"What are you having for lunch, big boy?" she said as she let down the window a little and turned off the engine of her natty little Clio. Clearly a lady who liked a man in work clothes. "You, apparently," I quipped. The fact that she then cracked up, that this was Mrs Turer, and I was lopping our front hedge, admittedly takes some of the suggestiveness out of this scenario. All the same, you can see there are some advantages to redundancy. I gather some others still in employment enjoy such advantages anyway, but my former colleagues and I were always much to busy hand-carving individual learning plans and the like to pay any attention to gossip. Lunch was a multi-task mess of crumbs and paper on our desks as we got ready for our afternoon class, and certainly not leek pie, goat's cheese and an artisan loaf in a relaxed atmosphere rich with double entendre.
Food was sometimes a distraction, though, albeit a hectic one. At Eid, Christmas, people's birthdays, or the drop of a kapelusz, our students produced samosas, Chinese dumplings, flat bread, croissants, octopus, sticky rice in seaweed, tortillas, and those Polish marshmallows coated in chocolate - or even better, chocolate plums. Our end of term parties were legendary, and if you weren't from our team, you had to be someone nice and friendly to get in - such as from the library or the International Centre, where they helped our students rather than baffled them in a shouty way through a piece of plate glass.
We were often the first helpful people they had run across since leaving their own countries. Muna, who had seen terrible things in Somalia, was now living with her little daughter in a high-rise and needed help understanding the bits of paper from the council. Farshad had arrived in the back of a lorry from Afghanistan. He was the class clown. He had scars and a bad leg, and nightmares about "the Talib people." In court he told the judge, in English, that rather than be sent back, he would say thank you now for the help he had had, and the court should kill him there and then, because he would die every minute in Afghanistan. The last I had heard, Farshad had lost his case. Then there were the Polish kids, with all their scrapes and emotional hoo-hahs, who had left their schools in Poland in year 10 arriving in the UK just in time to gear up for GCSEs, which of course they mostly didn't get. They were fiercely loyal to one another - and to us, in a chaotic teenage way.
Yet, these people are putting more into our economy than they are taking out, please note. Those Polish kids, for example, served your coffee or your burger. They're picking orders in monster depots you don't know exist. Their mum or dad drove your bus this morning, or laid your carpet. They pay taxes. Give these people some English lessons. And don't give me, Michael Gove, stuff about targeted provision and such like smokescreens. Funding's gone and going, and my students and the UK economy deserve better.
This is what I was thinking about up a ladder before lunch. Superficially, I may have looked employed (loppers, warm checked shirt, dusty khaki trousers and shoes), but I'm sleeping with the lady of the house. And if you've been to these electric paragraphs before, you may know I'm now employed here by Fruitcake Miniature College, whose Principal is our cat. It's probably just what David Cameron and his cabinet have in mind; I'm the private sector stepping in. No I'm not. This is a fantasy in more ways than one (even though I do have some students preparing for an EFL exam). These people need lessons in a proper college funded in such a way that even the shouty people behind plate glass can't complain.
http://www.gopetition.com/petition/41552.html
Showing posts with label Michael Gove. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Michael Gove. Show all posts
Friday, 4 February 2011
Monday, 29 November 2010
Is the Secretary of State for Education a dangerous zealot?
Last night, sitting by the fire contemplating the winter chill and the bleak political landscape, I was visited in my head by an imaginary Tory. Whether some inner debate function had failed to close, I don't know. Maybe redundancy makes you hear voices. Anyway, it appears I had provoked the imaginary Tory a day or so ago with my disparagement of Michael Gove, Secretary of State for Education, who in my opinion is a dangerous zealot.
IT: Are you anti Michael Gove just because he looks a bit funny and sounds keen?
AT: He does come across a bit bonkers, yes. And there is something about him that by-passes my intellect. But there are non-Tories who have the same effect.
IT: Tony Blair? Hazel Blears? Nick Clegg?
AT: Spot on. The first two seem so long ago now.
IT: And would there be an element of class consciousness in your reaction?
