EducationGuardian.co.uk | Schools special reports | School tests breach UN convention, envoy claims:
ONE OF THE MANY REASONS WHY I HATE MARGARET THATCHER
"The (British) government is breaching the United Nations convention on children's rights by imposing a targets and testing regime in English schools that ignores their needs, a UN representative has warned.
In an interview with the Guardian, Katarina Tomasevski, special rapporteur on the right to education for the UN commission on human rights, said she believed the British government was in technical breach of the convention.
Article 29 says education should be 'directed to the development of the child's personality, talents and mental and physical abilities to their fullest potential'.
She said that the current system of tests at seven, 11, 14 and 16 for children in England was designed to fulfil government objectives rather than meet the needs of children.
Professor Tomasevski also argued that the government's support for tuition fees contravened the convention, which calls for governments to 'make higher education accessible to all on the basis of capacity by every appropriate means'. She said that in Britain, universities were being given 'designer labels' and education was being defined as 'merchandise'.
There was inconsistency in the government's willingness to talk about human rights in relation to education in other countries but not in Britain, she said.
There were 'far too many' compulsory tests in English schools, Prof Tomasevski added.
Children were tested so much that she wondered whether the government wanted England 'to become another Singapore' - where in a poll pupils aged 10-12 said they were more worried about failing their exams than about their parents dying. "
A BIT of an UNFAIR QUESTION, because CHILDREN THINK THEIR PARENTS ARE INVINCIBLE,
which is all too typical of bad statistics.
Maggie Thatcher is one of the few people I would like to see run over by a bus, I remember being delighted when she became the first woman to be prime minister, I felt England was progressing, but my intuition said oh why oh why, does it have to be her.
ONE OF THE MANY REASONS WHY I HATE MARGARET THATCHER
"The (British) government is breaching the United Nations convention on children's rights by imposing a targets and testing regime in English schools that ignores their needs, a UN representative has warned.
In an interview with the Guardian, Katarina Tomasevski, special rapporteur on the right to education for the UN commission on human rights, said she believed the British government was in technical breach of the convention.
Article 29 says education should be 'directed to the development of the child's personality, talents and mental and physical abilities to their fullest potential'.
She said that the current system of tests at seven, 11, 14 and 16 for children in England was designed to fulfil government objectives rather than meet the needs of children.
Professor Tomasevski also argued that the government's support for tuition fees contravened the convention, which calls for governments to 'make higher education accessible to all on the basis of capacity by every appropriate means'. She said that in Britain, universities were being given 'designer labels' and education was being defined as 'merchandise'.
There was inconsistency in the government's willingness to talk about human rights in relation to education in other countries but not in Britain, she said.
There were 'far too many' compulsory tests in English schools, Prof Tomasevski added.
Children were tested so much that she wondered whether the government wanted England 'to become another Singapore' - where in a poll pupils aged 10-12 said they were more worried about failing their exams than about their parents dying. "
A BIT of an UNFAIR QUESTION, because CHILDREN THINK THEIR PARENTS ARE INVINCIBLE,
which is all too typical of bad statistics.
Maggie Thatcher is one of the few people I would like to see run over by a bus, I remember being delighted when she became the first woman to be prime minister, I felt England was progressing, but my intuition said oh why oh why, does it have to be her.
posted by Hugh W at 6:36 am
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