How Physical Education Failed Me

When I close my eyes, think ‘PE lessons’ and let my mind freewheel, the first memory is always ‘changing rooms’. I suspect it’s this way for a lot of people; for while your school PE lessons usually involved different sports and/or teachers, the seemingly mandatory fitness rituals started and ended here.

The sweaty fug, the echoey walls, the slightly sticky floors with the overlay of mud and dirt, haphazardly swept. Worn wooden benches, not enough space – reminders that your school is double the size it was originally designed to be. The smell of feet and cheap deodorant, sight of parts of youthful body. Teenagers talking, banging of boots, the background dripping of that shower-head which is forever leaking, the yell of Jones the teacher, chasing out the laggards with all apparent pleasure of playing the martinet. Glances at a few of your compatriots; the kid having to wear the crap out of the lost property box, that one you vaguely find attractive, the one you’re jealous of and that ‘oddity’ – the one really tall / short / fat / hairy / whatever.

From the distance of twenty-odd years, the ‘problem’ that the changing-rooms posed doesn’t seem that bad. But then I remember the lengths I went to; making sure I wore ‘right’ underwear, doing my best to get the peg in that spot which offered a bit of privacy, developing a manner of changing which led to the minimum of shown flesh and so on – I wouldn’t have done these things unless if the young me had felt it necessary to do so. Which leads to the questioning on whether the ‘mature perspective’ is nothing more than personal revisionism, where we edit our memories to provide a narrative which isn’t so depressing or painful.

One memory – or more correctly, series of memories – is firmly rooted in my mind, however. That I hated PE and all it’s works. The fact that this loathing still echoes over two decades showing me just how much I despised it at the time.

A Collage Of Failure

From balancing on a beam to catching a ball, via running a race to skipping; I sucked, bad. As a young kid, I wasn’t particularly unfit, but my physical body wasn’t really conducive to athletic performance; left-handed (this is more a cramp than you’d think), poor eyesight, crooked toes, weak ankles and a poorly-healed injury. In a way, it was the worst of both worlds; defective enough to make sporting accomplishment a non-starter, but not actually in a diagnosed manner which would stop Mr Jones and all his ilk from shouting at me for being crap, lazy or whatever. Or simply get me off ‘games’, period. (What a load of propaganda, that is. Making it sound like fun of some form).

I’m not mentioning this for any sympathy bollocks, but to make a point; that if I’d been a poor performer in a ‘real subject’ like maths, any remotely competent teacher would have looked to the reasons for the continued failure (or should have), instead of simply blaming the kid. Having old Mrs Smith bellowing at me to ‘do the reading, try harder!’ like any problem can be surmounted by sheer willpower alone is both stupid and counter-productive – yet we seemingly consider this acceptable behaviour from a PE teacher.

Teaching Fails

In fact, there’s a quite a lot of the tradecraft of the PE teacher which is objectionable in some form. The first glaring one being the general absence of motivational skill. Teaching is both a science and an art form, and much of it is to get kids who don’t overly want to learn to do so. This is an attribute which is seemingly lost on the average PE teacher, who’s attended the ‘Drill Sergeant School of Persuasion’ and is pissed off when smart-arse students learn how to do the bare minimum but they’re not allowed to belt anyone.

Then there’s the lack of teaching skill. That is, when they actually tried to teach you anything – all I got was the rudiments of perhaps a half-dozen competitive sports and a few ‘field events’ thrown in at the end of summer term as a kind of pièce de résistance. That’s about it. Oh, and ‘cross-country’; the ultimate ‘filler activity’, doing laps of a muddy field, normally while Jones is standing there with a cup of tea and a clip-board.

Looking back at this now, I can honestly say that my PE teachers didn’t impart a single item of information which proved useful in my adult life regarding health or fitness. Not even how to warm up properly. They can’t even take the credit for teaching me how to swim.

What’s more, their teaching was pointless. The ‘athletic types’ already knew how to play, say football so making them repeat rudiments was generally futile. The ones who did need the lessons were the kids to ‘didn’t care’ and thus, wouldn’t use it. The only good point about this was that the constant re-learning the same thing ate large gobs of time, which put off the day of reckoning. (And this wasn’t a ‘good’ point for the sporty kids who’d have loved to simply spent the whole lesson actually playing a ‘proper match’.).

Playing The Game?

Losing a game; well, it happens. Constantly losing games is bad. Constantly losing games because you’re crap is even worse. Having said crapness rubbed in your face on a weekly basis was the point I started to bunk off. Nobody finds constant defeat fun, and when you worship at the altar of the ‘competitive ethos’, you wonder why those who cannot compete simply withdraw from even attempting it.

This isn’t ‘snowflakery’ or some bollocks about wanting to ‘coddle kids from failure’, just simple common sense. Yes, I’m crap at [sport name] and what’s more, your half-dozen barely-taught ‘lessons’ are not going to impart enough either physical ability or technical skill to make me much better. Yet, you still expected me to run out there all bright-eyed and with a grin on my face? My memory is a touch hazy from the passage of time, but I’m sure I wasn’t either doped up with happy pills or a masochist.

Apparently, all this shit is ‘character forming’, at least at the public schools (yes, them!) much of the modern PE syllabus was copied from. Yet it doesn’t hold up at loser look because the very preachers of said lessons – the teacher – was usually rather suspicious types.

Of Questionable Character

The clear favouritism towards the athletic, for starters. Okay, I get (now) that you like sports and therefore will like others who also like sports and are good at it, but you’re supposed to be the teacher, not a rando fan who’s only got eyes for ‘people of the match’ or whatever.

Often this ‘blind eye’ is extended to include ignoring bullying; PE lessons being one of the best times to cause a bit of physical pain and then have it minimised or dismissed as ‘competitive spirit’ or ‘an accident’. Some of these are genuinely overlooked; after all, two eyes can’t watch all things at all times and if in a sporting event the context can be much more confusing. But I’ve also had teachers stare me down and announce my ‘story’ was in fact, a hallucination. In public, so everyone else knew I was a grass. Nice one, Jones.