AT: Possibly. It's certainly a collective failure that this country is still divided on class lines, to the disadvantage of very many.
IT: Good God, I thought Marxism was dead! But you see Michael Gove isn't the Tory toff you imagine. He was adopted, and he went to public sector and independent schools. As for you, you went to a grammar school and got a grant to go to university free.
AT: So there is a file on me somewhere. But no, it's not where people come from but where they are now that I care about. Too many people in politics (and education management and other top jobs) have a poisonous sense of their own entitlement and rightness on no qualifications, or direct experience of ordinary people's lives.
IT: Michael Gove is 100% genuine in his convictions.
AT: They often are.
IT: But look at his ideas. Don't you want the dead hand of New-Labour-inspired bureaucracy lifted from education? You were on about it only the other day. What's wrong with the idea of people being able to set up their own free schools, or with providing extra lessons for poor kids on Saturdays? For heaven's sake, don't we need to take education away from Local Education Authorities, and let the ordinary people you say you champion have the choice of not going to the rubbish local school where kids get stabbed?
AT: A kid got stabbed in my grammar school. My friend shot someone in the bum with an air pistol in chess club.
IT: You know what I mean.
AT: Yes, freedom from bureaucracy, but you don't have to dismantle publicly provided support for education to give teachers more say, any more than you have to privatise the NHS to give nurses less paperwork. In fact it's all just a screen for the right's dislike of anything provided publicly. You want someone, preferably your own supporters, to own it so that shareholders and entrepreneurs decide education (or public health) priorities. Because ultimately you want the populace to keep its head down and go to work for as little reward as possible instead of asking questions. You don't want the status quo challenged by people educated to ask pertinent questions any more than Tony Blair and his zealots did.
IT: So you want LEAs rather than the people to run schools?
AT: I want good education provided publicly for all. So I don't want people with a their own private agendas getting funds that would have gone to nearby public provision. Calling such schools 'free' is not honest, because they are a state-funded opt-out.
IT: So LEAs are good then?
AT: They are an agency of local government (and I thought you people liked government to be local). They are thus imperfect and prone to generate too many initiatives and too much paperwork. But when Hardacre Collage came out of LEA control and went corporate - the bureaucracy rocketed. Any management, public or private, that has no direct experience or involvement in the education itself and has a vested interest (e.g. a high salary, a political, religious or commercial position) to protect or promote will always fail to understand well what learners and their teachers really need. Unfortunately, the right - and New Labour too - have exploited anxious parents' readiness to believe a set of urban legends about their local schools, and a dark strand in this is class and race.
IT: But schools do fail, and succeed.
AT: They do, though no one ever seems to question the targets. And, giving funding to so called 'free' schools, buddying 'failing' schools up with 'successful' ones, and providing lessons on Saturdays to keep proles out of trouble doesn't begin to address the issues.
IT: But you still think Michael Gove is a bit weird. Even though he thinks music should be on the curriculum for everyone?
AT: I do. Beer?
IT: Have you got a malt?
AT: Sloe gin do?
IT: Yes, that would be interesting. Bottoms up.
AT: Not top down.
IT: So we do agree about something then.
AT: I doubt it.
IT: Are you anti Michael Gove just because he looks a bit funny and sounds keen?
AT: He does come across a bit bonkers, yes. And there is something about him that by-passes my intellect. But there are non-Tories who have the same effect.
IT: Tony Blair? Hazel Blears? Nick Clegg?
AT: Spot on. The first two seem so long ago now.
IT: And would there be an element of class consciousness in your reaction?
AT: Possibly. It's certainly a collective failure that this country is still divided on class lines, to the disadvantage of very many.
IT: Good God, I thought Marxism was dead! But you see Michael Gove isn't the Tory toff you imagine. He was adopted, and he went to public sector and independent schools. As for you, you went to a grammar school and got a grant to go to university free.
AT: So there is a file on me somewhere. But no, it's not where people come from but where they are now that I care about. Too many people in politics (and education management and other top jobs) have a poisonous sense of their own entitlement and rightness on no qualifications, or direct experience of ordinary people's lives.
