The Principal of Cheltenham’s Ladies’ College vs David McWilliams: guess which one knows what s/he’s talking about?

 

 

 

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Picture by chloeimages

 

 

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Picture by NICVA

 

Writing a  non-political blog like this one is a sure turn-off for many people, but in the last two days  I’ve encountered two contrasting views on education and I think they’re worth examining.

The first was  in an article yesterday when I was reviewing the papers (light stuff) for Kim Lenihan on BBC Raidio Uladh/Radio Ulster. It was an item reported in several of Saturday’s papers: Eve Jardine-Young, the new principal of  the  162-year-old Cheltenham Ladies’ College is thinking of  abolishing the ‘Victorian’ practice of pupil homework. She is also arranging for pupils to have more time  to move between classes,  and she either has inserted or will be inserting a yoga class into the girls’ curriculum. This, mark you, is a school where 92% of the pupils get either A* or A in their GCSEs – and  which you’d need a bob or two to attend.  The reason for these new moves, according to the new principal, is so that the pupils will  have an education that is fulfilling rather than just grades-chasing, one that equips them for  life as rounded adults. Some of the other  posh private schools in England have poo-poohed the idea, arguing that a bit of stress never hurt anyone and you need to learn to cope with it as early as possible.

The second educational item popped up on Marian Finucane’s show on  RTÉ Radio One this morning.  They had David McWilliams on and he was giving out about the south’s educational system which, he said, was using nineteenth-century approaches with pupils who’d have to live in a twenty-first century world. He was particularly concerned, as far as I could make out, with the idea of young people in the C-grade category, who’d be far better off getting into  apprenticeships rather than wasting their time trying to get a university degree.

Who’s on the right track?  Surprisingly, the new principal of Cheltenham Ladies’ College.  Parents want their children to be stretched academically, true, but they want their children to grow into  happy and rounded adults even more.  And that’s what the top woman at Cheltenham’s Ladies’ College  appears to be intent on delivering.

David McWilliams, in contrast, appears to think that what is not useful is a waste of time.: why have these young C – level people taking a university degree that’ll fail to equip them for a job? Well David, like you I’m all for helping people get jobs; but anyone who thinks that the job of a university is to prepare people for work-slots clearly doesn’t know what a university is for. Three or four years at university allows young people to follow interests they didn’t know existed; to learn from their peers about life, to learn from their lecturers about the wonder and beauty and problems  that constitute life. Studying the poetry of Keats or the music of Beethoven may not equip you for a salaried post, but then that’s not what it’s for. University is about widening your vision of life, about increasing your sensitivity to it, about helping you marvel at the miracle of being human. No, David, it may not get you a job as an electrician or a joiner or a plumber. But I’m damned if I see why it should be confined to people who manage to squeeze out the top grades.

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24 Responses to The Principal of Cheltenham’s Ladies’ College vs David McWilliams: guess which one knows what s/he’s talking about?

  1. Sherdy June 7, 2015 at 6:30 pm #

    Jude, there are arguments for and against the theories of the educationist and the monetarist which might be difficult to prove definitively either way.
    But if we look to some of our local politicians as an example, I don’t know of any university educated Sinn Fein MLAs (except maybe at Long Kesh uni.
    SDLP have a few uni educated and the DUP boast of the odd Oxbridge graduate.
    Can you honestly say our local grads are of greater intellect or are educationally more rounded or open minded, enlightened individual?
    Over to you, Jude!

    • Jude Collins June 7, 2015 at 6:49 pm #

      Good points, Sherdy. But I’m not saying there aren’t people who are learning-proof who go to university. Alas, I’ve taught such in my time. But university if it’s working properly should be making that a possibility, a gift to be availed of or ignored. I can think of one or two of our politicians who’ve clearly ignored…

      • Am Ghobsmacht June 7, 2015 at 10:20 pm #

        Indeed, I believe the DUP top brass have quite the impressive academic CV. But…

  2. neill June 7, 2015 at 6:57 pm #

    I have no problems about people wanting to go to University in fact I thinks its brilliant however I have one or two issues I would like to discuss.

    Is it right that students leave university with massive debts which will affect their ability to buy their first home?

    Are universities producing the right sort of people for business?

    Do universities offer to many subjects?

