Of course, as this brief history indicates, the multiple-sets-of-standards system is not immune to political pressures either. I don’t see a good solution here.

Likewise, a classroom of angry parents is usually enough to sideline a teacher’s career with the administration willing to do what it takes to keep the heat down.

And yes, a school full of angry parents usually means the end of a principal’s career.

And yes, when I talk about ending a career, I’m not usually talking about getting fired. For politicians, it can mean not getting re-elected. For administrators and educators, it means getting dumped somewhere out of the public eye.

Note, organizations are usually unwilling to spend a lot of effort to defend those who *purposely* cause trouble. If you’re not preparing to teach, then you’ve got problems and the system will defend you. If you’re *choosing* to anger parents by making extra effort and thus failing good numbers of students, then you’re purposely inflicting trouble on those around you.

Realistically, it’s not that swimming against the system *can’t* be done. You just have to be willing to put in super-human effort and expect to be vilified for that effort.

“The customer in this case, are the parents. They are the ones that will eventually end someone’s career for failing to deliver.”

That might happen in some private schools. Some teachers without tenure might not be re-hired in public schools. With tenure and seniority, though, there’s nothing parents can do to “end (a) career,” unless the teacher’s committed a crime.

“doing the job they’re supposed to be doing” = doing what the customer wants.

Allen, the educational system exists to serve the customer. In the long-term, failure to do that gets you replaced by someone who *is* willing to serve the customer. The customer in this case, are the parents. They are the ones that will eventually end someone’s career for failing to deliver. Standards that are achievable with minimal effort *are* what what the customers want (not what they *say* they want, but what they’ll punish you for not delivering).

“Real” standards mean real failures. People who worked hard, and despite their best effort, failed.

Until we’re at a stage were the customer is not going to punish educators or administrators for this real cost of upholding “real” standards, it just isn’t going to happen, and blaming the workers is, in my opinion, a somewhat cowardly way of making them pay for society’s choices.

The people who work in public education have personal lives and aspirations of their own. Those personal lives and aspirations may not necessarily be especially supportive of the ends of public education so it’s worthwhile to ensure that the hired help is doing the job they’re supposed to be doing.

That seems like a rather more manageable task then remaking society.

It seems pretty evident to me that barring the exceptional, standards X completion-rate is pretty much a constant. We can up the standards, but the completion rate (% students successfully graduating high school) falls, and vice-versa.

Moreover, the non-completes are heavily concentrated in the lower-SES areas.

Do the Conservatives truly feel they can enact standards that will cause the graduation rates to plummet in low-SES schools? It would be seen as a declaration of war on the lower classes (and it would be: given a completion of a low standards degree is worth more than an incomplete high-standards degree, it would essentially be sacrificing a lot of the low-SES crowd for the benefit of a few in the low SES and a lot more more among the middle and upper classes.)

That success can be achieved in lower-SES schools is beyond a doubt (see Our School), but it takes a commitment that, realistically, we will not see spread over the entire system. There simply aren’t that many super-dedicated teachers, parents, and administrators.

Unless a Conservative victory unleashes as social revolution along with it (which *can* happen, but is unlikely), the British educational system in unlikely to substantively change.

Such statements always remind me of the classic Tree Octopus satire.