Then there’s the pernickety obsession with rules. I’ll tell you this now; if my PE teachers had diverted the energy they expended on chasing up kids who didn’t shower or those wearing non-regulation kit and put it into actually teaching us, we’d have all been better off. What’s the lesson here, Jones? It’s more important to look the part than actually exercise? That athletic performance is directly linked to the colour of your socks? (think I’ve found the cause in designer gym-wear…). Or that it deeply wrong to want to wear a tracksuit instead of that horridly thin vest and shorts while doing cross-country in January?

Speaking of showering, did PE teachers ever actually think these things through? That having a communal showers with zero privacy (not even stall dividers), non-adjustable temperature (scalding hot or tepidly cold) and a smell of a urinal cake was bad enough for self-conscious teens in a country with little tradition of public nudity – but the kicker was that we students never had enough time to shower.

If I go full-pelt and cut all optionals, I can ‘turn-around’ in fifteen minutes after a workout session. Time allotted in lesson for this? Ten. Let’s also factor in that of the schools I was at, there was never a shower-head = student ratio better than one to four (often more). Therefore, the unlucky sods at the back could end up waiting the best part of thirty minutes (at least) for a shower to free up. That by this time, you’re already late for the next lesson (and the next PE class is already in the changing room) – or you’re eating into your own time. Like missing your bus home. Or your lunch-spot. Or just the pointless time-neurosis schools love to instil in their charges.

As you’ve kinda guessed; nobody had ‘proper’ showers. The teachers would check, but as this was done by looking at hair, this was easy to fake by simply wetting it a bit. I think I had one single shower in five years of compulsory PE – I do remember that my prop towel which lived in my locker got more use from hair-drying from rain-storms than it’s intended purpose.

Superficiality…

With the benefit of hindsight and a little bit of knowledge, I realise now just how shallow the PE ‘concepts’ were – that like it considered constant failure to be ‘character building’, it seemed to think that a half-hour of whipped, lacklustre physical activity twice a week to be the sufficient to stave off the ballooning obesity epidemic (which American studies have shown to be of minimal to no effect on the fighting the flab in kids). A situation which not only breeds stagnation and disinterest in the subject, but is so obviously stupid and devoid of logic that even the victims pupils point it out.

The obsession with ‘metrics’ – measurable results and so on – is also dangerously shallow. How fast, how long, how far etc. Is there even a point for the measuring? Normally, neither the teacher or pupil gives a crap about it – so why does it persist?

…and Harmfulness?

In fact, I would go as far to say that it is directly harmful for the pursuit of physical health. That it makes all too many people loathe ‘PE’ and all it’s works – not just at school, but for their whole adult lives. This ‘programming’ of hating fitness, fit people and anything that remotely resembled a PE teacher was a serious mental cramp which I had to get over before I started making real progress in This Thing Of Ours.

Even worse, Jones and their ilk failed to even impart any knowledge regarding health and fitness, the sort where even if I did not follow when 15, may refer back to when 35. No, Mr Jones – you left me completely ignorant of the subject. Your subject. Which was called ‘physical education’. You not only failed as a teacher and a coach, but also even as a cheerleader for the subject. In fact, my views of fitness would have been more positive if you’ve not existed at all.

And I know I’m not alone in this feeling.

Advocatus Diaboli?

Now, many of the above problems are out of the control of even the best PE teacher in the country. In times of budgetary squeeze, the curse of the ‘syllabus lock-in’ is even worse than usual; leading to schools offering the same old sports and activities because they cannot afford to buy new equipment, adapt facilities or offer ‘off-site lessons’. The classist result is obvious; the poor kids in the ‘sink estate’ schools miss experiencing the more ‘expensive’ or ‘specialist’ activities such as swimming, climbing, cycling or hiking – instead, ending up with the same four / five group sports again.

Even if an enterprising school is able to find the cash, it then runs slap-bang into the issues of Whitehall diktats; one which labours under the delusion that the above crappiness works. Then there’s the issue of efficiency; kudos is gained by winning on exam league tables, and PE achievement barely gets a look in on that. As a headteacher, I have all the incentive in the world to not only not invest extra into PE but to in fact, cut it back to the legally mandated minimum and focus my energies on ‘where it matters’.

Between these two, they become unsolvable headaches; PE doesn’t have enough time in the week do achieve much normally, will find it’s time cut further ‘when required’ (such as exam preparation) and there’s not enough staff to try to teach in ability groups, provide anything approximating ‘individual attention’ or merely give the students anything like a real choice of activity.

No wonder that we invariably end up with the lowest common denominator, one size fits none, statutory minimum, bargain-basement lessons – represented by the half-hearted jogging around the perimeter of muddy fields in the cold drizzle, while Jones shouts ‘encouragement’ under his umbrella warmly-dressed.

The Logical Conclusion?

Which may ultimately explain why Jones, his mentor Sudgen and all the others of his ilk continue to ply their ‘craft’ – because they do – even into the current age in schools throughout the UK and (I suspect) beyond. They survive cause few care about this state of affairs and even less can do anything about it.

This general lack of caring has allowed the incompetent, the burnt-out and the sociopathic teachers to remain (tainting the reputation of the subject), while their defects would have caused their dismissal years ago in any ‘important’ subject. In fact, the only thing we really care about from Jones is the assurance he’s not a paedophile. You’d think most parents would care more about their kid’s physical condition, but there you go.

Upwards, this ends up being replicated within government itself. The subject is not a ‘vote winner’, so it doesn’t get much priority on the ever-tightening budgetary constraints, unlike say, exam results. At best we can usually expect a tokenistic, symbolic ‘strategy’; – a spending announcement (which usually turns out to be peanuts or no ‘new’ money at all), a week’s PR campaign (a speech or two, and the obligatory shot of the Minister at a sports academy or something), a ‘pack’ which will usually combine the anodyne, the current fads and the party’s predilections, then quietly buried when the news cycle moves on to something else.

