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Product Description
Product Description
'Class War&' (2002) was Chris Woodhead's verdict on the systemic failures within the British Education system and a bold agenda for reform. 'A Desolation of Learning' is a retrospective on the 8 years since he resigned as Chief Inspector of Schools amidst a flurry of controversy over his views on the importance of a strong and politically independent schools inspectorate. - Are our schools any better? - Have standards improved? - What are the key areas he would target for reform today? Woodhead argues that the Labour administration has wrongly shaped expectations and policy based on a misguided and questionable vision of a social utopia and a misguided linking of educational attainment and economic well-being. Political pressure has resulted in the emasculation of organisations like OfSTED and the National College for School Leadership, whose remit is reduced to peddling ministerial enthusiasms. Woodhead argues that we need: 1) independent school headteachers to assert their independence; 2) the Conservative party to find its voice and generate momentum for change; 3) schools to be free of bureaucratic constraint, and parents to be empowered, via the implementation of a voucher scheme, so that a genuine educational market may be established in Britain.
About the Author
Chris Woodhead has over 35 years' experience in education. He has taught English in grammar and comprehensive schools, lectured in education at Oxford University, and worked in senior posts in three Local Education Authorities. He ran the National Curriculum Council and the Schools Curriculum Assessment Authority before becoming Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Schools. He resigned from this post in November 2000. In 2002 he published his verdict on British education, Class War, to widespread acclaim. He is Chairman of Cognita and Professor of Education at the University of Buckingham. He continues to broadcast and write regularly on education policy.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Chris Woodhead has had a long mission to improve state education. In this book, he demonstrates in no uncertain terms why the state education system has been failing our children and what should be done to drastically improve it. Although I feel that, at times, he suffers from being a little over the top in his shouting about the shortcomings of the system and its personalities, and his sentence structure is poor for a person who used to teach English, Chris once again saves no punches in his criticism of our education system. Let's hope that this book gets its deserved high readership in the right places, and that those of us who are more generally interested in education as it helps our children, and we see a massive improvement in the education system. Well done, Chris!
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
A Desolation of Learning: Is this the education our children deserve?
Certainly, but they won't receive it soon, after 40 years of the educational theorising Woodhead attacks.
It will be a slow process, turning it around, meanwhile our children suffer.
Certainly, but they won't receive it soon, after 40 years of the educational theorising Woodhead attacks.
It will be a slow process, turning it around, meanwhile our children suffer.
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful
This is a really good summary of all of Chris Woodhead's thoughts and feelings towards the state of modern education. Sadly so much of it is true and one can only hope that politicians and especially those with responsibility for educational reforms actually take note. He goes a bit over the top but any true teacher knows that exams are now far easier than they ever were, diplomas are a waste of public money and the government has no real direction whatsoever. Read it!
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Shocking, illuminating, uncompromising - all parents should read it
The follow-up to Woodhead's 'Class War', this is an account of the way the Labour governments of Blair and Brown tinkered with the state education system without tackling its... Read more
Published 10 months ago by Freddie Firework
An Education in the Politics of Education
As a trainee teacher (DT best subject in the curriculum) I found this book a right barrel of laughs (sarcasm). Read more
Published on 12 Mar 2010 by S. J. Cross
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