IT: Michael Gove is 100% genuine in his convictions.
AT: They often are.
IT: But look at his ideas. Don't you want the dead hand of New-Labour-inspired bureaucracy lifted from education? You were on about it only the other day. What's wrong with the idea of people being able to set up their own free schools, or with providing extra lessons for poor kids on Saturdays? For heaven's sake, don't we need to take education away from Local Education Authorities, and let the ordinary people you say you champion have the choice of not going to the rubbish local school where kids get stabbed?
AT: A kid got stabbed in my grammar school. My friend shot someone in the bum with an air pistol in chess club.
IT: You know what I mean.
AT: Yes, freedom from bureaucracy, but you don't have to dismantle publicly provided support for education to give teachers more say, any more than you have to privatise the NHS to give nurses less paperwork. In fact it's all just a screen for the right's dislike of anything provided publicly. You want someone, preferably your own supporters, to own it so that shareholders and entrepreneurs decide education (or public health) priorities. Because ultimately you want the populace to keep its head down and go to work for as little reward as possible instead of asking questions. You don't want the status quo challenged by people educated to ask pertinent questions any more than Tony Blair and his zealots did.
IT: So you want LEAs rather than the people to run schools?
AT: I want good education provided publicly for all. So I don't want people with a their own private agendas getting funds that would have gone to nearby public provision. Calling such schools 'free' is not honest, because they are a state-funded opt-out.
IT: So LEAs are good then?
AT: They are an agency of local government (and I thought you people liked government to be local). They are thus imperfect and prone to generate too many initiatives and too much paperwork. But when Hardacre Collage came out of LEA control and went corporate - the bureaucracy rocketed. Any management, public or private, that has no direct experience or involvement in the education itself and has a vested interest (e.g. a high salary, a political, religious or commercial position) to protect or promote will always fail to understand well what learners and their teachers really need. Unfortunately, the right - and New Labour too - have exploited anxious parents' readiness to believe a set of urban legends about their local schools, and a dark strand in this is class and race.
IT: But schools do fail, and succeed.
AT: They do, though no one ever seems to question the targets. And, giving funding to so called 'free' schools, buddying 'failing' schools up with 'successful' ones, and providing lessons on Saturdays to keep proles out of trouble doesn't begin to address the issues.
IT: But you still think Michael Gove is a bit weird. Even though he thinks music should be on the curriculum for everyone?
AT: I do. Beer?
IT: Have you got a malt?
AT: Sloe gin do?
IT: Yes, that would be interesting. Bottoms up.
AT: Not top down.
IT: So we do agree about something then.
AT: I doubt it.
Saturday, 27 November 2010
Santa ignored on A666 winter wonderland
The UK is all about weather. Even so, when the FMC Outreach team got in the car to visit Aunty, it was a surprise to see a local garage offering folding shovels free with every eight litres of oil. The poster suggested that the handle folded three times and the blade folded in half lengthways - the idea being, I suppose, that you could put it in the glove box until you need to dig your way out of a snow drift, and presumably, if things got really bad you could set fire to some of your cornucopia of engine oil. It looked like something from the late lamented Innovations catalogue, which used to offer hilariously outsize remotes you couldn't lose, solar powered fairy lights, and fleece blankets with hoods (which no doubt are for when you get snowed in on the sofa without a folding shovel).
The journey to Aunty's took us past Hardacre Collage at a time of day I would normally have been teaching. There was a light on in my old office, where I guess someone was wildly cobbling together a spreadsheet of imaginary figures to suggest that some initiative or other was being taken forward in full anticipation of all targets being met within budget in an aggressive funding environment whilst embedding functional skills and remaining fully inclusive. I must admit that I broke into an imaginary sweat till we got through the lights and away. We proceeded to Aunty's without further imaginings - until we arrived. She was there but didn't know where she was, though the Germans were involved, and she described herself as a lost golfball.