The biggest issue is perhaps the fact of governmental ‘compartmentalisation’ and buck-passing; Education doesn’t want to spend cash on an issue which ultimately benefits the health of adults, Health reasons it’s not their job to spend cash on schools, Youth Services explains their relatively minuscule budgets are already ‘too tight’ to fund these things and the myopic cost-benefit analysis from the Treasury makes extra cash a non-starter.

Zombie PE?

The combination of all the above factors leaves physical education in a kind of undead state; too ‘liked’ to be killed off, not liked enough to be given the resources it desperately needs to do anything properly. The ‘liking’ of it is not even true; more the principle of PE is liked, rather than the reality. To paraphrase Sir Humphrey; spending on school PE is symbolic of the government’s desire to increase fitness and tackle obesity amongst the youth – it’s not really expected to actually achieve much.

And the vast majority of PE teachers know this. Chances are, they’re taken for granted, skills disrespected, assumed that as they ‘don’t teach a proper subject’ they’re free to do the thankless tasks and more than anything else, their goodwill is exploited. And whenever you end up in situations like this, the most skilled people are the ones who leave for greener pastures – for fee-paying schools, health clubs, sports academies, gyms or out of the sector entirely.

The Moral Of This Story…

Is that Jones and his ilk survive because not because they’re any good – but because they’re the only ones who’ll stick it out, which means they’re tolerated. The toleration comes because not enough people care about it enough to really change the situation. And that as in anything in this world, the rule ‘you get what you pay for’ is pretty accurate.

Jones is the symptom, not the cause. To improve PE, you would need to not just remove the Jones of the world, but to construct a system where you employ people better than him.

As everything on this blog, merely my own thoughts and opinions. Part of my Essays series.

Are Schools Obsolete?

As the coronavirus pandemic continues it’s wrecking-ball effect on our societies and lives, it keeps on producing various unforeseen – and normally unimaginable – issues, like the fact that in many advanced nations such like the UK, many children haven’t attended a physical school for the best part of a year, and even the ones who are attending are not getting the usual ‘school experience’ for various reasons.

This has led to a lot of people noticing this, and start talking about the ‘lost learning time’, the ‘attainment gap widening’ and so on. All perfectly respectable, reasonable worries – but it makes a key assumption, one so unconscious I was caught by it too until recently. This being: the ‘education’ the children were missing was important.

Cognitive Dissonance?

Many adults from as far as I can tell appear to operate under a form of educational doublethink; that while perfectly happy to regale others about ‘how school taught me a load of rubbish’ and so on, will in the next breath insist that ‘kids get to school’ like it’s the most vital thing ever. That while it’s possible that some feel that ‘school’ has completely changed (and so their experiences mean squat) as far as I can tell most don’t think about it at all – they simply accept it, part of What Life Is.

This wouldn’t be so much an issue if our school system wasn’t utterly obsolete; it’s goals and purposes redolent of another era.

Factory Model Schooling

The ‘modern’ school as we know it arrived in the 19^th Century; for when the Industrial Revolution was crying out for semi-skilled workers and the current system – designed to produce a few clergymen, lawyers and scribes for an agricultural state – proved to be obsolete for this task.

Now, much has been made of the above term, thinking that it equated the training to work in factories – it actually means the style of schooling. That like an assembly line for cars or televisions, our ‘factory school’ will take raw product (children), put them through the standardised mould (the curriculum), assay their worth (exams) and then send them out to be sold (careers). All at an affordable unit price (taxes).

As a rule, this worked well enough; give some basic skills and a bunch of ‘facts’ which are deemed important, then push them out into the world in their early teens to be trained as apprentices, which will then turn into lifelong careers. After all, this was the age where the office boy could end up as a manager one day.

Naturally, some kids were destined for ‘better things’ than this. That is why exams like the ‘Eleven Plus’ existed; where the cream was scooped off to be prepared for university admission, leaving everyone else to be ejected into the workforce each July.

Unsaleable Product?

This ‘two-track’ system sort of worked until the 1980s, when the demand for manual labour collapsed. Realising this, the schools changed their curricula – unfortunately, they were mainly designed by academics, who naturally thought that academia was the most important. The state, knowing the cachet of university degrees with the voters and feeling ‘the knowledge economy’ was a cure-all which would provide everyone with good careers without any government intervention, went along with it.

The factory-line was simply re-purposed; instead of churning out young apprentices, it was producing university students, primarily in the humanities and arts. But a factory akin to one in the old USSR, for it was producing unsaleable product – for the world of business doesn’t want a load of academics.

Think; it’s doubtful you were ever really taught about marketing, journalism, sales or budgeting. Your skill in English was rated on your knowledge about literary classics, not your ability in public speaking or skill in debating. When urged to think, it was merely to ‘remember what you were taught’, not actually to come to conclusions yourself. Subjects like history producing little oases of ‘knowledge’, floating in mid-air with nothing connecting it. Each subject within it’s own little designated area, rarely if ever meeting another. More realistic representation of ‘real life’ – such a creative problem-solving projects – is a rarity.

Cult Of Practicality

Is perhaps the worst of the lot. Because it’s not really ‘practical’ at all; when folks usually talk about this, they normally mean ‘more science, maths and technology’. Apparently, it seems that archaic knowledge about Shakespearian sonnets is bad, but esoteric knowledge of calculus is good. Even when both hold zero practicality in ‘real life’.

The other obsession is about exam results. This might be a touch confusing until we remember that we’re stuck in a logic loop; ‘exam results’ are important because everyone says they’re important, so they must be. Odd… about all the complaints I’ve heard about exams over the years, so few of them have bothered to ask whether the things being tested were worth being tested.

The sad thing is, most of the people who thunder about ‘practical teaching’ (often along with some anti-intellectual comments about ‘the university of life’ etc) are normally the ones who blow a gasket when schools do this; from politics to ethics, sexual education to mental health – as soon as the teachers try to impart ‘useful general knowledge’ you can hear their angry bellows about ‘bias’, ‘woke’, ‘indoctrination’ and so on.

From Crisis To Opportunity?

