Keith, I took both "Matriculation" and the "General Certificate of Education". I can't remember what the difference was, except that Matric was 5 subjects - English and Math compulsory - 3 other subjects of which at least one had to be a language, whereas the GCE was 6 subjects - English and Math compulsory - 4 other subjects of which at least one had to be a language.
I think I was at Central School - a kind of halfway house between elementary and grammar. My impression was that I was around 12 -13. As we started school at 41/2 and could read most general material very well by 6 years - this early activity isn't strange. As I have mentioned before. I wasn't some kind of quick study. Most of my friends in our poor neighborhood could read as I could. My father was a carpenter as much out of work as employed in the 30's. Many builders would hire for so many weeks until a worker had established his dole rights, then fire him and hire another. When the dole was running out on the first worker, they would hire him back, and fire the other worker who by this time had built up his dole money. That was the 30's in England. For many people both in the US and Britain, the war was a salvation from a squalid existence. Jobs for everyone and high pay - even if they were soundly taxed. The educational system back then seemed to be pretty serviceable. It followed the general principle that before you went to university, or into the adult world, you should have finished your education. Any further education would be for your life's work - either in college, or at your job. My sister-in-law, another product of 30's education, was here on vacation. She was in a bank and the computers were down. The unfortunate girl teller was trying to work out the exchange rate between dollars and pounds on paper. She couldn't do it. Freda said, I'll do it. She grabbed the pen and paper and set it out so the teller understood it. Freda finished her schooling (graduated!) from Senior School at 14 and went to work. Senior followed elementary for practically all kids. The better kids went to Central and Grammar schools. Freda could read, write and do arithmetic and had a fair knowledge of most other subjects. Most importantly, she could read well, which meant that for her learning never ended. (Perhaps, reminiscent of Jefferson's plan to take the very best for university, while just teaching the dross - his word for everyone else - to read and write before throwing them out on the world.) I am not, of course, recommending that we go back to the times of general unemployment and poverty (and a little later, all-night air-raids)! I do however, believe that as an educational objective, we finish educating the kids before they leave high school. I'm not sure how post-secondary education is in Britain, but here they are still taking general education when they get to college. (One smiles at Clinton's project that every American youngster will do first year college! What he was really saying was they will go to college to finish High School.) Thus, my grandson Jeremy, a very bright kid, is about to start college at 18 1/2. He will be taking Math (Advanced Algebra), Computer Programming, Writing, History of Art (required!), and PE (2 credits). Perhaps, at this age, he should be doing his final work for a hard degree, on which he has spent the last two years. Harry __________________________________________ Keith wrote: >In the attempt to produce increasing numbers of graduates every year, >standards have steadily declined ever since the first educational theorists >and egalitarians took possession of the Ministry of Education in England in >the 1940s. The promulgation of such theories over the decades and their >imposition by central and local bureaucracies on every state school has >been very expensive, costing, on average, as much again as the normal >running expenses of schools and salaries of teachers. > >But it now appears that examination standards are now so low and grades so >indistinct that we needn't worry any more about selecting students for our >universities. They can as well be chosen by tossing a coin as by paying >attention to the grades that are reached. > >Here is a news item from today's Daily Telegraph. A-levels, for those >unacquainted with our system, are the university entrance exams (usually >two or three specific subjects are taken -- rarely including maths or >science subjects these days because these are too difficult for most young >people): > ><<<< >TOSS OF A COIN 'AS GOOD AS A-LEVELS' > >by John Clare >(Education Editor) > >A-levels are only slightly better than tossing a coin as a way of >predicting who will do well at university, a professor of educational >assessment said yesterday. > >The relationship between students' A-level scores and the class of degree >they obtained was so weak that admissions tutors might as well trust to >chance. > >Prof Dylan Wiliam, of King's College, London, said that less than 10% of >the differences in students' degree classes were accounted for by >differences in their A-level grades. > >"To put it more concretely, if you had two candidtaes competing for one >place on a degree programme, tossing a coin would get you the better >applicant -- in the sense of the one who go on to get the better degree -- >50% of the time. > >"By taking the one with the better A-level grades, you would get the better >candidate just 60% of the time, but you would get the weaker candidate 40% >of the time." > >At King's, 10% of the students who were admitted with A-level grades AAB >obtained a first-class degree three years later. But so did 10% of those >with three C grades, and 10% of those with three Ds. > >"It does point to the need to take factors other than A-level grades into >account," the professor said. > >One problem was that A-levels were accurate to only plus or minus one >grade, so a B could equally well be an A or a C. another was that A-levels >measured achievement rather than potential. > >However, the Government and the exam boards were reluctant to admit that >exams were unreliable "for fear of destroying public faith in the system". ><<<< > >Keith Hudson ****************************** Harry Pollard Henry George School of LA Box 655 Tujunga CA 91042 [EMAIL PROTECTED] Tel: (818) 352-4141 Fax: (818) 353-2242 *******************************
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