The future of education

Peggy Robertson

"The little blurb for the show states, "How can the science of learning help us rethink the future of education for all children?" Nothing alluding to emotion at this point. Of course there’s a big focus on ALL children – and science, my friends, will get us there."

"It begins with the usual suspects, Linda Darling-Hammond busts out first with a statement about inequality being our Achilles heel. She’s followed by Kahn who wants us to have an "equal shot regardless where we are born."
"It all sounds great. Really feel good stuff. And then it gets moving. The narrator wants us to discover how science can give all children this so-called equal shot – not food, not shelter, not equal access to books, democratic classrooms, libraries, fine arts – nope, science will get us there."

"The next message goes like this – don’t ask kids to beat the odds, use science to change the odds. "

"They follow up with a pretty strong statement. They state: Our brains aren’t wired to learn to read."

"Stephen Krashen states, `There is a lot of evidence that shows that reading is natural. We learn to read the same way we acquire language, by understanding messages. Also, in print-rich societies, everybody with access to print learns how to read, unless there are serious neurological or psychological problems`."

"So, based on what Dr. Krashen is saying, equal access to books, librarians and libraries might solve this problem, huh?"

"Yet, nope. No need for that. Because we have SCIENCE. And……..there are ways to change the brains of children in order to level the playing field."
"Really???!!!! Who knew that scientists could-should-and-would manipulate the brains of children – but okay – BRING it NOVA. Oh they do. Just wait."

"They soften us up by talking about the perils of poverty. They do seem very concerned and compassionate. So concerned that they want to figure out a way to help children not be distracted by the stresses and distractions which come with poverty, such as violence, hunger, lack of shelter, fatigue – all those distractions that make it difficult to learn. They decide that science, and specifically looking at and altering the way the brain works, will solve this problem."

"So – in a nut shell, they have no plans to protect children from poverty, they intend to keep making money off children in poverty, and they will alter their behaviors and emotions to make sure they can make even more money – all the while, keeping these kids in check, under control and compliant – AND they are going to make them LIKE IT…or at least appear as though they do. Got that?"

"Just in case you don’t, they have examples of how they plan to do it."
"For starters, they show a little boy wearing headphones listening to a story during which they interject a second story on another speaker, making it difficult to focus on the first story. Next, they emit random noises from an additional third source. Meanwhile, the child’s head is all wired up as they watch his brainwaves. They want to see if the child can focus on the first story with all these distractions! You know, kind of like gun shots outside your window might be a distraction from doing your homework, while you stand in eye’s view of the window, cooking dinner for your younger siblings? No worries – these kids are going to learn how to deal."

"They have another young child in a Head Start preschool where she is asked to play `Dr. Distraction` – where she walks along a strand of yarn while not dropping a plastic frog held on a spoon, all the time children on either side banging sticks to distract her. Sounds like a relaxing day in preschool doesn’t it? The goal is to strengthen the `architecture of the brain.` Everyone applauds her when she is done."
 
http://bustedpencils.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/GEF-CA.png

YoungMinds another charity

 Speaking about the HeadStart programme recently Sarah Brennan, CEO of YoungMinds had this to say:  

   “It is desperately sad that in an average classroom, 10 children will have witnessed their parents separate, one will have experienced the death of a parent, and seven will have been bullied and yet there is no single approach to supporting all our children at this key stage in their development. This is why YoungMinds are delighted to support the Big Lottery Fund’s HeadStart investment that looks to support the emotional resilience of all participating 10 to 14 year olds and provide targeted early intervention for those children who need more help at this key time in their lives.”

Again, we have to remind ourselves that the HeadStart targeted early intervention she is delighted to support has never been tested. Neither can she quote any studies which show that a single approach could possibly support all children at a key stage in their development. Common sense tells us that is nonsense. 