Destruction is not inherently negative – for it can destroy bad things as well as good. Sometimes, the destruction will reveal to us that the ‘good’ was actually worse than expected; like a storm revealing that ‘healthy’ tree was in fact rotting from within. Other times, the destruction can clear a space where we can produce something better.

And I feel that we have this chance with education. That schools and teachers have had to be creative on producing work-around solutions to the problems. Some have worked, others haven’t. The power of inertia, to continue doing things ‘the way we’ve always done them’ without questioning the reasons why is immense. But in this case, to ‘go back to before’ requires conscious effort.

There are people who would argue that ‘this is not the time’ to start a debate about the future of our educational system – like what the hell is it actually meant to achieve. But like Dr King said, many of those people who say ‘later’ really mean ‘never’. A pandemic may not seem to be the ‘right’ time for a debate like this, but it may in fact be the only time that we can – at a time of dislocation, where the issues and problems are fresh and visible and there’s a firm appetite for ‘new thinking’.

I’m not sure what the ‘school of the future’ should look like. But I know one thing; it shouldn’t be like the one from the past – run with a load of assumptions on how the world operated thirty, fifty, a hundred years ago.

As everything on this blog, merely my own thoughts and opinions. Part of my ‘Essays‘ series.

University: Product Not As Described?

In a way, Coronavirus is like Donald Trump for journalists; it’s the gift which simply keeps on giving. In this case, it’s the increasing levels of University students being put under lockdown conditions on campuses, the cancellation of some to all face-to-face teaching and the possibility that some may even be forced to endure the Christmas / New Year period stuck in their term-time accommodation. Even more important than we older folks would imagine; what with the glut of university students due to our seeming utter obsession with the thing.

Ramifications

Lockdown; some which are even stricter than the ones in the spring – not even allowed out to exercise or shop. Result; 24/7 of staring at the walls, some of which will be close indeed, if you take into account how small some Halls rooms are.

Physical isolation; effectively no food or drink with another; games, sports and similar all verboten. Some have cancelled all physical contact with other students and/or their tutors. If the screw is tightened (say due to a case) often a whole residential building or class is thrown into quarantine – backed up with university sanctions if broken.

Allowing some adaptation to suit your own circumstances – could you live under these provisions for months on end? My answer is simple; no. My glorified squat of a flat may be too small legally to even be constructed as such now, but at very least I did not have to share my kitchen or bathroom, was bigger than a glorified cupboard and contained items to alleviate cabin fever, such as books and dumbbells.

What’s more, I could still leave. Even taking work out of the equation, I could still visit shops and take my daily ration of exercise; which in my case was mainly jogging or going for long walks. To use an analogy; while I may have been imprisoned in a cell for the best part of three months, but at very least I was allowed walks in the yard.

Speaking of cells, I didn’t have a cell-mate either. Speaking as a Kid From Care, having to share physical space with complete strangers sucks indeed. Yet, now many tens of thousands of first-year students are being forced to do this – and there’s no escape.

Pile Up The Stress

Another thing which needs to be remembered is the people being subjected to this; mainly those in their late teens and early 20s. First year students will be getting it worse of all – for almost none will be familiar with the situation of you actually living away from the parental home. For a decent slice, this will be the first time they’ve moved away from where they grew up too. Okay, this is kinda theoretical an issue for me (due to being said Kid From Care) but I’ve seen the reactions from enough to know this can be a Big Thing.

In these cases, people end up creating ersatz ‘families’, through friends and so on (this also happens in places like children’s homes). Yet, with the massive restriction on socialisation – how will said students make the friends? Online can help plug this gap, yes; but we are social creatures, and as anyone in elder care knows, loneliness can kill.

Financialisation…

However, the most important issue is that students are paying the best part of twenty thousand pounds for the privilege for renting a room and watching Zoom lectures. As a few people have pointed out, most of these could have done this for half the price with an Open University course from their own bedrooms. A situation exacerbated by the fact the chances of part-time work will be even less than before, what with the combination of student-related closures and the general recession we’re about to enter.

This leads to the obvious question; why. As in; why were Universities re-opened ‘as normal’? Anybody who’s been a student or parent of one knows diseases spread like wildfire, like meningitis. We also knew that coronavirus was bound to flare up again in the autumn. That students would be the ideal vessels to deliver said infections back to larger family units over the Christmas period, just like primary school kids giving their families head lice. And the answer is depressingly simple; money.

Universities are now de facto businesses, always looking to get more ‘surplus’ out of their students. As they’re unable to raise their tuition fees above the nine-and-a-bit grand per year, they’re reliant on ‘extras’ to puff up the surpluses – Halls rentals, selling advertising space, sponsorships, retail unit leases and so on. No physical students, no income – not even from the vending machines.

This is even more serious an issue for most universities are wallowing in debt. A massive glut of spending on Shiny Stuff to impress possible customers, a thick padding of administration staff, the use of marketers, brand managers and so on. Naturally, said debts need to be serviced; and as their best money-makers – international students – have been crippled by the pandemic, they need to sweat their remaining customers – UK students – as much as possible to make up for the shortfall.

…And Commodification

You’ll notice I started to use the term ‘customer’ in the last paragraph. For that is what students have become to their university administration – sources of profit, nothing more. In the administration’s minds, a ‘university education’ is just another commodity to be bought and sold at whatever the markets will bear. Don’t blame them for this; it’s the logical conclusion to the series of marketisation reforms which began in the early ’90s and culminated under the Cameron pseudo-Coalition Government twenty years later.

To their credit, universities generally realised this, asking for government assistance over the summer. This being denied, they were forced to get their UK-based customers back into the campuses, simply so they can get their rental income. While they’d prefer the customers to be able to make more a financial contribution by consuming other things such as retail, they’ll be content enough to charge perhaps £500 a week for Zoom lectures, a box-room and free Wi-Fi.

I wonder if we can put a mark-up on ‘room service’ food deliveries?

End Of The Line?

My thought is this; two can play at this game. If a student is just a customer and education just a commodity, well I’ll say to the students of Britain – you’re being short-changed.

