The answer is to make bad schools better
If you think social engineering is a myth, look no further than the admissions procedures used by a number of Britain’s top universities. Using information from the Department for Children, Schools and Families, the sinisterly named “DCSF standardisation measurement score”, universities such as Oxford and Durham are employing a points system to penalise entrants from the best state and private schools.
Social engineering well describes a system that uses a mathematical formula and GCSE results to provide applicants from poorer schools with a leg-up, handicapping those from good schools. Universities insist this is a fair way of spotting talented candidates who have been held back by poor teaching. Superficially it sounds reasonable – who can object to helping bright children from poor backgrounds? But there are deep flaws in this system. With the exception of Cambridge, universities have been slow to admit to using these methods. It has had to be dragged out of them. Yet students and parents have a right to know how their applications are being judged. The use of GCSE results also means many are being judged retrospectively. Having believed what mattered was A-levels, they now find the die was cast much earlier. Parents strive, rightly, to get their children into the best state schools. Others make huge sacrifices out of taxed income to pay for a first-class education. Now they find their sacrifices may have been in vain.
Not only is this wrong; it is tantamount to an admission that education policy has failed. As Chris Woodhead, the former chief inspector of schools, puts it: “The solution lies in the schools disadvantaged children attend. Labour has failed to raise standards in such schools and now wants us to believe that the problem is the elitism of our best universities.” It is not. Britain’s best universities are not so good that they can afford to be weakened. Social engineering is as bad for them as it is unfair for bright students who are being penalised for going to good schools. The government should instead concentrate on making bad schools better. That is the best way to serve the underprivileged.
* Click here for further reading from The Sunday Times 24 May 09, with additional formulae added for the online edition:
Top schools boycott ‘biased’ Durham. The leading university's entry system handicaps high performers
* The Cambridge GCSE formula is here
The answer is to make bad schools better
If you think social engineering is a myth, look no further than the admissions procedures used by a number of Britain’s top universities. Using information from the Department for Children, Schools and Families, the sinisterly named “DCSF standardisation measurement score”, universities such as Oxford and Durham are employing a points system to penalise entrants from the best state and private schools.
Social engineering well describes a system that uses a mathematical formula and GCSE results to provide applicants from poorer schools with a leg-up, handicapping those from good schools. Universities insist this is a fair way of spotting talented candidates who have been held back by poor teaching. Superficially it sounds reasonable – who can object to helping bright children from poor backgrounds? But there are deep flaws in this system. With the exception of Cambridge, universities have been slow to admit to using these methods. It has had to be dragged out of them. Yet students and parents have a right to know how their applications are being judged. The use of GCSE results also means many are being judged retrospectively. Having believed what mattered was A-levels, they now find the die was cast much earlier. Parents strive, rightly, to get their children into the best state schools. Others make huge sacrifices out of taxed income to pay for a first-class education. Now they find their sacrifices may have been in vain.
Not only is this wrong; it is tantamount to an admission that education policy has failed. As Chris Woodhead, the former chief inspector of schools, puts it: “The solution lies in the schools disadvantaged children attend. Labour has failed to raise standards in such schools and now wants us to believe that the problem is the elitism of our best universities.” It is not. Britain’s best universities are not so good that they can afford to be weakened. Social engineering is as bad for them as it is unfair for bright students who are being penalised for going to good schools. The government should instead concentrate on making bad schools better. That is the best way to serve the underprivileged.
* Click here for further reading from The Sunday Times 24 May 09, with additional formulae added for the online edition:
Top schools boycott ‘biased’ Durham. The leading university's entry system handicaps high performers
* The Cambridge GCSE formula is here
