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for education
23 May 2007 04:49 pmMaybe being Chinese makes a meritocratic system sound infinitely familiar and more appealing. After all, this system has worked for practically 3000 years in China (don't quote me on the date) and overrules all silly boundaries like bloodline and wealth and class. Or rather, your talent and ability decides your place in the hierarchy.
Maybe that's why I get so annoyed when reading reports about federal funding cuts for education.
Is a blooming economy going to be worth it if we're just going to turn out people who don't know how to use that wealth?
And I thought that in democratic countries, education should be free and equal for all. Funding just the private schools is doing to Australia what it has been blissfully free of - selecting for a class system. Both the UK and (to a lesser extent) America has this problem. Class struggles, a theme we see in practically every show or book from the UK, and which also dominates in American school culture (the preps versus the ...well, everyone else); this is something Australia hasn't had yet, because we're a young country - and because, let's face it, the first Europeans were convicts, not rich landlords.
Of course, Howard isn't the only one selecting for private education. I remember a few years back, people were accusing Bob Carr of doing the same thing, withdrawing funding from public schools that need it.
While I don't understand everything in this report, I just find that a really underhanded and sneaky way of pampering the rich. Make schooling undesirable for the poor, they'll never get properly educated, they'll never be able to make enough money to send their kids to a rich school, their kids repeat the cycle.
It's not just about funding or what sort of education system we're going to end up with, it's about the sort of society this prejudice is going to select for. A subpopulation of white, rich kids - and in a few generations' time, they're going to be no different from the rude, arrogant bastards that plague English literature, and in a few more generations' time, talk about blood lines will start.
.....Okay, maybe I'm just being paranoid, but secondary education isn't the only thing affected. While UNSW has come out and complained, there's been similar ramifications at Sydney as well. The Nursing faculty was sold a few years ago simply because the university couldn't keep it running. Apparently now the maths department is suggesting voluntary redundancy to its staff.
For a government this apathetic to education, no wonder one of its members thinks he'll win brownie points by making buffoonish remarks about an opposition's feminity ="=
Har har, real funny mate.
I don't study economics. I study health, and the government's pleased me neither on the studying front nor on the health front. I know who I'm not voting for.
Maybe that's why I get so annoyed when reading reports about federal funding cuts for education.
Is a blooming economy going to be worth it if we're just going to turn out people who don't know how to use that wealth?
And I thought that in democratic countries, education should be free and equal for all. Funding just the private schools is doing to Australia what it has been blissfully free of - selecting for a class system. Both the UK and (to a lesser extent) America has this problem. Class struggles, a theme we see in practically every show or book from the UK, and which also dominates in American school culture (the preps versus the ...well, everyone else); this is something Australia hasn't had yet, because we're a young country - and because, let's face it, the first Europeans were convicts, not rich landlords.
Of course, Howard isn't the only one selecting for private education. I remember a few years back, people were accusing Bob Carr of doing the same thing, withdrawing funding from public schools that need it.
While I don't understand everything in this report, I just find that a really underhanded and sneaky way of pampering the rich. Make schooling undesirable for the poor, they'll never get properly educated, they'll never be able to make enough money to send their kids to a rich school, their kids repeat the cycle.
It's not just about funding or what sort of education system we're going to end up with, it's about the sort of society this prejudice is going to select for. A subpopulation of white, rich kids - and in a few generations' time, they're going to be no different from the rude, arrogant bastards that plague English literature, and in a few more generations' time, talk about blood lines will start.
.....Okay, maybe I'm just being paranoid, but secondary education isn't the only thing affected. While UNSW has come out and complained, there's been similar ramifications at Sydney as well. The Nursing faculty was sold a few years ago simply because the university couldn't keep it running. Apparently now the maths department is suggesting voluntary redundancy to its staff.
For a government this apathetic to education, no wonder one of its members thinks he'll win brownie points by making buffoonish remarks about an opposition's feminity ="=
Har har, real funny mate.
I don't study economics. I study health, and the government's pleased me neither on the studying front nor on the health front. I know who I'm not voting for.