You were partly paying for an ‘university experience’ which may for the most of this year be variants of sitting in a small room with your laptop. You were deceived into thinking it was okay to come back to campus. While you were clearly aware that it wouldn’t be exactly like normal, you at least didn’t think it would be a variant of a 33-week house arrest.

If this was a restaurant and you only got half a meal, you’d get a discount. If you went on holiday and all the entertainments were shut, you’d have reasonable grounds for some recompense. Yet as universities are not de jure companies, you’re apparently exempt – a line being backed up by the government, who basically don’t give a shit about you on this case.

But while Coronavirus threatens to kill or maim British universities, it’s mainly due to the fact they were not in rude health beforehand. The staff and students alike have been more ruthlessly ‘sweated’, marketisation has corrupted standards, teaching has degraded, it’s become overly reliant on international – particularly Chinese and Indian – students, and worst of all – their ‘final product sold’ is becoming hugely devalued.

Bankruptcy or bailout; this will be the ultimate decision at the Government’s door. Or more likely, bankruptcy and then bailout when the Ministers realise the Deans weren’t exaggerating…

As everything on this blog, merely my own thoughts and opinions. Part of my Coronavirus 2020 series.

A British Obsession: University?

The official coronavirus-related shambles continues, shining lights on aspects of our society which were were either ignorant of or we liked to pretend we were (lest we have to do something about it). The ‘current scandal of the weekend’ this time being regarding the awarded A-Level grades; basically put, the teens were awarded the grades which their school was expected to achieve, not what they were (as they were unable to sit the actual exams).

This meant that a hard-working teen in a crap, sink school would find their predicted A’s turned into B’s, C’s or even worse simply on the fact their school ‘didn’t achieve A’s’. On the other side, a rather dullard teen in a fee-paying or selective school found their predicted C’s turned to B’s or even A’s on the similar assumption – their school ‘achieved many A’s’.

Now, the lack of official movement on this clearly classist, divisive action unfortunately did not surprise me. No; what interested me was the comments about A-Levels – and the fact they just revolved around university admissions.

Qualification Inflation?

The message being said by all was unmistakable; everyone doing A-Levels were aiming for university and the ones unable to get in to their desired meant their lives were over. The idea that perhaps not everyone wanted to go to university was not asked. Even worse, the idea that perhaps not everyone should go wasn’t asked either.

British teenagers face a unique dilemma. They are the first cohort in our history where their degree is both in high demand and (usually) carries no premium but lots of debt. Odd situation, yes. And one which most folks over thirty-five haven’t really spotted yet.

The problem is – in a nutshell – that the British economy has a chronic oversupply of graduates; particularly ones in the humanities, arts and social sciences. This means that the ‘degree bonus’ that used to exist is (usually) no more. Worse; degrees have become so thick on the ground that companies are demanding them for roles which in previous decades were happy with lower qualifications, such as for bank staff.

Basically put; so many young Britons gain degrees now, it’s become so devalued to the point that it’s become ‘normal’.

Now, this wouldn’t be so bad… until we remember that these students are paying through the nose for this. Or more correctly, will be dealing with a fifty-grand plus debt-pile for decades hence. Many of which working a myriad of jobs that don’t pay a hell of a lot or even need a degree.

Yet… more and more teens are pushed into ‘going to Uni’ as the One And Only Path. And the reason is oh-so quintessentially British…

Snobbery & Bias

The fundamental problem lies within the British class system, as so many of these things do. It stems from the traditional cultural values echoed by the upper-middle class; Public School – Oxbridge – Humanities – The Professions. A system which was primarily designed to produce lawyers, clergymen and civil servants for a pre-industrial state.

The problem was that the class below them – the ‘ordinary’ middle class – simply tried to ape their ‘betters’. Well, either that or they fell into the ‘association fallacy’ – Eton was a good school, Eton teaches Classics, therefore Classics is good.

So we had the spectre of grammar schools trying to ape Eton, while universities did their best to cultivate an ‘Oxbridge feel’. We still see this now; it was the reason the polytechnics were allowed to become ‘universities’ in the 1990s, it’s why any crusading new head at a failing school starts out by introducing a stupidly formal dress code.

For we all know that the British class system isn’t just about money, it’s about status, one’s position in society. A teacher may earn less than an electrician, but the former will be seen by many to be ‘superior’ to the latter. It’s like that classic ‘Class Sketch’ with John Cleese in it; it’s like every Briton desires to know who they can look up to and down on. And anyone who tells you that this system is dead is either an idiot or a liar.

This bias is compounded by the prejudices within the minds of the educators themselves. For the vast amount of them are from the middle-class, educated along traditional lines and having entered their careers along the method of university. It is the self-fulfilling prophecy; the middle-class teacher believes that being middle-class is the way to ‘succeed’, and thusly does their best to teach their charges to be middle class. To whit; get the grades, go onto university.

Meritocratic Academicisation?

The main problem, however has been the relentless push to ‘get as many into university’ during the last thirty-odd years. The reason for this is simple; it was an half-arsed attempt to build a meritocratic society without actually spending that much or having to change anything.

At the time, it did made sense. Graduates enjoyed a premium in their wages through their entire lives. Academic skills were still pretty short. The numbers of teenagers entering the workforce was proportionately low. And the last thing the British economy needed right then was more unskilled labour.

The problem was that nobody planned anything past this point. As in seemingly nobody considered that the ‘degree premium’ would vanish if the supply of degrees tripled and nobody did any forecasting into what skills the UK would need in the next thirty years. Naturally, during this time the schools were increasingly ‘academicised’ to suit the demands of universities rather than employers or real life.

However, the worst problem was that the degrees which held ‘status’ – the Humanities – were often the cheapest to run. Therefore, it was in the university’s interest to expand provision in say, Media Studies or History rather than Engineering or Physics. After all, it didn’t really matter much as they got paid the same per-head whatever the subject was.