The week got colder, and the photo at the top of the page came true. However, last night our Principal had all his feet in the same place, because when a cat has every paw together it means he or she is curled in bliss (having a remarkable skeleton) and that there is a fire. Fruitcake luxuriated all Friday night in its glow, and in the vague knowledge that it was snowing and that once he was a vagrant but now is a billionaire education manager.
As I said, we are a nation made by our weather, a bit like Russia. Mind you, Napoleon would have done better to have headed for Oxford or Ashby-de-la-Zouch rather than Moscow. Though last night, he and his troops might have got snowed in somewhere on the A46 in a Little Chef car park. But if we are now a land of roundabouts and slip roads, we still thrill to the chill and hope it all becomes a 1950s Narnia of porridge and apple-cheeked scallywags, and that we get a day off because everything is shut thanks to a wonderful national lack of foresight. That said, we probably split fifty-fifty into pro and anti snow, and the telly reckons we've got more salt and grit than last year.
Nonetheless, there were signs on the A666 today saying sledges for sale, and the man outside the fish shop was desperately claiming that oysters keep colds and flu at bay (how much more British than the usual claim for oysters). A better claim might be that they boost intelligence. Then, Michael Gove (Secretary of State for Education and another kind of fruitcake) might prescribe them for the lower orders to have on Saturday instead of the extra lessons he's suggesting at present. More about him, no doubt, next week. Later still, mid afternoon (that is, as darkness began to loom), a flock of young Santas, elves, reindeer and snowmen went by, collecting for Wallace and Gromit's Grand Appeal. They were, in the main, largely ignored, except by lorry drivers who tooted the pertest elves. It is after all, despite the early winter wonderland, too early to bring up the subject of Christmas. So let's get out the grit and the folding shovel. With the Tories back, we're going to need them.
The journey to Aunty's took us past Hardacre Collage at a time of day I would normally have been teaching. There was a light on in my old office, where I guess someone was wildly cobbling together a spreadsheet of imaginary figures to suggest that some initiative or other was being taken forward in full anticipation of all targets being met within budget in an aggressive funding environment whilst embedding functional skills and remaining fully inclusive. I must admit that I broke into an imaginary sweat till we got through the lights and away. We proceeded to Aunty's without further imaginings - until we arrived. She was there but didn't know where she was, though the Germans were involved, and she described herself as a lost golfball.
The week got colder, and the photo at the top of the page came true. However, last night our Principal had all his feet in the same place, because when a cat has every paw together it means he or she is curled in bliss (having a remarkable skeleton) and that there is a fire. Fruitcake luxuriated all Friday night in its glow, and in the vague knowledge that it was snowing and that once he was a vagrant but now is a billionaire education manager.
As I said, we are a nation made by our weather, a bit like Russia. Mind you, Napoleon would have done better to have headed for Oxford or Ashby-de-la-Zouch rather than Moscow. Though last night, he and his troops might have got snowed in somewhere on the A46 in a Little Chef car park. But if we are now a land of roundabouts and slip roads, we still thrill to the chill and hope it all becomes a 1950s Narnia of porridge and apple-cheeked scallywags, and that we get a day off because everything is shut thanks to a wonderful national lack of foresight. That said, we probably split fifty-fifty into pro and anti snow, and the telly reckons we've got more salt and grit than last year.
Nonetheless, there were signs on the A666 today saying sledges for sale, and the man outside the fish shop was desperately claiming that oysters keep colds and flu at bay (how much more British than the usual claim for oysters). A better claim might be that they boost intelligence. Then, Michael Gove (Secretary of State for Education and another kind of fruitcake) might prescribe them for the lower orders to have on Saturday instead of the extra lessons he's suggesting at present. More about him, no doubt, next week. Later still, mid afternoon (that is, as darkness began to loom), a flock of young Santas, elves, reindeer and snowmen went by, collecting for Wallace and Gromit's Grand Appeal. They were, in the main, largely ignored, except by lorry drivers who tooted the pertest elves. It is after all, despite the early winter wonderland, too early to bring up the subject of Christmas. So let's get out the grit and the folding shovel. With the Tories back, we're going to need them.
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