School reports and planning problems

School report calls pupil 'wally' (BBC)

A confidential school report found lying in the street named some pupils as "wally" or "dingbat"

For a quick refresher the dictionary definitions are:

wally n. a stupid person.

dingbat n. a crazy or stupid person.

Both words are in the dictionary and are valid descriptive terms. After all if the children are slightly stupid or slightly mad you don't call them normal just to protect people's feelings. Yes, it is unfortunate that a teacher should think of a student as a wally but rather than criticising the teacher for injecting a bit of realism the child and its parents should be looking at how to change things. In reality little Tarquin (not the child's real name) wont have done anything wrong he is just a bit hyperactive or perhaps misunderstood.

There is a tendency to protect children from the reality of life, on what is a fine line between encouragement and reality. If you tell kids they are great, when they are clearly not you end up with the drama queens on reality tv who know they will make it one day and pursue a dream while working at a low paid job.

Is this what happens when you are never critical or realistic with a child? They pursue a hopeless dream and end up being desperately unhappy.

If they have people who tell them the truth then they keep the dream as a hobby and find themselves something they are good at. They may even lead happier lives because they are no longer pursuing hopeless dreams. Life is hard enough without being sent down the wrong path by over protective parents.

So please can we have a standing ovation for the teacher who just called a spade a spade, rather than a non-tooth fork. At least one teacher in the UK has managed to keep their sanity and still injects a bit of realism into education.

Planning shake-up for big schemes (BBC)

What is being heralded by the media as a new Brownabour idea is a simplification of the planning process in order to streamline all the red tape. The white paper being put before government proposes an independent planning commission to replace lengthy, costly and complicated planning inquiries. This commission would be made up of independent experts such as planners and lawyers to help decide policy.

There would also be more strategic guidance in terms of a planning framework at a national level which would cover major issues such as transportation and electricity generation.

The opposition have used the usual media buzzword objections of the idea taking decisions away from elected officials and giving them to government quangos.

So I can have a politician making a strategic planning decision who is only worried about whether he will get re-elected and may not have the relevant qualifications or experience to take the decision, let alone the guts to make the right decision.

-Or-

I can have an independent panel of experts with vast qualifications and experience who make the right decision for the country balanced against public opinion.

A panel of experts that's crazy talk, next they will be putting a panel of experts in charge of inflation policy. Oh they already have and it actually works a lot better than when the politicians were in charge.

Bring on the panel of experts they can hardly do a worse job than politicians.

So before you get on your soap box and follow the media crowd and complain about decisions being taken away from the people, think about it for a second and make your own decision.

After all in reality would the media ever agree and say it was a good idea, that just isn't newsworthy.