Their partners in crime were the careers advisor. With their own biases towards the traditional academic, ignorance of the alternatives and the incentives to get as many of their charges into university as possible, no wonder few folks chose the other options. Hell, most of them didn’t even know there were alternatives.

Market Malfunction?

If universities were an ‘ordinary’ market, the whole thing would have collapsed long ago. Basic economics tells us that if said products (degrees) were no longer worth the cost (student debt) paid for them when considering value (employment), the demand for the product would decline, substitute goods (apprenticeships etc) would become more attractive and in the long run the equilibrium would re-establish itself.

But we’re not seeing this, for we as a nation are suffering from a mental block regarding universities. As in; a sane, evidence-based and critical look at the whole thing. But that’s the problem; as soon as we start looking at this from a pounds-pence point of view the bourgeois ‘learning for the sake of it’ and all rot that hones into view. An obsolete idea in itself, that there is a ‘time for learning’ and then you ‘get on with it’ for the rest of your life.

Final Thoughts

I don’t want to put off anybody going to university. But unfortunately, the truth has to be faced. That if you’re thinking about university, I’d say to consider the following…

– Will the degree I wish to do ‘pay for itself’? As in; will it lead to a job which pays enough extra to cover all that debt I’m getting into?

– If it doesn’t, is the level of fun you think you’ll have be worth more than around £25k a year?

– Am I considering this degree because I am aiming for a particular career field, or simply because I find the field interesting?

– Is there an actual market demand for my proposed degree? Sorry, the UK does not require any more Gender Studies grads any time soon.

– Is there any other method(s) of gaining entry into my chosen field? As in; one which is cheaper?

– Am I thinking about university mainly because my parents/teachers/friends are going on about it rather than any conscious desire myself?

– Am I wanting to go to university simply to get away from the parental home?

The problem is, ‘going to Uni’ has become such a thing, such a Rite of Passage that it’s very easy to simply get swept up in it and go along with it. Much more so if you’ve not really got that much idea on what ‘you want to do’ anyway (don’t worry, most of us don’t…).

It always takes guts to swim against the tide…

As everything on this blog, merely my own thoughts and opinions. Part of my Essays series.

Why GCSE’s Are Obsolete

Coronavirus is the new Brexit; as in being the current event which is affecting every damn aspect of our lives in ways you wouldn’t think it could. One aspect I’d all but forgotten about is the upcoming slate of GCSE’s, A-Level etc exams due to start in some eight weeks time – some headteachers stating they must stay open for pupils, while others are asking that said exams to be delayed. Yet precious few people are actually going as far to ask the question whether GCSE’s are still worth doing in the first place.

A Little History

While GCSE’s fully started in 1988, their format began in 1951, when the ‘School Certificate’ was segmented and formalised as ‘O-Levels’. During this, around a third of sixteen year-olds did them – for until 1972 it was legal for you to leave school at fifteen. Yes; you could quite literally leave education for the world of work without a single qualification. I remember seeing an echo of this in an old school brochure from the 1960s; they possessed a ‘fifth-form common room’ – something a little bit extra to tempt kids to stay that extra year. Looked okay enough from the photos, though I’m sure today’s teenagers would have hated it due to the lack of technology.

As the demand for unskilled labour declined through post-War period, said system was tinkered with around the edges; such as the introduction of ‘CSE’s’ in 1965 to allow the less skilled pupils to gain something if they were unable to score O-Levels and so on. But that didn’t really do much, so in 1972 the school age was raised to sixteen.

The fact that a large dollop of cash and many ‘ROSLA’ (Raising Of School Leaving Age) prefab buildings were provided showed just how many weren’t remaining for fifth form before – though the fact this was near the peak of the echoes of the Baby Boom may also have had something to do with it. This made CSE / O-Levels de facto mandatory for every Briton.

However, by this point the idea of dividing pupils by ability had fallen increasingly out of fashion; the Grammars and Secondary Moderns were ‘going Comprehensive’, and qualifications followed suit, though much more gradually – O-Levels got actual grades in 1975, by 1978 some exam boards were producing ‘combined’ papers for those who were straddling what we’d now call the C/D grade boundary. With mixed-ability teaching almost the complete norm by the 1980s, it was only a matter of time before the two exam types became one – and between 1986 and 1988, they did.

The World of the GCSE

The educational world of the late 1980s was significantly different to today, so it’s worth looking at it for a moment. In this time, only around 15% of sixteen year-olds would continue school education – the rest heading to either work, apprenticeships or vocational training at college. This meant that GCSEs were the benchmark of most pupil’s academic education; and the grading allowed to the likes of employers and so on to judge the intellectual merits of the myriad of school-leaving candidates each summer. Therefore, they served a critical purpose.

A decade later, sixth-form was still relatively rare; I remember the first bog-standard comprehensive I attended had a combined group of perhaps sixty – giving a fag-packet retention rate of somewhere between 20% from Year 11. This added to the programming I’d already received into my working-class head – ‘sixth form is special’. Oh, I’d learn the wrongness of that…

Academicisation

As far as I can tell this rot began around the time of the introduction of the GCSE – the late 1980s. ‘Rot’ being in this case the rapid decline of practical elements to education, the focus being shifted to the ‘academic’; for the first time in English history, the providers of mass education were being told to prepare their charges for further education, rather than direct entry to the workforce.

Schools weren’t the only ones who could see where the wind was blowing; colleges massively expanded their A-Level offerings, the old practical-based Polytechnics became academic Universities, apprenticeships continued to contract due to neglect and so on. The political masters set the tone; from the drive to get ‘as many into University as possible’ to the introduction of school ‘league tables’ which rated ‘success’ only from the results scored in exams such as GCSE’s.

This was the era where ‘the knowledge economy’ became the shibboleth of the British elites; after all, once we’d sold our manufacturing base to give the super-rich tax cuts, it was either that or turning the land into a massive historical theme park for tourists. It was to provide us all with excellent, well-paid, interesting careers; no polluting factories, physical labour or anything. It chimed well with the old English bourgeois disdain for ‘manual work’, as well as a plinth of the long-term Thatcherite project in making as many people think of themselves as ‘middle class’ as possible.

