Organised a reunion of the Grade 8 graduates of 1960 two years ago. Of the 100 written replies received to my correspondence, only one did not exhibit perfect spelling, punctuation and grammar. What was different in those days?
There were classes of 50+ (no supply teachers in the event of absences - just slide the adjoining walls open), our teachers were enthusiastic (possibly driven by external exams), and there was a great balance of male and female teachers.

The bottom 10 percent of unruly students are the key to everything in the public schools. They're the students that make teachers life hell, and distract the whole class, in fact end up being the focus of the whole school, and influence via peer pressure and even fear.

The top 10 percent of high achieving students with high achieving parents set the tone in the private schools, and influence via peer pressure, and are the targets of aspiration, and fund top class facilities.

So the answer is how do we get the best overall results. Do you mix all the kids together and let the bottom 10% mix with the top 10%, and see who wins that peer battle for the hearts and minds of the follower children.

I know who my money's on.

So we have this system that encourages an elite insular system of silver spoons on one hand, and a rat race survival of the fittest system where the kids in it with decent parents survive well enough to enter the dumbed down universities.

Then it all starts again on an even footing at Uni. It has been shown that the kids that made it through the tougher half of the draw actually are more resourceful than the silver spoon lot at university. Though I suppose there may be more that got lost along the way.

In the end it's a better preparation for university to go to a public school, given the ineptitude of the lecturers these days, and the bureaucracy one will encounter, and the political bias one is used to dealing with.

All those years of honing essays (disingenuously of course) to be full of environmental black arm band socialist Utopian fantasies makes fitting into Uni a breeze.

Pity at the end of it we get graduates that have NFI. Still, keeps the kids off the streets and saves my tax money.

A fool and their money are easily parted, and i'll back my kids in the tough half of the draw, and save $40k a year to boot!

Houellie,

Einstein said something to the effect that the only thing that got in the way of his education was his schooling.

I know you used your school years to hone your style. It must have been a revelation to discover that you had more wit and intelligence than your teachers : )

(have you started that book yet?)

Is it just me or is this Donnelly guy a dead ringer for the loser teacher in Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

Poirot,

My English teacher couldn't spell, my maths teacher barely attended 3 of the 9 lessons per week for our 4 unit mathematics (In the absence of any teacher, we played cards or played touch footy), and I finished school with a high enough TER (Yes I am that old) to get into the course I wanted.(Well, wanted is too strong a word, in the abscence of any other ideas at barely 17 years of age, I was sheepled into a Science course, and who knew that you'd need a better score than that to be a glorified massuise.)

The very term TER was a wonderful example of the whole schooling system for mine. I await in anticipation for the Steak Holder Index my girls may have.

Imagine that! The SHI....

I only wish I had the dedication to home school like you do, as I fear my 'attitude' to the 'system' may either be taken out on my kids by the teachers who continually cop a serve from me, or my 'attitude' may rub off on my little cherubs.

I think it's like you say, I don't see school as 100% responsible for their education. I'm happy if their school just keeps them relatively safe, and does a basic job and I'm confident of being able to fill in the gaps or even pay a tutor with my $40k savings from not having them in the private system. I really cant believe people will pay that much after tax, I just don't see the benefit. I suppose because I see the exercise as a farce to begin with.

PS: I am penning my 50 shades of sexually repressed nice girls.

I will make trillions tapping into the educated woman's penchant for dreadfully written cringe-worthy tame and lame domination and submission porn and call it 'erotic literature'.

PPS: I am also deeply studying the work of the Bhagwan as Yabby suggested. Everyone needs a role model!

POWER corrupts and ABSOLUTE POWER corrupts absolutely.

Letting wealthy students set the standards in our schools will lead to an aristocracy that won't be brought down by chaff bag comments but rather by the guillotine.

The "educated" know-alls in the last several posts who IGNORE the clear and present dangers of dictatorship by immigration and baby bonuses don't even KNOW their French HISTORY. How educated is that.

I even saw a low class conversation by 'philosopher' Patrick Stokes out of Deakin Uni excoriating Free Speech thus: "It’s no part of a reporter’s job to give bulldust equal time with serious expertise"
Deakin University and the philosopher stoned? Where do they get these neanderthals.

In a true democracy, opinions avoid the inevitable erosion of democratic rights by wanna-be aristocrats and cashed up foreiegn criminals. Don't think that revolutions will not re-emerge in western nations as the GFC phenomenon rebites and the world is awash with phony printed US dollar bills sucking the life blood out of everything on this planet.

Australia, you will continue to be dumbed down via immigration and baby bonus dictatorships. The economies of scale that should come with JUST Immigration and poopulation expansion programs are NOT THERE!

We paid 3c/KWh for off peak electricity before Labor started treating us like sardines in a can. Now we are paying up to 20c/Kwh. With economies of scale it should be 3c or LESS. The dollar difference is going to making the rich into aristocrats who ware now actively targeting & attacking free speech.

If you believe that these people want your children to be better educated so they too can be rich then YOU deserve to be in the PEASANTRY they are cramming multiculturcorraling you into as we post.

You all know the worst OVERPOOPULATION offenders. They used to advertise on Jonesy.

Knowing who they are makes it easier to exact JUSTICE.

Hopefully before Paramatta Rd is turned into an open SEWER by a rebirthed Versailles Greiner Liberal dictatorship.

The silent MAJORITY must be catching on by now, no matter how badly they are being educated!

Shuffling sideways, trying not to make eye contact.

You make OUG seem coherent.

Can you tell me about the war or somfink codge?