Don’t we all have to pay taxes, if we earn sufficient?
In my experience the description of a Darkside Manager accurately describes anyone wishing to remain on the Darkside. In a previous role as a Trade Union official I took delight in ruining the careers of many of them, but sadly not all. They all to a man always thought it most unfair when in turn their higher managers sacrificed them for an agreement, profit rules OK.
As for students, of course they should protest - they have been lied to by the politicians, the same lot that have lied about accrued pensions rights (private and public).
Who’s responsible? Not the students surely, they have been spoon fed their entitlements to further education. There is now absolutely no brakes on the system, “It is my right to go to Uni” they earnestly protest. Years ago standards were set and yes, it was your right to go for free, once you had reached the standard. Now all the Schools and Colleges boast about 98.35% pass rates, I’d like to meet some of the young students that actually did fail!
Let’s face it decades ago most failed, (brutal?), (harsh but fair, I’d argue) but it set standards. Now all students pass, the able and the useless, so what does it all mean? I’m not against education; it is one of the most important aspects of our life, too precious to be wasted. It should be about learning and reaching set standards not collecting meaningless pieces of fancy decorated sheets of paper.
When teaching at a highly regarded college, many of the students were wasters but I was instructed (by one of those Darkside Managers!) not to kick them out, just pass them, since the college would not receive the funding if students left the course before completion. Others doing (Excel) HNC courses never sat an exam, it’s all modular course work now, easily poached from previous students’ work or the internet, needless to say they all passed. As for City & Guilds, most is now all tick a box from 5 answers, 3 of which an idiot could rule out, so now you are left with 2 to choice from. As the pass was 50% right, they all again passed. Sadly these were our future electricians, many of which I would not trust to wire a chicken run! As for university education, I went to the University of Bath, a fine technology university, but alas not as a student but on the building site to wire the place out. In those days 7% went to university, yes the elite, and I was also happy to pay my taxes for them, with the belief that the country would prosper from their endeavours. BUT in those days they weren’t all taking degrees in surfboard management etc..
Unfortunately there are still the able students, industrious in their endeavours, but now pressurised to go to ‘Uni’ to get a degree to set themselves apart from the ‘easy pass brigade’ and so it goes on, standards have sadly fallen.
Even children now burst into tears if they don’t win a race or are beaten at cards, they all have to win. Real life is not like that, perhaps things were a little harsh when I was at school (failed 11+, left as a teenager with no GCEs) but you could go to night school, and if your employer thought you were worth it get day release to a technical college and pass exams after you worked hard to reach the standards. In those days exams were [censored] or bust, but if you gained the ticket at least an employer had confidence that you met a prescribed standard.
Bring back standards and let students keep trying until they reach them, then perhaps we might see standards improve in their behaviour as well. If they can’t meet the standards, then get a job. Education is now a joke controlled by the liberal social engineers, it allows thousands of foreign students to enter the country and enrol on full time courses (specially devised so in reality they only need to attend 1 or at most 2 days a week). This enables them to immediately find employment in the many thousands of jobs our super educated can’t find or won’t do.
Excuse the rant, but I am still shocked to the core from watching TV last night witnessing what looked like some demonstrators burning wreaths previously placed at the Whitehall Cenotaph. If this is what our education system now turns out then there can be absolutely NO standards and that my friends is the problem with our dear country.