The End of Specialness

By the time I reached Sixth Form in the early 2000s, it had all changed. My year’s intake had ballooned from the 15% to around 75%, and many of those who decided to leave went to College instead. ‘Normality’ had flipped; now to leave ‘to work’ was the oddity; something which only the true screw-ups and idiots did. True, I did go at this point to a very middle-class school, but general statistics back up this trend; for example, in percentage terms more students started at University in 2015 than achieved 5 A-C GCSEs in 1988.

This ‘end of specialness’ showed itself in odd little ways; perhaps the easiest is the changing clothing rules. As late as 2001, almost all Sixth Forms either had no dress codes or very loose ones; but over the years this noose gradually tightened – my nephew had to wear a full suit, every day by c2016. Worse, a lot of schools now enforce the same uniform on their sixth-formers as the rest of the school; at best, making them look like idiots, at worst pleasing the Dirty Old Man demographic by making physically adult women dress like schoolgirls.

I mention this because when ‘perks’ are removed, it’s a sign that they no longer feel the need to actually attract students to stay – after all, my first secondary school was crap academically; those few ‘bright enough’ to do A-Levels could easily transfer to either another, better school or college.

What does this have to do with GCSEs? The simple fact that when in the 1970s it was the ‘full stop’ of most people’s academic lives, it had become the ‘semi-colon’ by the 2000s; the first major hurdle you Had To Clear To Be A Success^TM. It’s value to the pupil had declined, massively. Unfortunately, it’s value to the school had risen; for every ‘good pass’ went into the hallowed League Table which they lived or died on.

The Final Nail

It was in 2015 that GCSE’s became totally obsolete; when the school leaving age was raised to 18. Now, there was no employer to show your certificates to. That officially, every Briton should leave two years later with higher qualifications than it. Yet… almost nobody has questioned the continued existence of said certificates. Yes, they still ‘have value’, but only because we insist they do have value – rather like say these bits of plasticy paper in my wallet with the pictures of this old lady on them.

First, we have the people who say it’s ‘good motivation to learn’. This may be true; but it’s even bigger motivation for teachers to ‘teach for the tests’ throughout Years 10 and 11 – after all, league tables! By ditching the exams at 16, you’ll be freeing up a lot of teaching-time to… y’know, actually teach the kids stuff rather than stuffing them with enough tit-bits to fool the examiner you know more about the topic than you really do. My own fag-packet calculation shows the scrapping of GCSE’s would be at least the equivalent of adding three months to every pupil’s educational life.

And what about the huge amount of stress we’re piling on children? Is that good for them too? Oh, wait – ‘character-building’, right?

Next, we have the folks who say it’s needed to judge academic competence when applying for apprenticeships, sixth-forms and the like. Again, true; but that’s only the argument for a test, not a full gamut of external exams. It’s quite possible to instead have a paired-down ‘General Certificate’, internal tests and/or the opinions of the pupil’s teacher(s) regarding their general suitability for what they’re applying for or whatever.

Lastly, we have the argument that they’re vital to the education system. Again, true – but only because we built our education system around it. That’s like arguing that the scaffolding surrounding a house is vital to it’s continued existence and can’t ever be removed. Many countries – such as the USA, France, Germany etc all seem to survive without testing at sixteen perfectly fine.

Parting Thoughts

I’m no fan of exams in general; mainly because they’re more often a test of memory rather than understanding (let alone actual thinking). But GCSEs really get my goat, hearing the load of wind coming from right-wing types extolling it’s virtues which I don’t think even exist anymore.

I’m not a minority of one on this opinion – an old politician called Kenneth Baker agrees with me (or more correctly, I agree with him) when he said the GCSE’s ‘days were numbered’. And he was the Minister who oversaw the GCSE’s introduction in the 1980s. The guy was quite literally calling for the execution to his old flagship project.

As everything on this blog (save the quote), merely my own thoughts and opinions. Part of my Essays series.

Librarians Aren’t Obsolete

I did something a few days ago I’d not done for some time; I visited the public library. Not by choice, mind; I required a map. A very particular map; and neither my trusty OS Landranger or Google Maps were suitable. Therefore, I reasoned – the large(er) “central library” would surely provide. For I was vaguely sure said maps existed; I remembered seeing them once. It’s only much later I realised “that time” had been in 2002 while doing research for a school project.

So I toddled off on my day off into town; first surprise was that they’d had a refurbishment since last visiting. Then I realised that time was 2007. What struck me was that there seemed to be a lot less books than they used to be; then I reasoned that Wikipedia et al had made general reference books obsolete. Still had the old crowd of smelly older men reading periodicals / newspapers, old women getting talking books and the either-scruffy-or-homeless group, though.

After a little bit of searching, found the map section. What little there was of it. Yes, had the Landrangers, Explorers, a couple atlases and A-Z’s – but nothing suitable for my needs. Approached a librarian for assistance – and got the apathetic non-service with a shrug. Had all but given up, decided to check out the rest of the library before heading home – wanted to see what fitness books they had, actually – but spotted tucked away in the corner the Local History section. And saw, through the door; a metal cabinet which I recalled as a map case. No, there was two of them.

Dug out another librarian for the key; and unlike the last one, they actually gave a shit. Asked me what I needed it for; but in the perfect way which made it clear it wasn’t a demand for justification, but a desire to know my needs so they could fulfil it to the best of their ability. Seemed perfectly happy to help me dig through the cases; though I’m sure this is library policy in regards to handling large sheet maps some over a century old, they could have done this with a sulk. They weren’t even fazed by the fact they’d not been digitised, were out of sequence and the card catalogue was incorrect. Alas, they couldn’t find the required sheet.

Even though I’d now taken up some forty minutes of this librarian’s time and it was now getting close to closing-time, they refused to admit defeat. Asked a colleague for suggestions, then made a couple of calls to other libraries to see if they could help. Ironically, the one in the town where work is – which I’d discounted as being just a little “neighbourhood” one – said they could. Reasonable opening hours too.

