RE: Agile education and pragmatic schooling

I'm a school governor in England and we have major problems with funding,
not just getting it, but also being allowed to spend it how we wish.  We are
told how much to spend on maintenance, how much on computers, and so on.

Then there's the National Curriculum that mandates how much time is spent on
various subjects each day, along with suggestions as to what time of day the
teaching should take place.

Basically, it's an attempt to run schools like a factory along with a hugely
expensive bureaucracy called the Local Education Authority.

Trying to accomodate the needs of individual children in such an environment
is extraordinarily difficult.

The best would be to drastically limit the size of the L.E.A. and allow more
per-pupil funding go direct to the school along with *no* restrictions on
how it is spent, (i.e. proper "Local Management of Schools").  England, to a
lesser extent Wales, (but not Scotland I believe) have standard testing of
all school pupils at various ages.  Parents would soon know if a school
wasn't performing its job correctly.  In fact, let's face it, they already
do.  It's why houses in the catchment areas of good schools are sold at
premium prices.

The best approach has to be an education voucher system that allowed schools
to be set up to accomodate pupils' individual needs.  This would provide
funding for home-schooling and other schemes as well.  The primary role of
the L.E.A. then is to ensure that children are being taught to a decent
standard.  Otherwise let different schools (and different schooling) compete
to show which is the best approach.  Our current one-size
lowest-common-denominator approach is failing, and failing badly.



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