Saturday 13 March 2010

How About An Enquiry To See If Their Anti-Tyrannosaur Measures Are Effective Too..?

So, while the teachers have been told that they can’t discriminate against political parties they don’t like by banning them from becoming teachers, they can still continue to waste time and money on whinging about private schools:
… a separate inquiry has been announced into whether measures to stop racism being promoted in independent schools are adequate, provoking an angry response from representatives of the private sector.
Unsurprisingly, because even the cretin suggesting the inquiry is forced to conclude that, well, there’s no evidence that it’s even a problem…
He added that no evidence had been brought to the review about problems with racist incidents in private schools.
Still, tea and biscuits and a cracking lunch buffet for the meetings, no doubt! And none of that icky teaching stuff to do for the duration of the report.

Who wouldn’t want that?
The Independent Schools Council (ISC) said it was dismayed to hear about the new review and had not been told of any concerns about the sector by Smith or the department for children, schools and families (DCSF).
I can’t see why they should be ‘dismayed’, they ought to be used to this by now.

Unsurprisingly, this bonkers decision to waste more taxpayer money met with the approval of ‘Blinky’ Balls:
The schools secretary, Ed Balls, said many independent schools belonged to associations that "provide a degree of self-regulation and discipline".

Balls added: "All the available evidence suggests that these associations have high expectations of their members and have their own procedures for handling cases where problems arise.

"However, I remain concerned about Maurice Smith's observations about the independent sector, and therefore I have asked him to explore further whether the current arrangements strike the right balance between allowing independent schools autonomy [to operate] in accordance with their ethos and values, and protecting the young people attending those schools from teachers displaying racist or intolerant views or behaviours that could be harmful."
The perfect NuLabour ‘issue’ – ‘OK, there’s no evidence it’s happening, but we think it must be, because we know what you private sector are like!’

Even this sop didn’t quiet the unions:
The inquiry was branded a "golden opportunity squandered" by the teaching union Nasuwt. Its general secretary, Chris Keates, said its report was "woefully inadequate and littered with contradictions".

Keates said the review failed to provide any evidence about how effective measures already in place had been, and accused it of being "complacent about the dangers schools and children face".
'Dangers'..?
"Maurice Smith seems to have focused, to a point of obsession, on the number of incidents," she said. "One incident is one too many. How many incidents would there have to be before Maurice Smith would be persuaded that further action is needed?

"The idea that a person who signs up to membership of the BNP can simply leave these beliefs at the school gate and behave as a 'professional' when they walk into school is risible."
Yet you’d have no problem assuming that a member of Respect or the Socialist Workers Party could leave their beliefs at the school gate, I suppose?
"A principled stand was required. This is a matter of social justice, staff wellbeing and child protection."
It’s precisely because of that first thing – social justice – that you’ve been thwarted.

3 comments:

Quiet_Man said...

I'm not bothered which party a teacher belongs too as long as they leave their politics at the gate and are good at their job.
Having seen some of the antics of the SWP and their hirelings the UAF I doubt they could leave their beliefs behind if you tried to detach them with a crane and they'd be supported by the unions too.

Mark Wadsworth said...

I don't get it.

There are about 500,000 teachers in the UK.

The BNP has about 12,500 members.

How many BNP members have a suitable degree and a PGCE? Let's be generous and assume about one per cent (the same as for the population as a whole), that's 125 potential BNP members who could teach (or already are teaching).

125 is 0.025% of 500,000.

That's what we are fussing about? That maybe 0.025% of teachers have slightly, er, old fashioned views about Johnny Foreigner?

Even if ALL BNP members went into teaching, on average that would only be one BNP teacher per school.

JuliaM said...

"...and they'd be supported by the unions too."

Indeed. You can imagine the unholy fuss if it was suggested that this policy be applied to other groups, couldn't you?

"That's what we are fussing about? That maybe 0.025% of teachers have slightly, er, old fashioned views about Johnny Foreigner?"

Quite. But for the Righteous, it's a case of being seen to 'do something' that's the key, not whether it's sensible or even grounded in reality...