Education

The main problem with the government's eduation poliy is that it is based on cost, when it should be based on value. Not the value that is produced by statistics as in the league tables, which are a complete misnomer, much like the World Series, in that it assumes that everybody starts from the same point. No two shools will ever be the same so why should they be judged on a qualifiation based system, where qualifiations may not be appropriate.
I am talking about the value to the person, the community and the country. You annot judge a hilds eduation in money but in potential. How much faster would we have broken the 4 minute mile if the country had allowed working class manual workers to participate. People whose very existence is based on physical activity for 8 hours a day. Who an say that the child forbidden to go on to higher education not due to a lack of academic achievement but a lack of money might be the one to make a breakthrough in medicine, science or peace negotiations.
Are we now reduced to exporting potential students to abroad, giving the Australian, Canadian and Amerian Universities our best potential, not because of knowledge but beause of money. The very same potential graduates that will make officers for some God forsaken useless war. Loyalty and duty are not of a single path going in one direction. The idea that a ountry annot afford to educate it's young shows that the priorities are all wrong.
Why do the government insist on persuing this train, this juggernaut of quasi politial doctrine when it just omes down to a small minded provincial policy that was outdated in the 60's. It's why things changed then beause a prime minister saw the potential that eduation an give.
Now we have stastically operated systems that mean children still leave school being unable to read or write properly, where they feel rejeted by a society that they have yet to beome a part of or even understand. Why are the prisons filling up with young people, whose only life is dulled by a surfiet of drugs, alcohol and violence. As far back as the ancient Greeks they knew the power of eduation as an improving force.
We have given the young consumerism, technology and a disdain for the elderly, not the very things they do need; respect for themselves, for their society and for the people within that society. The young need to understand that education is all about individual responsibilities and understanding the consequences of actions. Something this government does seem to be able to do. They are destroying a complete system of education while blaming something else and not realising the consequences that this policy will have.
I just wonder if we are pulling out of the Middle East to save resouces for another conflict in the South Atlantic. Imagine it could be a hild from a working class family without GCSE's but just armed with common sense who might be able to solve the problem.