Stop Schools Cheating Please

[twiggles]

Whatever your child is like, some primary schools and nurseries are pretending children start off at the low end, so they can pretend to inspectors of private and state schools that the child has developed only because of their teaching. If your child's advanced , some schools in rich areas take it out on the child. They won't bother giving the child attention, because the child's advanced, so they let the child coast downwards. But they give reports in writing about the child that pretend the child has started off at a low point in development and then got much better because of the teaching at the school....when the fact is the child was able to read or write when the child started at the school and as the school is giving the child little attention, the child has coasted downwards. Tha's what many schools do so they can pretend they've developed everything in the child, they want all children to be the same standard, like a photocopier. Poor children. Some teachers admit they're cheating and don't take the reports seriously and write them to impress inspectors. This is happending all over the show and I can't understand why inspectors are allowing them to get away with it. If parents start grading teachers in the school every three months the teachers won't be able to hide what's going on to the inspectors and teachers who are pretending might stop. Teachers that aren't giving inspectors the facts need to be stopped...they're not giving children an honest education.

Oh great, let's get published gradings of teachers by parents, better yet, let's have anonymous websites where folk can post their own opinions of their children's teachers (explicitly named). Coz that system works very well and entirely objectively on Amazon and trip advisor, doesn't it? They are such reliable sources.

(Oh wait...)

Better yet, let's introduce another layer of bureaucracy and administators, coz we all want our taxes to go up, to have teaching performance reviews published and categorised (into grades if you will). Because that will really be a great use of taxpayer money. And lead to high levels of honesty between teachers and their line managers. (ironic smiley here)

Sorry, OP, I'm failing to get excited by your ideas (am not a teacher, only a parent).

Maybe if parents had to publish their real names next to their real comments about the real teachers. And then teachers or schools would have the right to reply. Because it would be so beneficial to children to have their private problems published, and so entertaining for everyone else to get to closely observe any disputes.

twiggles, a lot of us are not school teachers

I am a university lecturer and have absolutely no axe to grind: all my teaching is judged on student feedback which is recorded and has an impact on my career; I have no problem with that whatsoever.

however, there are two factors here:

a) school teachers already are monitored closely and parents do have the right to feedback- I have used it many times myself as a parent

b) when monitoring is done in any situation, questions need to be formulated so as to bring out constructive criticism, and in this particular case due care needs to be taken to the fact that some answers may not be guided by a genuine desire to improve the learning situation

unlike customers at a bank or students at a university, school children generally do not have a choice about attending school, and some may have negative attitudes that are not to do with the actual quality of the teaching

there are pupils (and parents) who actively dislike the idea of learning and whose rating of a teacher will be in an inverse proportion to how much learning goes on in her class

in my ds' case the definition of a bad teacher is one who forces him to work- he doesn't like it and is too immature to understand why it is good for him

if I listened to his opinions of which teachers are unfair or incompetent, my black list would contain all the most efficient teachers in the school

Add message | Report | Message poster twiggles Mon 21-Jan-13 14:01:52
"Feedback needs to be standardised, frequent and impartial. Schools do not handle feedback in an independent manner and generally make everything sound as innocuous as possible, so that they look good for inspectors."

The Ofsted feedback questionnaires handed out to parents are not handled by the school at all, but by independent Ofsted inspectors.

twiggles please listen to people.
Most schools send out an anonymous yearly questionnaire (paper or online), with comment section, to gauge parents' feelings about the school.

In our school, only about 20% of parents can generally be bothered to fill these in. However, all comments and ratings are addressed and (if appropriate) actioned by the SLT.

During an inspection, Ofsted advise parents to voice their opinions on parentview (on the Ofsted website) to rate the school. This is used as part of the inspection.

There are also various evil rateyourteacher /rateyourschool sites which invite hurtful remarks to be made about individuals, mainly by disaffected teenagers.

Do you have children at school, or are you just 'avin' a larf?

I am not a teacher.

But, twiggles, if you are speaking from your own experience - please try and understand your experience is not the norm.

I am a governor at a school, and there is no way on earth that an able child - or any child - would be held back. Its all about the children. No one, not the SLT nor any of the teachers, care that much about OFSTED that they'd put 'ratings' in front of what they think is right for a child.

I sit on courses with many, many other school governors from across this (leafy) borough. I meet the SLTeams, I talk to teachers, and of course (as a parent) I talk to parents.

There may be one or two dreadful examples of the sort that you mention, but tarring 'most' schools or even 'many' schools, or teachers, with that kind of brush is just wrong.

And, incidentally, as teachers' morale is (so I'm reliably informed by senior educationalists) at an all time low, I think it is probably worse than 'wrong'.

Teachers are being 'graded' all the time. In, sometimes, quite odd ways. Enough.

twiggles pops up every January to post the same moan ... I just wonder where she is locked up the rest of the year

Maybe it's her New Year's resolution which she doesn't manage to sustain until February.

Hello, hello, earth to OP - OP, are you listening at all, to anyone?

Why not use the free resource of parents to provide the missing link?

For all the reasons everyone has already told you, but which you have totally ignored.

Maybe the OP can only see her own posts - maybe MN have her posting to herself?

So the OP isn't a stupid troll just a stupid alien

Please op, don't let facts get in the way of a good conspiracy theory, eh??

You appear not to be prepared to back up any of your accusations with facts and are ignoring arguments against you as 'hitting a nerve'

With freedom of speech comes a responsibility about what you say.

OP, I am not a teacher, never was, never will be. Nor am I related to any teachers, nor are any of my friends teachers.

I ask again:

What is your evidence for this?

Perhaps if you answered people's questions, they would take you a little more seriously, and then your crusade might achieve something; instead you choose to act like a nutter once a year.

I got deleted a second time for mentioning heavy duty tinfoil?

WTAF???

OP - Evidence. Links Research. Please.

and I got away with calling her barking mad in the light of her brief yearly appearances I will revise that opinion to howling mad

I wonder whether the OP is reporting me?

And me not even a teacher!

For links, evidence and future deletions, that is.

I got deleted for listing all the possible things that Mrz could have said about op in her deleted post because she couldn't remember what it was she had said!

First ever deletion! EVER!

Er, evidence please.

Yes, yes!!

We want evidence!

literally, I will believe you if you provide me with decent, supported evidence.

OP what you are claiming is at best innacurate. Teachers do not get 'praised' by inspectors for having all children in their class at the same level. They want to see differentiation, they want to see gifted and talented children, and they want to see provision being made for these children! Where did you get this information from?

I still can't remember what I wrote that warranted deletion [indignant] but obviously the OP agrees with what I said later

Shipwrecked I got two in the space of 24 hours!

Pointy, you deserve a shiny cup for two!!

(It's full of red wine, hole that's ok)

'Hope'