    My preference is University for vocational courses and apprenticeships for business and skilled labour jobs

    • Jude Collins June 7, 2015 at 8:51 pm #

      That makes universities jobs factories. I fundamentally disagree.

    • Sherdy June 7, 2015 at 9:24 pm #

      Careful, Neill, your concern for students being lumbered with massive debts for years would indicate that you have a social conscience.
      You daren’t follow that – you could wind up supporting the Sinn Fein budget stance!

      • neill June 8, 2015 at 9:51 am #

        Sherdy I am now officially worried!

  3. neill June 7, 2015 at 6:59 pm #

    You should do more blogs like this and more cultural ones would be appreciated by many on this blog

    • Jude Collins June 7, 2015 at 8:50 pm #

      I’ll take that as a comp…No, hold on.It’s a cleverly disguised insult! You swine, neill

      • neill June 7, 2015 at 9:38 pm #

        I always thought it was unionists that were supposed to be paranoid!

  4. RJC June 7, 2015 at 7:23 pm #

    Spot on. This whole notion that academic institutions must simply churn out people who have some value to the market is a load of old balls. There is far more to life than following the whims of the markets, and you can be damn sure that the market doesn’t care a jot about you.

    I like a lot of what McWilliams has to say, but he is an economist so by definition a dismal fellow. He should take some inspiration from his namesake and learn to let his freak flag fly!

    • IrelandSaoirse June 7, 2015 at 9:51 pm #

      Jasus don’t mention flegs or you’ll be upsetting Neill !!

  5. Iolar June 7, 2015 at 7:44 pm #

    Salubrito et Eruditio

    I say old chap this is simply not cricket. Let us get back to our principles. Good God man, we are discussing Cheltenham, home of the racecourse, the cricket festival, the Croquet Association, The National Hunt and GCHQ. Anyone who reads the Daily Telegraph knows that Cheltenham is the best place in the world to raise a family. Now let us get on with running the country, where were we, yes, the cuts…Health and Education…, Tally- Ho.

  6. Am Ghobsmacht June 7, 2015 at 10:06 pm #

    Dr C

    I find myself in a right old warp as I agree and disagree and agree again.

    I hate the idea of universities becoming job factories (as you highlighted), you triggered a recollection of PJ O’Rourke commenting on how the British civil service in India comprised of only a few thousand people all of whom learned things like Latin, Greek (NOT Punjabi or Hindi) and other arty topics rather than vocational topics.

    I do think (sometimes) that it’s better to usher people down the path of their capabilities rather than dreams BUT at the same time that’s immensely hypocritical as going to university was the best thing I ever did and it’s appalling for me to discourage people from doing the same (and I’m a C grader, I think I had the worst GCSE’s out of all my university contemporaries).

    However, I’ve noticed quite the change in university life and it seems to me to be very “service orientated” as opposed to being a life changing experience.
    E.g I did a post grad 4 years ago and loved it (Arts and Social Science people, you don’t know you’re living!!) but I think it was the last bastion of independent thought etc as the budgetary axe was scalping just after I left and that department took most of the blows as the degrees and diplomas were deemed ‘less practical’ than vocational degrees such as engineering.

    I can honestly say that one academic year of Arts and social sciences in my thirties had as much impact on my life as 5 years of engineering studies in my teens and twenties.

    I would encourage people to take up apprenticeships rather than degrees IF they meet certain criteria but I’ve met borderline genius people who just can’t/couldn’t hack university life and likewise not so smart people who blitz degrees and are otherwise completely ‘handless’*.

    I think yer mawn just got his categorising criteria wrong, it’s not just about grades, there’s much to consider.

    I know I’ve probably contradicted myself about 10 times but it’s a rather broad and deep topic and an excellent one at that.

    Bravo.

    *Ulsterism of the week I think, thank you very much….

  7. Perkin Warbeck June 8, 2015 at 6:34 am #

    One tuned in, Esteemed Blogmeister, to the Well-made up Marian Finucane Show but lacked both the will and durability to stick with it till the bitter-orange end. And so missed listening in to the David McWilliams / Principal of Cheltenham Gels College item you refer to.

    The irony here of course is that Cheltenham is the Listening In Capital of the, erm, British Isles of the Wild Atlantic Way.