 

So who are YoungMinds who can give this kind of endorsement to HeadStart? This is what YoungMinds have to say about themselves:  

YoungMinds is the UK’s leading charity committed to improving the emotional wellbeing and mental health of children and young people. Driven by their experiences we campaign, research and influence policy and practice.

Like many charities these days YoungMinds believes it has the right to set itself up and then become an influence on Government policy and practice.  
 
On their website we are invited to meet the team. It is surprising how many of the team have been involved in charities and management services. They boast that they are uniquely informed about the mental health and well-being service and support needs of young people because they draw on a wide range of expertise. But are they able to evaluate the information they are drawing in, and then become so expert they are justified in influencing policy and practice?  I would doubt that. 

Sarah Brennan, Chief Executive Officer [below] gained an MSc in Voluntary Sector Organisation in 1990 and has bounced from one charity to another.

 

Lucie Russell, Director of Campaigns and media started The Big Issue`s charity, The Big Issue Foundation in 1995. She promotes YoungMinds through the media and is currently leading on the development of a new YoungMinds website on mental health medication for young people... [From the homeless, to medicines?] 

Christopher Walker, director of fundraising has worked as a fundraiser for children and young people`s charities in the United Kingdom and United States since 1997.

Lysanne Wilsonn, Director of Operations, qualified as a physiotherapist, specialising in paediatrics, having started her career as a linguist and worked as an English teacher with VSO in Kenya. She then moved into health management to be able to better influence the way services were designed and delivered  [my emphasis] to meet the real needs of patients, working in both the developing world and London. 

Daphne Joseph, Parents` Helpline Manager, has worked for YoungMinds since March 2001. She began as a helpline adviser, was promoted to senior helpline adviser in 2003, and has managed the helpline since 2006. Daphne had a 14 year career in international banking, before returning to education and gaining a BA Hons in Psychosocial Studies with Professional Studies from the University of London, and a Diploma in Counselling & Psychotherapy. ..

Laurie oliv A, youth engagement manager, prior to moving into mental health,  led the development of the national youth engagement programme at Stonewall, the lesbian, gay and bisexual charity- working with thousands of young people across England through campaigning and leadership programmes.  

Cryss Mennaceur, HR manager, joined YoungMinds as HR and Office Manager in June 2013. Cryss has been an HR professional for 18 years. Much of this was spent as a learning and organisational development specialist in both the public and voluntary sectors. More recently Cryss has worked in a broader range of HR roles in the voluntary sector in young people and family orientated charities. 

Matthew Daniel, Training and Consultancy Manager, was appointed as the training and consultancy manager at YoungMinds in September 2013 and has previously worked for the charity leading the participation and engagement training team for the VIK project. He has worked extensively with children, young people and families as a Citizenship Teacher, Connexions Personal Advisor and Youth Worker and he is passionate about working with young people, professionals services to give them the skills they need to facilitate positive change.

Richard Moore, Project Manager, BOND, managed mental health services in the NHS for 10 years before moving into independent consultancy.  

Chris Leaman, Media and Public Affairs Officer, previously worked for a Member of Parliament as their Press and Campaigns Officer and then became responsible for running political campaigns across London.

According to LinkedIn, Chris Leaman was campaigns officer for the LibDems. So no conflict of interests there!

One of the main projects carried out by YoungMinds is a helpline for parents staffed by volunteers. Like the NSPCC Childline, also staffed by volunteers, it is the management team who have the big salaries whilst the frontline staff work for nothing. Charities these days are given `stakeholder` status and have the right to consult with Governments who then make financial contributions to the charities. This is taxpayers` money being sucked into a mangement class who undermine democracy. It is called Big Society.

On the Adam Smith Institute blog, Tim Worstall has highlighted fakecharities.org and invited everyone to join in with the submission of charities.

I think we all know about one type of fake charity? The ones where almost every penny raised goes on either paying for those who run the charity or into more fundraising to, err, pay those who run the charity? Allow me to introduce you to a new form of fake charity, one that has risen rather large in our political discourse in recent years. 