Cue a couple of days later, I popped into the little library. Sure enough, they’d collected a half-dozen which one was just about suitable. New librarian clearly wished to know suitability; I explained needs, they took me out the back and to another map-case; five minutes later was photocopying the appropriate Landplan, which while being a bit on the old side was perfect for my needs.

I’m telling you this rather dull little anecdote for it showed me exactly why both libraries and librarians are still vital in this era. I’m just old enough to remember the pre-internet age, with the relative dearth of information. And in this world, the librarian was the Custodian of the Tomes; the one with their shushing, hawk eyes and accusatory looks.

Now, we live in a veritable sea of information. Yet… so much of this is of questionable quality. Search engines often seem to be like talking to the elderly aunt with the defective hearing-aid; half the replies being to “what they think you said” rather than what you actually asked. This is naturally making the assumption you know exactly what you’re looking for too. It’s difficult to judge the quality and bias of individual websites, it’s also difficult to, for example strip out American sources when doing searches (not that I’m anti-American, simply that a description of say the US protein bar market is not much use to me in the UK).

This is where the modern librarian can shine – as information specialists. To be the ones who can help answer the questions search engines can’t, to point you to reputable sources, other places which might have what you’re looking for and so on. Sure, it’s not exactly what their original job description was; but times change and it’s adapt or die.

It’s also an example of why libraries shouldn’t be too quick to chuck out the dead trees. Particularly the ones which have serious niche appeal. For it’s often the seemingly-unanswerable niche questions/problems which drive “non-library types” into the building.

Let’s go back to my dullish anecdote again. If the second librarian had given me the same non-service as the first one or if they’d simply been a jobsworth I wouldn’t have got my map. If in the refurbishment they’d have thrown out the old maps for “it’s all like Google Maps now” there wouldn’t have been a map for me to get. And in both cases, it would have made me less likely to try the library again.

Which is important, as I’ll be much more touchy about losing services I actually use – and pay for.

As everything on this blog, merely my own thoughts and opinions.

Bring Back Home Economics

Put bluntly; feminists killed Home Economics. Repeatedly bludgeoned, stabbed and starved for the final two decades of the last century, the subject limped on for another fourteen, before finally put out of it’s misery in 2014. The public reaction to this knowledge was muted, a combination of nostalgia, celebration and slight surprise that it had survived that long in the first place. But the cheers from feminists that it had died was short-sighted, in my opinion.

Sure, the ‘traditional’ Home Economics courses were terribly sexist and confining. The training of girls to be Betty Draper housewives; cooking, cleaning, babies, sewing – the very fact that boys in the early post-War period went off and worked with bricks, metal and wood instead was a clear bellow of ‘women, know your place!’. The feminist intellectuals who attacked this were completely on the mark with this – that ‘Home Ec’, as it existed had to change. Instead, they killed it. Why?

Four Motives

Firstly, I think they failed to realise how useful it actually was. Said first two waves of feminists were reared in world where every woman ‘could cook’. Classism rears it’s head again; for most of the campaigners hailed from the upper grades of society, which often meant that the campaigner’s female relatives had made sure they could put edible meals on the table. Put somebody through hundreds of hours of lessons of things they already know, they’ll bitch about it later.

Second; the decline of practicality in schooling. I think this rot got into the British education system around the late ’80s, where the pendulum swung strongly towards preparing pupils to enter higher education, rather expecting to kick them out at sixteen into the workforce. Thus; a strong focus on ‘academic’ subjects.

This made sense in the regards of the labour needs of the time; manufacturing was being decimated by Thatcher’s policies, unskilled jobs were getting pretty scarce and the demands for formal qualifications in employment was rising. Feminists went along with this change, feeling (with some reason) that if girls were say studying more maths and science instead of housewife-training, this would allow their ‘horizons to expand’. This has been proven in statistics; that (for example) female education is the most effective means of limiting teenage pregnancies.

Third; the National Curriculum and League Tables. Both introduced in the ’90s, while introduced for reasons utterly unrelated to Home Economics, it helped it’s demise. For the former gave a ever-growing list on what had to be taught and when; this meant that teaching-time was becoming an ever-precious commodity and the unprotected subjects found them increasingly squeezed. The latter compounded the problem for it graded schools on how well it got pupils through exams; this meant that to be a ‘successful school’ it was easiest for the school staff to ‘game the system’ by cutting out any subject not being tested – such as Home Economics – and to give more of the parts that were – such as Maths. Similar complaints have been heard from the likes of Art, Music, Drama, PE and Modern Languages.

Lastly, the feminists’ own biases and prejudices. Hailing mainly from academia, they naturally thought that it was incredibly important that more girls went into academia – particularly their own subject. Remembering their own experiences as ‘sexist housewife training’ rather than ‘lessons to how to feed self’. Making the ‘anti-stereotype’ culture so strong that some women almost feel like they’re ‘letting the side down’ by admitting they’re a good cook – or even worse, they enjoy cooking.

Cause And Effect

The net result of all the above led to my own sparse ‘Food Technology’ lessons at the turn of the millennium. Learned about different ‘dietary needs’, presentation, how to make nice-looking thick folders and all that – but nearly nothing about nutrition, budgeting or even cooking. The lessons… all but useless. And we’re paying the costs of decades of aggressive neglect.

We’re producing a generation of children who – while the best-educated academically in British history – are woefully unprepared for the practicalities of Real Life^TM. And I’m not just talking about the ability to cook meals here, but also personal finance, budgeting, nutrition, voting, electronic device maintenance, basic repairs, first aid, how to spot scamsters, internet safety, mental health, the legal system and so on.

A few of these things are done in a semi ad-hoc method via ‘Citizenship’ in schools, others done here and there in other subjects, but it’s still akin to trying to end a drought with a cup of water. Which is why ‘Home Economics’ needs to return; overhauled and fully updated for life in the modern world. And realising that names can be sticky points, let’s name this subject Euthenics – ‘the science of efficient living’.

After all, who can object to that idea?

As everything on this blog, merely my own thoughts and opinions.