    The reason why one had the show turned on in the first place is because it is a de rigeur part of one’s radio-listening ritual with Sunday Morning Coming Down. Perkie’s inner masochist-going self-flagellator is nothing if not a creature of sack-cloth and habit.

    While the best one can say of David McWilliams is that he far from being the worst of the Blattering Classes in the Free Southern Stateen nonetheless as soon as it became obvious that yesterday’s show was to be primarily about taking the benign view of the Bootyful Game, one quickly reached for one’s wireless-shaped knob.

    The thought that John ‘Explainey Away’ Delaney was but to be Yellow Carded at worst even as he stumbled yet again for the closet where he fumbled for his cleanest dirty Charvet was a step too far for the normally placid and tolerant Perk. One feared one might at any moment be compelled to endure Delaney’s green-tied Paddy-fuelled murdering of the Ballad of Joe McDonnell.

    Or, if anything, even worse: the imagined spectacle of footie-fan Dame Dosh Finucane in the studio stretching her lengthy arms out wide and fluttering her ring-encrusted fingers on arrival at the crucial line of ‘The Feel Goods of Athenry’:

    -Where once we watched the free birds fly.

    You know, the way females d’un certain age with a few on board tend to do.(Come back, Alice, sez Perkie. Where the eff is Alice?’)

    Suddenly finding himself with unexpected time on his idle hands, the Shedivil Herself tempted Perkie;s inner poetaster to indulgeionce again in a little Limerick gimmickery. So, putting biro to Basildon Bond:

    Septticaemia

    Sepp’s sniggers made us Irish feel like the N-word
    Especially when he jeered at us as ‘Le Dirty Turd’
    With, Le Back-hand du Thierry
    J. ‘Delay’ turned teary to cheery
    Curtains up time, fans, in this Theatre of the Absurd.

    A little historical context might not go amiss here: while youse up there in Norneverland, Esteemed Blogmeister, were enduring your own Long Night of the Soul a generation ago, we too down here in the FSS were not without own particular troubles.

    Only difference being ours was The Long Ball of the Gool (which is how our new national hero from Norhumberland pronounced his second biggest Goal). Well, there is another difference, actually.

    Unlike youse, to our cost, we have never had our Good Friday Agreement which might have put a lid of sorts on our versh of the Id v Ego contest. Sadly this means, our Ongoing Troubles are just that; and liable to break out at any Given time. Our Ole Ole Olecaust is, alas, always with us.

    Take, yesterday, oddly enough, as an example.

    When there was an even more joyous outbreak of Eejitry in the Aviva (nee Lansdowne Road) than that which erupted there twenty years ago. On that occasion, bucket seats of Sheffield steel made were calmly unscrewed by restrained English fans and cheerfully tossed in a carefree manner from the upper deck of the East Stand onto the heads of those lucky enough to be down below.

    Or maybe it was from the upper deck of the West British Stand.

    Yesterday, even more lethal projectiles were hurled in the debt-dealing shape of base, fawn-coloured spaniel-sounding yelps.

    This time from the Thierry-teary throats of those sycophantic sickos, the adoring fans of the English B team – down on to the becapped head of the Citizen Charlatan heself below who took time out from local pub, lad to Come Over. And to come on over as the original avuncular Uncle Jack.

    The cap (of reinforced Sheffield steel made) was in keeping with a cherished tradish first introduced by one Stanley Mathews in his day. On a visit to Dublin on one occasion he replied to a request from a local journo for an interview:

    -How much tin ya got for me, lad?

    Even as he skillfully proferred his cap (of Cotswold cloth made) in the face to face of the local journo.

    (It will be interesting to see what tidy sum will be entered under T for Tin in the next abject annual returns of the FAI-lure).

    This latest Mario Lanza-like extravagaza of Eejitry was followed, one understands, by a Scoreless Epic, the second such at the same venue in the space of four days. Four teams: no goals. Oh, the sheer excitement of it all .

    The first game (again, one understands) was a game of two wee MON-managed teams from opposite sides of the Black Sow’s Dyke. At which one MON (i.e the better funded one, the DOB-sponsored MON) was heard to sing the agreed national antrim of the occasion, the, (gulp) Charlie Rich classic: ‘Behind Closed Doors’.

    My DOBy makes me proud
    Lord, don’t he make me proud;
    He never makes a scene
    By hanging all over me in a crowd.

