Another wanky Guardian article - the 'anguish' of finding a good school ....

[disgustedbythehypocricy]

This is the most BOAK-inducing thing i've read in a while.. it's so bad i honestly don't know where to start!

www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/sep/04/andrew-penman-schools-education

I was wondering that! But I still reckon Penman made up the quote. And probably his own name, since he's obviously not talented in the pen department.

Senua - I know you were not making a joke at the expense of his child, it was clearly a dig towards his stupid father.

I understand how you feel though, we are all examining the school selection criteria of a poor kid which should be a private matter, but in order to sell a ghastly book is splashed around all over the media.

... I mean the man not the little boy!

I wondered that about the director, Blu. I've interviewed a lot of people in Official Jobs and the most candid has never behaved like that. The most you'll ever get is a 'look, this is background NOT for publication' and a bit of detail.

Oh and can I just add that everything I personally have written for the Guardian or any other publication has been meticulously checked. I do get things wrong sometimes but not on that scale.

MI - and most probably wouldn't go that far with a man who usually writes fo the Mirror, perhaps. I know I wouldn't!

so, Rutlishers, what's the chat this arvo? are all the pupils going ballistic? (or are they sun readers?)

I am about to start exploring the secondary options for my nine year old, in full knowledge that at least one of the schools I'm thinking about will probably have improved dramatically by the time she's actually starting secondary.

I'm still boggling at the idea of basing my choice on the fact my mate didn't like the cut of its jib five years ago. Five years ago at least one school in my authority was renowned for being dreadful. Today it's rather fabulous. Unfortunately it only takes boys.

MN HQ, Please, could we have Andrew Penman on for a live chat? As a website full of parents constantly anxious about schooling we must represent his major market - and surely this is an ideal place for him to promote his book? And we could find out what sort of biscuit he likes best. (or says he likes best,anyway, he might lie )

i very much enjoy a eucharistic wafer, says penman, still hedging his bets...

Based on this article, how bad can his book be? And I do wonder how an entire book can be written about Andy, Tim, the so-called buyer and the little old ladies Andy ferried around?

Maybe he's low-carbing, and sees it as a little bready indulgence, Aitch?

I should imagine Merton's director of education choked on his cornflakes reading that article on Saturday morning.

I think he was quoted selectively - stitched up in other words.

heheh

i think he thought he was being an honest broker with a parent, rather than conducting an interview with a journalist.

I think he was being ridiculously indiscreet, whichever it was. And also pretty ridiculous about education, with his 60 per cent pronouncements.

oh yes, for sure. but i think men often like to do that trouser-hoisting 'just between us boys' stuff, though.

the story and his telling of it have plenty of holes but basically he has addressed the concerns of a vast swathe of London parents.

This concern is typically not about sending children to an "ordinary" school, but to sub-standard ones where pursuing higher education is not on the agenda for the vast majority of students.

what parent who values education can willingly send their child to a school where the chances of success are statistically slim, and many of their peers (and peers' parents) don't give a toss about learning?

"We've started telling friends in Merton that we're planning to move. One mum, says Pam, was welling-up."

Tears of joy, I suspect.

Does Andrew Penman actually think that what schools do between 9-4, 5 days a week for 39 weeks of the year has that much influence on how well their pupils do in national exams (which is the only aspect of education we're looking at here)? Or does he think socio-economic deprivation means having to wait for the Boden sale?

I went to a secondary school with a bad reputation and poor academic record. However, if you wanted to work hard the staff would bend over backwards to help you. My timetable was even rejigged to let me take an extra exam in an additional subject.

Meanwhile, I received an excellent education in real life social skills and gained an awareness that not everyone was from a secure and supportive home like me.

How much academic pressure must his children be under, knowing their parents went through all this rigmarole? And where is the message that you are responsible for how your life turns out, not your parents? I'm actually totally shocked that he's so open with his children about lying and disrespecting someone else's religion to obtain what you want by underhand means?

And god forbid either of them want to leave at 16 and become sparkies or plumbers (and good on them I'd say, because that would show they really had thought about their future rather than just getting on the current higher education conveyor belt)...that would be a family discussion worth being a fly on the wall for!

BecauseImWorthIt - my son is just going into year 8, so not as much experience of school as you but enough to know that Penman is talking rubbish..

Chandelina

The point is that he had an array of good schools from which to choose but decided none was good enough based on his prejudices: a friend's bad experience, too ethnic, poorer part oflondon. He didn't even bother to visit any of them but instead chose to run them down in a national newspaper.

Did anyone see 'parent panic' in action in the Schools Lottery programme that was on at 9pm? The parents who had carefully chosen a particular school, and were then stricken with doubt after a friend had told them that there were 'serious problems' at the school based on one incident two (or maybe more) years ago!

I went to a highly academic selective 'Direct Grant' school - a sort of cross between an independent and a grammar where the LEA paid for the majority of places on a a scholarship system, while the rest were fee paying (shows my age). Believe you me, there was a steady trickle of incidents that would be worthy of scaring parents off for at least a decade - not quite as bad as the murderous Tooting dwellers, but easily as bad as chucking fireworks in Wimbledon station. Pregnancy, drugs, drink, fighting, theft (shoplifting, rather than armed robbery) lunchtime prostitution...

Mind you Blu my selective private boarding school in the country had drinking (including hospitalisations) drug busts, pregnancy and shoplifting. No prostitution that I knew of though, but a suicide.

rebuttal letter from a councillor in Merton in today's guardian making a lot of these points.