Education

The education system is buggered and we all know it.

I was recently watching a series online called “Orange is the new black”, now whilst I’m by no means going to act as if I watched this on my own accord to begin with, I must concede that the series was eye opening. The format of the show follows the character called Piper Chapman and her journey in prison for a year. Now without going in to too much detail, the series shows the journeys of every inmate she encounters into prison and shows the variety of stories and sentences that inmates are subject to. If you’ve read this far and haven’t thought I’ve gone completely mad I thank you and assure you I am coming to my point. One such character on the show is a girl called Janae Watson, she is around twenty years old and her story is by far the one that resonated with me the most. Now, without advertising the show too much if, when you read this, you feel like you need to go and watch the show I would recommend it and urge you to watch it in its entirety and appreciate the messages and scenarios that resonate with you.

Janae was a young girl when she was imprisoned and is shown at a public school where her teacher sees potential in her, thusly arranging a field trip to a prep (private for all the Britons) school to experience what their life is like. She is shocked at the differences and soon becomes angry that she must work “twice as hard to get half as far”.

This is my issue, an issue that I’ve tried to explain for the last four years but one that frustrated me too much to put into words. I went to a private school for years seven and eight, a preface that I ought to share with you to understand that my stance doesn’t come from ignorance or a place of jealousy. After year eight, my family realised that it was too expensive to fund and I had to leave the independent school and joined a grammar school instead. I must concede that grammar schools are by no means for the impoverished alone, in fact they cater to a wide variety of students that can come from wealthy families as well as families that aren’t so wealthy. I come from a family that does well, not private helicopter or swimming pool well, but moderately well.

I noticed, however the vast differences between the schools. I came from a school that had a sports track with an athletics field adjacent to it on one side and a full-sized cricket pitch on the other. They had eight rugby pitches and three hockey pitches as well as a full sized astro turf and sports hall. This by no means makes a school but I ought to explain to you the wealth and land that the school had at its disposal. I made friends whose parents were CEO’s of banks and heads of their firms, it was an environment I was in awe of. Being from my background, however meant that I would often think that this made me better in some way and, like many in my year, I would look down on schools or institutes that wouldn’t have the same facilities or that didn’t speak in the same dialect or accent as my friends and me.

It was because of this that I was distraught at learning I had to leave, I remember pleading and begging my parents to take a loan, to sell the house, to do anything to keep me from leaving. I joined a modest grammar school near a high street, about half an acre in size. I was shocked at the culture and at the school itself. I was now in a school predominately Asian and with no fives courts, no rugby, no hockey. I was lost.

However, I soon learnt that none of the things that I once considered to be defining of a school mattered. I was given an education that’s garnished me into a good student but also a good human being. I am proud to say that I am from a grammar school.

There are some qualms I face, however. First and foremost, I realise that grammar schools are paid for by academic trusts or the local authority and not by affluent families that fork out thousands a year to the school and allow them to expand. However, its just not right though, is it? This idea that’s instilled into many of us that such schools are just better, I remember seeing boards up every year at the private school with tallies of the amount of people that applied to Oxford and Cambridge. This is not the case at my school, a tally like that would accumulate enough to take up room on a piece of A7 paper. I realise that this is because grammar school children don’t apply and if they want to they should, however, why would they? In a system where the difference in education and facilities has gotten so huge, how psychologically would a grammar school child consider himself as capable?

Im not going to say take down independent schools or take funds off them, after all where people want to pay they should be allowed to. I will, however, try to explain what the problem is.

Teachers aren’t paid enough, frankly I believe teachers are the most under appreciated they have ever been. The demand is high yet the price paid to them remains sub-par. In a society where footballers are paid millions, why are teachers paid only enough to sustain their families? The economics of this question will show that footballers deserve money because of several reasons and teachers shouldn’t be paid more because then it would ruin the balance and create issues. However, morally, a teacher can inspire a child and create the future. If Sir Isaac Newton didn’t have a teacher who first explained basic science to him, who’s to say he would take up an interest in physics?

Schools deserve better funding. That child you read about who got mugged or jailed because of street violence could’ve been saved or protected had the school had enough funding to create an after-school boxing club. That teen that beat the computer at chess could’ve been to the national finals if the school had enough money to start a chess club. These are just a few of the examples I’ve seen, so I can’t even imagine schools in areas that have worse conditions and funding. They are wasting a potential classics professor by not teaching Latin at grammar schools, they’ve lost out on the next Leonardo Di Caprio by not encouraging or funding drama classes, they have lost out on a future because they thought they weren’t as good enough as private school kids.

I don’t understand it, why is the gap so huge? The defence can get billions but schools can’t be helped with just a bit more money? If everyone isn’t given equal opportunity or at least shown ways to make the most out of life then how does anyone expect to see the improvement in society, all that will come out of it is a further divided society with a private school that produces CEOs and “normal” schools that you’ll just read about.