    Should Marty Rich (for it was he !) choose to reinvent himself (after the FSSexit from the Euros) as a Country and West Brit Crooner it is possible he will be the first poppy-wearing, poppy-cock spouting BL with an OBE and an MBE in his kit bag / guitar case from Kilrea, County Londonderry to do so.

    So, he will.

    Alas, Perkie missed all the cardiac threathening delirium of the craven in the Aviva, having (on Doctor’s orders) switched from the radio to the telly. Where a soporific game of bogball was being shown, from the Blanketland Stadium in the vicinity of the Bogside.

    After which snooze-in the following Luimneach as leiprechaun oozed out. Hopefully, it will curry favour with the yogurt-flavoured Gregory Crooked-mouth whose fabulous physog Perkie could have sworn he spotified on the t for terraces. Disguised only with a, erm, Oak-leaf.

    Da olcas e An Dun v Doire, duirt Spillo
    Fos, is fearr e na an Aviva lena: Nill-o
    Laighean no Uladh?
    NNNeal no codladh?
    An rogha idir an phuid agus an pillow.

    Personally, Perkie’s inner poetaster blames his, erm, tutor in English Literature at t.-rex level educaiton. Whose tutoring prepared him for nothing more in later (than we think) life than Jobs (see under Steve) as a, keyboard warrior and/or blogtrotter.

  8. George June 8, 2015 at 9:25 am #

    Jude, I half expected that blog to be accompanied by Michael Jackson’s “We are the World”, so romanticised is your view of the purpose of going to University. You seem to think that, at the end of their studies, groups of enlightened and rounded young adults will wander our streets quoting Keats and that the individual, not to mention “Society”, will be infinitely the better for the experience.

    A nice thought but this Utopia does not exist and never has. Students go to Uni to get away from their pushy controlling parents for a bit after their A levels but they are not quite ready to grow up proper so they go on the piss for 3 years before finding out that all the employers think they are a useless waste of space. So, to get over the shock of realising they are not quite as wonderful as they think they are, they go on a “gap year” because they can’t get a job and because, wait for it, they are still not ready to grow up.

    Anyway, “the study of Keats and Beethoven” – that’s a hobby, is it not (wink!) and forty grand is a helluva price to pay for a hobby.

    Going back to the original point of what (I think) your blog was about, I actually think that the statements from the Principal of CLC and those of David McWilliams are not differing views of education at all because I agree with both of them.

    I agree with The Principal that homework should be abolished. It is a load of nonsense. It consigns thousands of kids to nights of misery when they should be outside on their bikes and it teaches them nothing. It is set by mindless teachers in mindless fashion just to tick it off a list of things a teacher needs to do without there ever being any review of its effectiveness.

    And I agree with David McWilliams. Uni should not be the “solution” for everyone. I detect a general mood that more and more kids are coming to that conclusion too. However, I think that we need to create a culture of ensuring that those who follow the route of the apprentice are given equal “status” in our society, as is the case in Germany. The young person who goes into an apprenticeship in Germany is thought of no less than those who go to Uni.

    UK graduates have been wrongly inculcated with the belief that they are superior (however you wish to define that term) to those without a degree. But they are not in so, so, many ways. I generalise.

    • Jude Collins June 8, 2015 at 10:27 am #

      George – once more thanks for a very interesting post, three-quarters of which I disagree with…

      I’m not saying that attendance at university will automatically result in all the desirable outcomes that I’ve listed. I’m saying that’s what a university is for; whether students avail of it is up to them. The study of Keats/Beethoven could be a hobby but it is part of a course of study at most self-respecting universities and can add enormously to the cultural life of a student. The £40K is another issue entirely – what university costs now is of course a bloody scandal, but I’m talking as I’ve said about the purpose of a university, not its cost. I agree with you (obviously) re most homework. However, I think the question of ‘status’ is a red herring. Everyone – from the street-sweeper to the brain surgeon – is deserving of equal status in the eyes of society. That’s why each gets a single vote at elections. And yes, Germany and some other countries do much better at it than our own, north and south. Of course graduates are not ‘superior’ to non-graduates; but they have been given a chance to think about life, walk through doors or even peep past doors that are denied to those who don’t get to university. The trouble with apprentice-ships is that they focus exclusively on the job, not the person (so does medical training, btw); a university course should focus on the person.

