The New Curriculum

School books ?

I read recently that someone gaining an A grade at A Level today would have achieved a D a number of years ago. There has been much debate surrounding the phenomenon of grade inflation in recent times, and it does seem to have become easier to stand out in exams today than it used to be in the past. This is not surprising, given the improvement in teaching standards (or perhaps more precisely the concentration on teaching for results), the plethora of resources available to pupils to research their subjects, specialised coaching and a myriad other things never available to students in times gone by. All we had when I was at school were the text books such as they were and any other background matter one could dig out in a library or come by with an enquiring mind. Well done to all those who can achieve excellent grades in today's A Levels; they will need all the help they can get when they start looking for a job or finding a place in university.

Rather than fearing this debasement of grading, I am more concerned by the subjects taught in schools - or rather the subjects not taught, or taught sufficiently or with enough force. Is any time given to James Lovelock's work and inventions, or even Charles Darwin, beyond a cursory mention ? Evolution and its true meaning and significance ? The Gaia theory ? Or the Medean hypothesis ? Or the inexorable rise of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere, or the origin and evolution of life, the soil and their future ? Are humans placed in their context - one species among many, gifted with intelligence and self reflection perhaps, but no more equal or worthy than earthworms or plants. What books are studied other than the same tired 'classics' ? In this country, we are not exposed to a wide range of knowledge during our education and many subjects are ignored unless one makes a conscious decision to study them. Hence generations of young people (and I was one a long time ago) who have little knowledge of science, history and many other areas of learning, ill prepared for the grave challenges facing our world.

I myself, after stumbling beginnings many years ago when I dabbled in protests and being at least mildly radical and vaguely realising that all was not well with the world have finally seen the light as it were. I have at long last rejected the silly notions that economic growth ad infinitum is either possible or desirable, and the notion that humans are somehow on the Earth but not of the Earth, divorced from the natural world. I have read the works of Lovelock and made the effort to understand Darwin, learned about the soil, the biology of plants, been impressed by Tim Flannery, been a subscriber to the Ecologist, grow food, don't fly any more etc. I want desperately to learn more about this planet and our duty to it. But how many people are exposed to these wonders and given this same hunger for knowledge unless they have had the good fortune to have come across, say, Lovelock in the course of their reading. Very few I would say.

Everyone should be given the chance to learn about our planet. Youngsters should be given the opportunity to travel to the poles and to the tropics and to the different habitats of our own country, to see and feel for themselves, to realise that science is liberating. Education can save us and all the species we share the world with. A New Curriculum is needed to do this in which the works of the great scientists and ecologists are to the fore; a massive investment in education. What is not needed is 'academies' financed through PPP extortion schemes, grade inflation, league tables and the division of children into those who can access a good (i.e. in this country private) education and those who can not. Before you vote again ask your prospective candidate if he or she or their party are prepared to do the right thing; and take a keen interest in what your children are being taught in school. If they are not being taught about the real world, make sure you fill in the blanks yourself. There is hope.