Letter: Columnist should direct anger at politicians, not teachers
Tim Wasdell (Star Mail, August 17 – Hastilow ranting) is right. Nigel Hastilow continues his habit of presenting vague and prejudiced assertions as fact, and seems to delight in denigrating many of our dedicated, hard-working people.
His well-known intense dislike of the NHS and its amazing workforce (how many lives have you saved this week, Nigel?) is temporarily put aside to allow him to attack teachers – another profession brim full of real professionals, committed in their tens of thousands to provide the best for our children.
As teachers increasingly become overwhelmed with frequent changes to their curriculums and mountains of attendant paperwork, and class sizes creep back up to intolerable levels, perhaps there is more to concern us than the ridiculous notion that the return of grammar school is the answer.
One question for the 'return to grammar schools' lobby. What happens to the 80 per cent 'failures'? In my day, they went to sink schools, deprived of resources, to be prepared for a life of zero expectations.
If Hastilow is concerned about the state of our education system (and who isn't?), then let him turn his rhetoric on successive governments, who have used education for their own purposes.
He might even want to examine the growth of academy chains, run as commercial organisations by profit-oriented business people. For the record, some academies have succeeded, but some have failed – and some have even been the subject of criminal proceedings!
The fact is that academisation is not a research-led, well-piloted education initiative. It is a Tory tactic (strategy is too strong here) to weaken local authorities (those dangerous, democratically elected bodies, full of easily approached councillors) by taking schools out of local control. At this rate, local councils will only have bin-collection to concern them.
Let Hastilow turn his attention to so-called free schools, and let him ask why such institutions are often set up in areas where extra school places are not needed, and often dominated by pushy parents and business interests.
As a retired lecturer and father of a serving teacher, I take great exception to Hastilow's rantings. I have first-hand knowledge of the increasing pressures under which teachers work, and I am aware of the problem of teachers leaving the profession – or going to teach in countries where teachers are respected – in their thousands.
Get a grip, Mr Hastily, people will start to doubt everything you ever say, and that would be a shame.
David Askins, Telford
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