Education, education, education....

Let's start with an anecdote. I was in the pub tonight. I often am. However, tonight, whilst there, my friend - let's call him N. - told me a tale. He was out last Friday, watching a pop concert (The Bluetones at Shepherds Bush Empire, if you're interested) with his friend - let's call him X. X.was in the mood for heavy drinking - he's a teacher, in a rather deprived school in East London, and which had just had its Ofsted inspection. The results had depressed him greatly. He was told by the inspectors that they didn't believe social background had any influence on SATs scores (I did ask N. at this point in the tale which planet the inspectors were from. "Planet Woodhead", was his response). The inspectors also weren't interested in "value added" results - the differences in scores between the students when they arrive, and after they'd been in the school for a year. No, they wanted the raw data. Unsurprisingly, the school did badly. It is being marked down for privatisation in Mr Tony's brave new world of education. X.'s wife is also a teacher, although in a rather more affluent school. She had a very pleasant experience with her inspectors - they took a much broader picture and gave the school good marks.
Question - how sinister is that? Failing schools in deprived areas for ideological reasons, whilst passing those in more affluent areas. And once again, we need to consider who's taking over these schools. Businessmen and faith-based groups, mostly. In other words, religious nutters. Let us recall Mr Tony's reaction when asked by Liberal Democrat MP Jenny Tonge for his opinion on Emmanuel College, Gateshead, and their teaching of Creationism: "In the end, a more diverse school system will deliver better results for our children". I may have written about this before, but it's important, so I'll ask again - how much fucking diversity can "our" children stand? Teaching flat-earth hypotheses would be diverse, wouldn't it? Teaching Holocaust denial would add to the diversity of the education children receive. Would Mr Tony applaud schools which taught that flavour of bullshit?
And let's not kid ourselves that religion is nice and fluffy. Last week, a Northern Irish DUP Councillor declared, seriously, that Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans because God wanted to punish the people there for their sin - evidenced by the fact that there was a Gay Pride parade due to take place the week after the hurricane hit. Are these the sort of people that Mr Tony wants passing their poisonous bigotries on to children, in the guise of some half-witted superstition? Or would he prefer suicide bombers, people who blow up abortion clinics or any of the other multitude of murderous theists out there? Who's going to regulate these schools? Not you or me, because they've been taken out of democratic control. So, erm, no one, then. Complete freedom to tell whatever lies you like. Marvellous. That, ultimately, is what "education, education, education" seems to mean.