{"id":2665,"date":"2012-11-04T09:49:08","date_gmt":"2012-11-04T09:49:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/?p=2665"},"modified":"2012-11-04T09:49:08","modified_gmt":"2012-11-04T09:49:08","slug":"more-lunch-than-launch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/2012\/11\/04\/more-lunch-than-launch\/","title":{"rendered":"More lunch than launch"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

To parliament the other day, for the launch (over a good lunch) of a report by the Aldersgate Group, who say they are \u201cleaders for a sustainable economy\u201d.\u00a0 The report is:\u00a0Skills for a New Economy: a paradigm shift in education and learning to ensure future economic success<\/em>.\u00a0 [Note 1<\/strong><\/em>]<\/p>\n

The image on the front of the report is a series of cogs, none of which interlock, which seems a good enough visual metaphor for the present set up.\u00a0 The report itself is very attractive, with cute artwork.\u00a0 But it\u2019s written in small print, with piles of even smaller footnotes, all set out in restfully harmonising tones of mid-brown and pale blue. \u00a0The result is not easy to read. \u00a0This is quite a triumph for an outfit that goes on a lot about skills.<\/p>\n

I wish I could say that the substance of the discussion on the day and the contents of the report make up for all this. \u00a0Sadly, they don\u2019t.\u00a0 One example from the report will serve to make the point.\u00a0 This is the curious case of higher education (HE). \u00a0I cannot understand why HE doesn\u2019t feature in the section of the report on\u00a0Coherence<\/em> (pps. 18\/19) which has foci on 3 \u201cdifferent actors and age groups\u201d:\u00a0pre-19, FE, <\/em>and business. <\/em>This seems an extraordinary lacuna.\u00a0 What became of \u201cwhole system design\u201d, I wonder.\u00a0 HE doesn\u2019t feature in the\u00a0Proficiency<\/em> section (pps. 20\/21) of the report either.\u00a0 Should I conclude, as far as the skills agenda is concerned, that all\u2019s well with HE, or that it\u2019s deemed irrelevant?\u00a0 It looks very odd, and not worth much as an argument.<\/p>\n

I read a lot of papers \/ reports like this as ESD folk are fond of pulling them together; they all usually have two things in common: [i] they are a wish list of what tomorrow's schools are going to be like; and [ii] they say little about how to get there from where we are at the present. \u00a0This is because they are mostly about educational idea(l)s rather than the messy business of actually running a school and thinking about curriculum and pedagogy now<\/em>.\u00a0 This is not to say that I disagree with much of what's in here; rather, its just useless as a strategic <\/span>document.<\/p>\n

I thought for one moment during the discussions on the day that something useful might be emerging; something along the lines of seeing formal education, training and workplace (and community-based) learning as a continuum with both coherence and progression.\u00a0 In this view, perhaps, primary schools would aaa, lower secondary schools,\u00a0bbb<\/em>, and the 14 to 19 range\u00a0ccc<\/em> (and probably\u00a0ddd<\/em>).\u00a0 FE and its sister, HE, would then\u00a0eee <\/em>and fff<\/em>, leading seamlessly to\u00a0ggg<\/em> (and maybe\u00a0hhh<\/em>) which occurs in the workplace and in life more extendedly.<\/p>\n

\n

aaa<\/em>, for example, would be something around socialisation, basic skills, and a love of, and facility for, learning as a means to social \/ personal fulfilment and economic activity, and a foundation for everything that comes afterwards.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

But it was not to be.\u00a0 We had some who said MBAs were the key; others rooted for primary schools.\u00a0 Oddly, there\u2019s no trace of the report on the Group\u2019s\u00a0website<\/a>. \u00a0Maybe they are as disappointed as I am.<\/p>\n

Note 1 \u2013 <\/em><\/strong>Goering is widely misquoted as the originator of: \u201cWhenever I hear \u2018culture\u2019, I remove the safety from my Browning<\/em>\u201d.\u00a0 Actually what he said was \u201cWhen I hear \u2018paradigm<\/em>\u2019 \u2026\u201d.\u00a0 I feel much the same, except I reach for Housman.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To parliament the other day, for the launch (over a good lunch) of a report by the Aldersgate Group, who say they are \u201cleaders for a sustainable economy\u201d.\u00a0 The report is:\u00a0Skills for a New Economy: a paradigm shift in education...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":237,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2,3,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2665","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comment","category-new-publications","category-news-and-updates"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2665","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/237"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2665"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2665\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2665"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2665"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2665"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}