More annoyance

I now know what bugs me about those Teachers Federation signs on school fences.

The wishy-washy nature of their message.

They say things like "Our children are the future". Well, all children are the future, not just yours. But what sort of children of the future are you turning out? The feral children of the future?

I prefer to see more action oriented stuff. "We improve kids maths scores". "Kids that go here are great at reading". "We teach more Australian history than any other school in the area". "We've produced 4 great cricketers and an Olympic swimmer in the last decade - and we aim to produce more in the future".

I like stuff you can get a grip on. Wishy-washy, airy-fairy dribble that sounds nice but is essentially meaningless hot air gets up my nose.

Given that this attitude appears to infect the entire state system, it's no wonder I favour private education. Not because they are necessarily any better, but because they know what they want to be better at, and they work at getting better. They don't just produce a vapourware vision and then hope that everything turns out ok.

And I don't think private schools are as doctrinaire when it comes to teaching methods. That method not showing any results for the last 20 years? Perhaps we should try something else. State school educrats though seem to be welded onto teaching methods regardless of the outcomes. Not getting the right outcome? How dare you try and measure the outcomes! We do things this way because we believe it is the right way - how dare you try and prove or disprove whether it is the right way with facts. State education seems to be driven by those that prefer feelings over facts.

The horror, the horror.