discussion as will be at work but will come back to see it. Some great questions here, I hope solutions can be found to some of the problems we all face.

hahaimawitch I thought your post was great. Really interesting and I would love to hear more.

Also Cortina I agree with you, especially "all students aren't working anywhere near their ability ceiling".

I feel so depressed by this. My children will be fine, probably. We are reasonably motivated, do some tutoring at home, have them in good schools and they are pretty bright.

But we need all children to be moving upwards and achieving, all of them, whatever their background. It's of no benefit to us, to society, when there is a mass of ill educated children mired in a social and educational swamp -- and instead of throwing a rope we allow them to flounder, expecting their parents to throw the rope instead.

Those poor children. We cannot leave them behind.

Kids these days seem to be highly motivated by maintaining their "image" and retaining the respect of their peers.

The prospect of being kept back a year until they had attained a certain minimum level of acheivement could work very well and would give the pupil and teacher a common goal to work together on. High time we adopted this USA educational motivational method given that we have already copied the States in renaming pupils "students" and having High Schools and Proms.

Grammar schools- only available in some areas so unfair ?- private tutoring for 11+ affordable by some so unfair ? Etc Etc Etc.

Solution - bring back grammar schools in all areas of the country and have all primary schools prepare their pupils accordingly (no different to having them prepare for SAT's. I do feel that lots of smug parents apparently happy with their state comprehensive are so because they have a good comprehensive available to them due to their catchment area/luck and they would opt for a grammar school if one were actually available. Widen the net however, grammar schools used to take the top 20% I believe. Somebody posted earlier that it has been shown that middle range ability pupils do better mixed with higher ability pupils than. Let grammar schools be the educational establishment model for 30% or even 40%.

HOWEVER - Do not bring back secondary moderns for the remaining 60-70%. Invest serious money in providing Academies or Colleges (or whatever new-fangled name you like) that provide vocational training alongside a non-negotiable compulsory basic standard of english/maths/science to equip this group, the majority of our future workforce, with the ability to earn a living. Do not let pupils graduate from their school until thay have achieved the basic level and do not let them draw jobseeker's allowance or whatever the equivalent is these days.

There would of course be exceptions to this rule for those that will not be able to achieve it but just as in an ideal world, a hospital should not be discharging a vulnerable elderly patient until they have assessed how their life will progress once they return home, the government needs to demonstrate that it is doing the maximum possible, for say 16 year olds, rather than letting them drift away/opt out of education. If, as a disaffected but perfectly fit and able pupil coming up to the minimum school leaving age, you knew that you wouldn't be able to draw benefits to fund your post school life of unemployment unless you had achieved your basic school certificate in maths/english/science wouldn't you be motivated even though you loathed having to do it ?

It's not a stick, it's a carrot and if whilst aiming for the bottom grade of carrot (benefits) you made yourself that bit more employable by achieving a basic level of maths/english/science isn't there a possibility that both you and society will benefit in the long run ?

Just like their pupils, teachers are not all the same, some will be better suited to teaching in a grammar school and some to the alternative schools but they can then decide and with pupils being more motivated towards needing to achieve their basic school certificate or to not have to retake a year on the way through their school life, life just might improve for teachers too.

I fear that we as a family will be increasing our carbon footprint far more by car use when ds is 11, as over my dead body will he go to our nearest, catchment area, comprehensive school or High School as it was rebranded some years ago. Either that or we will move into a grammar school area and tutor him, but only because he has to compete with other tutored children, I'd far rather they all just did the 11+ test untutored as dh and I both did 30 years ago but that would be naive of us and unfair to ds.

DH and I are both grammar school educated. Our parents were borderline working/middle parents or is that lower middle class ? Dh admits that he would most likely have gravitated towards the trouble makers in a mixed ability comprehensive and that his life would probably have been very different. I would have been very scared by having to attend school with some of the girls who went to the secondary modern in our town and would possibly have not had a fairly happy school life being driven to achieve well despite not actually being half as clever as lots of the girls at my grammar school. I doubt I would have achieved the leap to well etablished middle classdom so I do believe in Grammar schools for social mobility.

Gosh, this is long, you'd never have let me ramble like this on the TODAY programme would you ?

P.S. Why has Humphrys got an apostrophe in the thread title ? Is that how he spells his name ?