Britain’s miserable youth…
You might wonder why recent studies indicate Britain’s youth are the most unhappy in Europe. A story today in the Sunday Times sums it up nicely: A 2,200-pupil high school is being built in Peterborough, under the “flagship” academy schools programme (so the local authority – and hence the local, democratic council, representative of the community won’t have any say in its running).
This school will replace THREE current schools, so pupils will be going from relatively small communities to be all mixed up in a huge one. But the real misery clincher is this – there will be NO PLAYGROUND – no space in which to chill, relax, take some time away from structure.
“We are not intending to have any play time,†said Alan McMurdo, the head teacher. “Pupils won’t need to let off steam because they will not be bored. 
Miles Delap, project manager at the academy, said: “For a school of this size, a playground would have had to be huge. That would have been almost uncontrollable. We have taken away an uncontrollable space to prevent bullying and truancy. 
There will be a 30-minute lunch period when pupils will be taken to the dining room by their teacher, ensuring they do not sneak away to run around.
In those three quotes there is so much to unpack it is hard to know where to start. There is fear – teenagers must be kept strictly under control at all times; there is planning – everything, every second, must be strictly managed; there is desire to turn these children into nice little corporate automata.
I certainly wouldn’t want to live in a house near this school; when the kids escape they’ll explode out of it like cork from a pressured bottle. And that will be used as an excuse to demand more controls…
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[...] at Philobiblon reports on a merger of three schools enough to make any parent shudder in Britain’s miserable youth…In a microcosm of contemporary Britain outside the school gates, pupils are to be subjected to a [...]
Pingback by Redemption Blues » BritBlog Roundup 116 — May 6, 2007 @ 12:43 pm
But the Greens are in favour of state education aren’t they?
Comment by Bishop Hill — May 6, 2007 @ 6:27 pm
Indeed, very much so. But not this sort of state education – which more closely resembles a sort of fee-paying military academy in style.
Comment by Natalie Bennett — May 6, 2007 @ 8:40 pm
This sounds like what are referred to here as “charter” schools–touted by some politicians, mainly at the right-wing end of the dial(“pimped for” might by a better characterization), as great ways to do an end-run around debatably failing public schools, using public monies to fund superior-results-alternate-tracks projects. Some work, some don’t–but most seem to start out by trumpeting their focus on hard-core academics, at the expense of free time and recreation. Happily, many of them end up with recreational space and some accomodation of that need.
That said, I’m glad that I’m not a student under the care of Mr. McMurdo. That sort of bald assertion that “they won’t need play time . . . [because] they won’t be bored” makes me wonder what planetary academy he’s out of. Good luck, Mac–you’ll need it.
Comment by david ware — May 9, 2007 @ 4:11 pm