Comments on Dr Rant: IPPR - thick cunts

IPPR is a New Labour bordello - I do wonder if Dav...

2008-05-05T19:53:00.000+01:00

IPPR is a New Labour bordello - I do wonder if David Pitt-Watson is still involved now he has run away from the General-Secretary job at New Labour Central Committee ?

I hate to be disloyal to my colleagues but there p...

2008-05-05T18:56:00.000+01:00

I hate to be disloyal to my colleagues but there probably are some genuine problems with quality of teachers. Not on large scale, probably not one in a hundred, but it really doesn't take many to cause a problem.

The trouble is the actual solution to the problem is to pay more and attract more, and more able, people in the first place. As it is schools have no choice to accept the substandard and are, if anything, lucky there aren't more of them.

Yes, amazing (through predictable) how managers ro...

2008-05-05T18:26:00.000+01:00

Yes, amazing (through predictable) how managers routinely prescribe "more management by more managers" - plus "more management activities" like appraisal - as the solution to any perceived difficulties (often only visible to the managers) in the professions.

We have been through all this in the Universities too - appraisals blah blah performance review blah blah compulsory Mickey Mouse "skills training" blah blah endless "visioning the future" meetings blah blah. All totally useless.

What University staff would like is - would you believe it - a decently funded system, less incessant dancing to Govt-inspired top-down diktats and basically to be left alone to get on with what we are there to do. All clearly too "Rocket Science"-y for the management consultants and thinktank wonks to appreciate.

Sadly, the only major response of the Univs - not unlike the medical establishment of Dr Rant's "Twatterati" - has been "if you can't beat 'em..". Hence when the Russell Group Univs decided they needed a frontperson they hired Wendy Piatt as "Director General" Piatt's key qualification for the job was that, unhandicapped by never actually having worked in a Univ, she had been an important Blairista education policy wonk, latterly in Tony B's office and previously at... the IPPR!

Trebles and large salaries all round, as Private Eye would say.

with all teachers required to observe four lessons...

2008-05-05T18:05:00.000+01:00

with all teachers required to observe four lessons by colleagues per term

oh for God's sake.

As if bloody Ofsted hadn't done enough harm already.

"Introducing a bursar for each school, to assist i...

2008-05-05T13:35:00.000+01:00

"Introducing a bursar for each school, to assist in day-to-day management, freeing up more of the head teacher’s time for issues such as staff management and inspirational leadership."

I expect the bursar will firstly be required to sort out who will pay his/her salary. I don't expect most schools have £40-50k hanging about to pay to get a decent bursar, probably need pay more. I wonder if the accountancy firms are behind this recommendation...?

Dicks.

Mrs Jobbing Doctor is a teacher and she says that ...

2008-05-05T13:22:00.000+01:00

Mrs Jobbing Doctor is a teacher and she says that this kind of stuff is fairly typical.

I want her to retire.

She won't because she says she owes it to the kids.

So she risks her health and temper to do a difficult job as well as she can.

For any professional politicians out there, this is what professionals do.

But to be professional, you have to do a good job. Not like the idiots in the departments of health, or education skills and families.

Morons.