What do we want from our elected politicians and their government officials? In previous posts this week we’ve considered the views of several educationalists on how our system needs to change and how politicians need to act in order to improve and indeed reinvent our system of education.
In this post we’re re-blogging a post written by Debra Kidd (Love Learning – Campaigning for Education) that describes what happened recently when a group of ‘progressive’ and ‘child-centred’ educationalists actually met with a senior politician and a group of her officials at the Department for Education.
We’re very thankful that Debra and her fellow bloggers and tweeters were able to articulate views that set out a vision of how education needs to change in England. Perhaps Tristram Hunt will now invite this same group for detailed discussions on One Nation Labour’s future policies for schools and for education in general. Unlike Liz Truss he could even give them his full undivided attention with no interruptions, no distractions and no SPADs whispering in his ear.
I wasn’t quite sure why I got an invitation to consult/consort with civil servants and a minister at the DfE yesterday, but when the email came through, I booked my train tickets as fast as my fingers could type in my debit card details. It’s not a chance you get every day and I was intrigued to know whether or not these latest interactions with the teacher twitterati were PR stunts or genuine attempts to engage. I came away feeling that they were/are really genuine attempts to engage and that there is real potential for every day classroom teachers to be taking part in a process that could lead to improvements in the system. I also left feeling that I wish these conversations had taken place a few years ago and not as we face the implementation of monumental changes this September.
On arrival, we were introduced to three civil…
View original post 2,006 more words
