Educational lottery

The decision by Brighton and Hove council to contract out the allocation of school places to Camelot or the Tote has generated a great deal of debate but little clear thought. Rather predictably, the leader writer in the Indie and Martin Wainwright in the Guardian welcome the idea of running a lottery for places at certain schools. No elitism to be found in their pages.

As ever, the Indie leader writer finds logical thought a bit of a challenge. Here is what he or she has to say,

'But it is worth raising our sights above the local ramifications of this decision to consider what the effect would be if such an admissions system were to be rolled out nationally. Yes, lotteries round the country for over-subscribed schools might prompt a greater number of wealthier parents to send their children to private schools. Yet the prize is worth fighting for: a more equitable state school system after 60 years of endless reforms and tinkering that have only served to widen social divisions in Britain.'

So yet more children going to private schools would lessen social divisions would it? Well, choosing Indie leader writers by lottery may provide a little, much needed, logical analysis. It may also provide writers, who even if ignorant, at least bother to carry out the modicum of research required to get their facts right. The Guardian writer would also like to see allocation by lottery extended into other areas and gives examples of when it has been used. None of which have much bearing on education in England in the present day.

Let us start with a simple stark fact. All children are not born with equal intelligence or equal ability to apply the intelligence they do have, nor with equal dexterity. In fact the whole range of human attributes is subject to variability. We need an education system which can deal with this basic fact in a way which firstly benefits all children and secondly benefits society at large. Such a scheme was thought out during the days of WW2.

The 1944 Education Act was the brainchild of Rab Butler, a conservative politician. It called for a tripartite system of schools. Grammar schools, central or technical schools and secondary modern schools. Allocation of children to one school or another was on the basis of the 11+ exam.

The differentiation between them can be summarised roughly as follows. Grammar schools were designed to produce academically minded children who would be expected to go on to university. The central school was for those who would become technologists and engineers and the secondary modern schools took whoever was left and it was understood that these schools prepared children for apprenticeships in various trades.

It was accepted that there could be children who developed later than age 11 or that some may not thrive in an academic environment. There was therefore a system of re-assessment and inter-school transfer at age 13. Not all education authorities adopted this scheme. Many discarded the central or technical school, which left just grammar schools and secondary modern schools.

It should be remembered that this system was designed to be blind to any attribute other than the child's assessed ability in reading, writing, maths and an intelligence test. It mattered not a jot what the parents' income was, what the child's colour was, what the address was. If a child obtained 11+ results consistent with going to a grammar school he or she went to a grammar school. Results consistent with going to a technical school? The child would, or at least should, go to a technical school.

The major failing was with those local authorities who only had grammar schools and secondary modern schools. The limitation on grammar school, and complete lack of technical school, places meant that far too many children went to secondary modern schools, which then inevitably received a reputation for under-achievement, particularly from parents who may have expected their offspring to do better.

There was a further factor which impinged on school performance both then and now. Location, and specifically the propensity of left dominated local authorities, to build vast council estates during the 1950s and 60s. Inevitably secondary modern schools were built at the same time as part of the estate. This sowed the seeds for future problems

The tripartite system came under increasing attack from theoretical educationalists from the 1960s onwards. The accusation was that the grammar school/secondary modern school dichotomy was preserving and indeed promoting class divisions. The answer that was proposed, and subsequently implemented in many areas, was the comprehensive school. Children were to be forced into equality.

As comprehensive education was seen as the egalitarian holy grail by left wing authorities who were overwhelmingly located in metropolitan areas, the vast majority of children came to be educated in comprehensive schools. These selfsame authorities then lied to their residents. They broadcast the myth that all children would now receive the education that had previously been reserved for grammar school children.

The actuality was that children who should have been in grammar schools now received an education which was, to put it mildly, inappropriate. Horrified parents who had expected to see their children educated to the highest standards, who had looked forward to seeing young minds stretched in a quest for academic achievement, saw their beloved offspring treated to uninspiring, badly taught, undemanding lessons delivered by teachers who had become accustomed to accepting low academic achievement as the norm.

The answer for such parents was simple. They looked around to see where the best of the comprehensives were located. They were normally to be found in the middle class suburbs. Often they were schools which had previously been grammar schools. These same middle class suburbs were the targets also for speculative builders who built middle class housing for sale to owner occupiers.

These areas rapidly became magnets for any parents who were interested in the future achievement of their children. A solution not entirely overlooked by NuLabour politicians. Inevitably this has led to a heavy demand for places at certain schools. The situation has been reinforced by the survival of some grammar schools in what are predominately rural middle class areas. This is where we now find ourselves, and why there is a shortage of places in certain areas.

It is not plotting by sinister middle class elitists that has caused the problem, or some schools seeking to prolong selection by back door methods. It is a combination of the long term effects of socialist housing initiatives and socialist denial of the reality of human inequalities coupled with their hamfisted attempts to force equality upon all children, even if it is the equality of non-achievement.

The answer does not lie in lotteries for school places or any other harebrained scheme that the equality mongers may come up with. It lies in a recognition of the reality of humanity. It lies in a teaching profession who see their role as encouraging all children to reach the limits of their abilities, no matter if those abilities are academic, skilful dexterity, or a caring nature. It lies in a recognition that a well trained plumber is as useful, no, actually more useful, to society as a well trained NuLabour researcher with a degree in sociology from an ex-poly.

It actually matters very little whether this is brought about by selective schools or selective streaming within schools. The choice between the two should be made purely on the efficacy of delivering a suitable education to each individual child. The physical constraints of size and range of teaching subjects would probably mean that school selection along the lines of the tripartite system would be the easiest to implement. At least this would mean that children could have an education commensurate with their abilities and propensities, rather than their physical location or any other irrelevant extraneous factor.