      • George June 8, 2015 at 11:47 am #

        It would be boring if you agreed with more than half of what I say Jude so let’s keep it around the quarter mark – I would start to get suspicious otherwise.

        I went to Uni and obtained a big fancy degree. My wife left school at the age of 16 and went on to become an international training manager for an American airline in Chicago – a very fancy job indeed. So the subject of Uni vs School of Life causes much friendly banter in our house.

        Actually, some of it is not that friendly, thinking about it –

        She – “can you put that shelf up – I’ve been asking you for weeks”

        Me – “can’t we a get a joiner in to do that – at least it would be straight”

        She – “oh never mind – I’ll do it myself – where’s the bloody drill”

        However, although I would never admit it to her, (especially at the height of such a debate) I do agree with her central premise. And it is this – graduates are not much use to man nor beast. I secretly know this in my heart of hearts because I interview many of them.

        She illustrates her point anecdotally. When she was 18 she did a season as a camp courier for a well-known UK campsite operator in France. The other couriers were invariably graduates who came out for a doss in the sun for a few months and, no doubt, expand those planetary-sized brains even further.

        Demonstrating a strong work ethic and organisational skills, she was appointed campsite manager. The “grads” couldn’t put up tents, didn’t know what to do when it rained, didn’t want to get their hands dirty cleaning out tents at the end of a stay, were always pissed and couldn’t converse with the locals to obtain the most basic of needs. I mean – who doesn’t know the French word for “milk” for flip sake? “Work-shy lazy useless bar stewards” she called them.

        Now call me old-fashioned but I know that if I was going off to France to a tent for my holidays, the kind of person that I would want looking after me when I arrived isn’t the one that I can discuss Descartes with. The person who has had chance to “think about life, walk through doors and even peep past doors” can’t put yer tent up Jude (or a straight shelf for that matter). Call that a euphemism for their (my) practical abilities generally.

        I do agree with you that “everyone – from the street-sweeper to the brain surgeon – is deserving of equal status in the eyes of society” and I really do sincerely mean that on behalf of my lorry driver dad and tea lady mum. But it shall never be thus.

        When you make the statements that you have made about the purpose of a University, implicit in that statement in the “eyes of society” is that those who go there are somehow exploring a more intellectually lofty path. That, in turn, inadvertently implies that it is a “superior” path to those who don’t have the opportunity of taking that path too.

        Ergo, the street sweeper and the brain surgeon will never be equal in the “eyes of society” which, I’m sure, is a contrary outcome to your sincerely held wish.

        Now where’s my drill?

        • Jude Collins June 8, 2015 at 12:24 pm #

          George – I had a detailed and wise and wonderfully witty response written to your latest post but I appear to have lost it in the ether somewhere and I’m damned if I’ll go searching for it. I blame my education…

          • George June 8, 2015 at 12:27 pm #

            You’ve never worked on a campsite in France by any chance?

          • Jude Collins June 8, 2015 at 12:34 pm #

            Been there and worked at keeping my children from wandering onto roads, drowning, beating up other children, getting sick on passing strangers…

  9. Colmán June 8, 2015 at 5:03 pm #

    David being a case in point. He studied Economics in TCD and is now a Journalist!

  10. Mary Jo June 8, 2015 at 5:56 pm #

    I’m old fashioned enough to think the purpose of education is to teach young people to be the best they can be. There should be a rounded general education up to age 18 that includes the humanities, sciences, mathematics, sport and health education. It should also include manual skills, whether knitting or hands on engineering. Further general education or broadening of the mind and body by travel, sport and community service would allow young people to make maturer choices about their future.

    At about 20 years old, the narrowing of education to mere training in job skills could kick in, bearing in mind that training is training, not education, whether the chosen career is doctor, lawyer or waitress. Naturally the entire exercise, both education and training, should be state funded with, perhaps, the support of businesses requiring narrowly specialised skills. Businesses should be willing to sponsor and support trainees in all fields of work, not just trade and mechanical apprentices.

    If businesses require specific skills, they should pay for them. What arrogance we hear from them today with their assumption that they may dictate the content of courses that students are paying for with their own indebtedness?

    • Jude Collins June 8, 2015 at 6:09 pm #

      Brilliant as ever, Maryjo – welcome back with your wisdom…