Looks like the government need an education on education
Dear Michael Gove,
I know that this furore over SATs is easy pickings for the Conservatives, but I am still dumbstruck by the sheer stupidity of the Labour Party (and that’s saying something). Even though thousands of SATs results are delayed and teachers are saying that there are huge numbers of mistakes and inconsistencies in the grades given by markers hired by ETS, the government’s response has been clear enough – it’s not our problem.
Like just about everyone else in the UK, I want to see education testing reduced - preferably to almost nothing other than internal assessments and school-leaving exams at the end of secondary school. I am sick and tired of putting children and parents through these mindnumbing and uninformative exams that distort the curriculum and make children believe that education and intelligence is all about exam scores. That aside, the way that the government reacted to this appalling state of affairs is appalling in itself, and this is where you have rightly stepped in. ETS hold a five-year, £154 million contract to mark SAT papers taken by 11- and 13-year-olds, but it seems as though even gross incompetence is not enough to boot out ETS. Just like PFI contracts, the government evidently thinks it is appropriate to go into business with private companies when the contract guarantees massive levels of compensation should it be terminated. The private sector has no incentive to perform well and will aim to cut costs at every corner safe in the knowledge that they will either keep their job (and get richer) or get compensation for losing their job (and get even richer). Gordon Brown and the Labour Party simply do not understand the concept of markets and incentives. Brown in particular loves private money in the public sector but doesn’t understand that you can’t just hand things over to the private sector without putting the necessary incentives in place – and this is where the Conservatives need to sort themselves out because they cannot afford to go down the same road.
Last night, the QCA (who hired ETS) declined to answer questions on whether ending the contract with ETS could cost taxpayers money, while ETS declined to answer questions about the contract (which is secret, naturally). In typical Labour fashion, Jim Knight, the schools minister said: “I hold QCA accountable for the contract, for the delivery of the contract and it’s up to them to come back to me with what they’re going to do to re-establish the reputation of the SATs in the future.” So, an incompetent and costly quango has screwed up but we are now going to pretend that neither the quango nor the failure of the private sector to deliver is anything to do with us. Don’t hold back Michael – this is too good an opportunity to miss.
Yours respectfully,
A.Tory
Witanagemot Blogs
Just talking with someone at EdExcel today. From what I gather the contract was given out on the basis of reducing the time taking to mark and complete the exams.
A new deadline was bought in which neither Edex or another said they could deliver on. It was too fast and would require a lot more assessors.
They lost and Mr ED won.
But of course they couldn’t manage it. The time frame was too narrow, they didn’t have the manpower and once it started to go wrong there was no contingency.
I gather the changes were not down to a Mr Knight, but a Mr Balls who wanted a big headline this summer.
Well, he got one.
..and according to the news, Mr Balls is very upset about the whole thing. What a surprise. Huge embarrassment for him and yet more shame heaped on government contracts with the private sector.
I have no doubt that the contracting-out of exam marking was designed to make things more ‘efficient’ – exam boards were privatised for the same reason, but this has also ended up crippling the exam system and we now have GCSE papers being marked by office staff.
“Like just about everyone else in the UK, I want to see education testing reduced”
Not so sure. Think of the tribe of Mail readers who complain about “political correctness gone mad” and “the nanny state” but actually support big government so long as it does things they approve of.
They are the constituency behind the battery of tests. The National Curriculum can be laid at their door. They are very significant in the Tory Party, as witness the idiotic grammar school row.
You speak the truth on PFI. I never tire of saying that Labour have fallen in love with large corporations, but are the exact opposite of economic liberals. They still believe in the state, not the market, and in effect want to make corporations a branch of the government.
We need to hammer home the economic liberal case against large corporations and the public sector in their bizarre, pernicious, troughing alliance.
We need to say that the low and middle earners will gain from liberalisation and that liberalisation is totally different from economically and socially illiterate nonsense like PFI, which is designed to enrich Brown’s mates.
I really do believe that many old-school leftists will come round to genuine liberalism. But is Cameron an economic liberal, or a class warrior?
I would never abolish the National Curriculum, but it is essential that schools are left to decide how to teach and also giving them flexibility in terms of what they offer could provide some welcome innovation anc competition between schools (which I personally think is the way forward).
PFI has crippled the public’s confidence in bringing the private and third sector into political decisions, but with any luck the private sector will be more effective in the Conservative proposals for welfare reform and prisoner rehabilitation – assuming that the system is designed properly, of course.
Yes, but for the system to be designed properly, Labour would have to actually understand how markets work, rather than combining a schoolgirl crush on big business with a continued belief in the need for state control and obsessive target-setting which is unrelated to any actual output.
That’ll be no then