My own eye opener came when I was pointed to the accounts of Friends of the Earth Europe. Some 50% of their money comes from the European Union. That in itself isn’t too appalling, but FoE Europe’s work is to lobby the European Union. You can imagine how this might go then…the taxpayer gets gouged so that a lobby group can be seen to be urging a course of action upon those who have gouged the taxpayer in order to be lobbied. Lobbied to do something that they already wanted to do but need some public lobbying to provide the fig leaf perhaps.

This is not though an isolated incident. Via the excellent and very new fakecharities.org we find that many of those "charities" which appear in our national media are in fact little better than such State funded lobbying organisations. Taxes are taken from us so that the government can pay for the government to be lobbied, providing that fig leaf of a vocal campaign telling them (and us, more importantly) that what they’ve already decided to do is obviously a jolly good idea indeed. 

Engage for Education, Strategy in Scotland 31 May 2013

Referring to the article below, full of management speak and spin, the approach to early years which Naomi Eisenstadt from Sure Start warmly welcomes is the collaborative approach which invariably involves incremental improvements on the small scale, tested and shared amongst participants. She does say that a collaborative is a promising methodology for ensuring a shared vision. It`s the SHARED VISION that is the important part. There`s still some resistance to this idea in England.

But who is to do the collaborating? It is the key players in the system who will all be collaborating together to arrive at the shared vision which those who set up the collaborative are after; the aim is that it will be supported and owned by all levels of the system.  In other words by the time those who are driving the changes have finished no-one will be quite sure how it happened. We know that Community Planning Partnerships involve the police, social services, health and education. The move towards Police Scotland and the break up of the separate police forces is in the same direction: integration and centralised planning.

This is LIKELY to result in improvements in early years services, we are assured by Naomi Eisenstadt.  No guarantee of course, because there are problems with what to measure, knowing what makes a difference, and over-bureaucratic recording systems. By the looks of things the shared vision is also likely to demonise parents and grandparents.

Naomi Eisenstadt asserts that it is parents who are responsible for getting into poverty and so must get the skills and jobs to get out of poverty. Never mind that there are not enough jobs offering a living wage for families and that many working families also require benefits to stay afloat. Meanwhile the child care provision gap which results when parents eventually find a job is better NOT managed by grandparents because they pass on disadvantages and should be out working too. So says Naomi Eisenstadt. The emphasis here is on children`s rights after all.  They are better left with strangers.

Here is what the Education Endowment Foundation has to say about early childhood interventions:

Early years or early childhood interventions are approaches which aim to ensure that young children have educationally based pre-school or nursery experiences which prepare for school and academic success, usually through additional nursery or pre-school provision. Many of the researched programmes and approaches focus on disadvantaged children. Some also offer parental support.

In most studies, the impact on attainment tends to wear off over time, though impact on attitudes to school tends to be more durable. There is no established amount of time where the fade takes place, rather there is a pattern of decline over time. Early years and pre-school interventions are therefore not sufficient to close the gap in attainment for disadvantaged children

There are a number of systematic reviews and meta-analyses which have looked at the impact of early childhood intervention. Most of these are from the US however, where children tend to start school at a later age. Evaluations of Sure Start in the UK do not show consistent positive effects and indicate that some caution is needed when generalising from exceptionally successful examples. However, overall the evidence supporting early childhood intervention is robust.

See Early Education in Childhood and Care 2011


Naomi Eisenstadt, Sure Start   

"Naomi Eisenstadt, Senior Research Fellow, Oxford University and former Director of Sure Start, visited Scotland to see and comment on our work on the Early Years."

 

"During my visit I attended an Early Years Collaborative (EYC) meeting in Ayrshire. The EYC is a very promising methodology for ensuring a shared vision for babies and young children, and a reflective, peer led system for continual improvement in public services aimed at young families."

"Participation of health in such endeavours in England continues to be challenging."

 

READ MORE