Chalkboard system left languishing in digital age

THE genie is out of the bottle and there is no way of putting it back in again.

At the end of this month Education, Sport & Culture will ask the States whether to retain selection in education or back a comprehensive system.

And there is now only one answer – change has to come in the public school system. Guernsey needs to look to the future and not dwell on what worked for some in the past.

It's just a shame that there is not enough clarity of thought to believe that this committee can deliver change – and deliver it quickly and efficiently.

If backed, a move to a comprehensive system needs careful management and clear messaging for all those thousands of people that it affects – the children and their parents to the teachers.

This committee, split five ways in how it wants to move forward, has so far been incapable of creating the aura of trust that is needed.

With a tight vote expected, and some members on the brink over which way they will go, they would do well to dwell on how much weight to place on the different arguments.

Last term, and to an extent this, far too much has been made of anecdotes and experiences of the past.

Everyone has been to school and too many seem to be basing their support for selection based on what happened to them when they were there, or perhaps when their children went through the system.

Society moves on, as do the teaching methods and facilities.

We do not need a chalkboard system in a digital age.

Much has also been made of the public mood during the election.

So do you go with what some voters were telling you on the doorstep, or what the vast majority of an entire profession is arguing?

When you dwell on the motivation of teachers, why would they be so passionately orchestrating a campaign for wholesale change?

You would have to be really cynical to say it is motivated by self-interest – indeed, the transition and settling-in periods will be anything but easy.

It is much easier to see that motivation being all about what is best for the children they are trying to help every day – they are the most informed interest group in this debate – not the person opining after a few pints in the pub, not the deputy who went to the old Boys' Grammar School and not the former teachers dreaming misty-eyed about some past faux-utopia.

And they are after getting the best results for everyone based on a much wider experience than many could ever have.

Just as I'm inclined to have faith that a pilot is in a better position to land a plane than a passenger, so I'd put more weight on what teachers are saying than anyone else.

There also has to be thought given to what happens if the States does back selection to continue, in whatever form.

It is then faced with managing an almost impossible situation.

Education will be forcing a system on a workforce in which a vast majority do not believe in what they are having to enact.

Faced with that prospect, who would blame teachers for leaving the profession?

It will be at best demotivating and at worst lead to a constant schism between the committee and its staff.

That is not an environment which leads to results.

This issue has been mishandled from the off, from the failure of the previous department to get it before the last States early in the term to the stream of mixed messages from this committee, but that is no reason not to back the right conclusion now.

In the midst of the GCSE crisis it would have been unthinkable to argue for a comprehensive system, but since those dark days when pupils were being failed, massive steps have been made.

Shining a light on a problem has proven to be instrumental in driving up standards and getting support where it was needed.

The system change is the next stage in that process, a move to a more inclusive, more varied and more flexible education that better accounts for students' strengths, weaknesses and interests.

Guernsey's current system still leaves it languishing behind other countries.

With the island's size, and the economic resources available to it, that is an aberration, one driven by complacency – that complacency could in part be down to a political unwillingness to drive change because too many are basing their viewpoints on the 'I did fine out of it so what's the problem' thought process.

It seems that just about everyone agrees the 11-plus is dead.

But for supporters of selection, their next conclusion appears to be that the 11-plus plus, or the 11-plus minus, would be OK.

That defies logic.

Some want to have more exams, some want to restrict the type of things tested for.

But neither argument overcomes the problems that everyone has recognised – the undue pressure on young children, the different speeds with which they develop, the unfairness of a system where some parents can afford to coach their children while others cannot, and so on.

And to add the final element in the debate – and whisper it, because it's an uncomfortable one for some – but the States' financial position needs to be given some consideration. Can it afford to continue with selection given it would mean, according to Education's board, losing the option of closing a school?

That is a multi, multimillion-pound question.

People get uncomfortable and want to decouple decisions about the education system from cost, but that is short-sighted.

Every argument needs to be made in the round, with different weightings added to different elements.

Perhaps Guernsey can afford to build a new school and the ongoing expense of keeping all the others operating as they are. Perhaps, but it is much more likely that it cannot.

Rationalisation was needed in the primary sector, change is needed in the secondary sector too.

This is a divisive issue that will not end when the decision is made.

Whichever way it goes, there needs to be strong leadership and communication.

A large number of people will feel alienated whichever camp they are in, but they should not be shut out.

Clear messaging and not stubbornness is what is needed – and tolerance from both sides of other people's views, something which has been lacking too much so far. You rarely win an argument by preaching, but you can lose one.

Only by rolling out an understanding of the direction Guernsey will travel with education will move things forward.

People may still disagree, but at least they will know what is happening.

So even when the binary decision of selection or not has been made, a big challenge awaits.