The crap they're teaching your kids!

[TordelBack]

...but I find it jaw dropping that archaeologists come to employment without field experience! Surely that's the basis of most of the discipline!

I didn't say they got hired, did I?  (But if they didn't get a job with us, they probably did somewhere else).  Mandatory 'organised' field experience in the context of third-level courses depends on the area, and Ireland seems worse than most.  Most universities have some kind of department-linked research dig or other project (even if it's only a junior lecturer with a tiny grant), so some field experience is common.  But fiddling about in slow-motion on a picturesque hillside with a bunch of your peers and a chummy lecturer for a couple of weeks isn't always relevant experience for a working life (nice and all as it is) - and plenty of applicants didn't even have that. A professor of mine once expounded at length that he didn't think there was any room or need for any practical experience or training at all in an archaeology degree, so I shouldn't be surprised.    

(I should also note that to become a licensed archaeologist in Ireland (i.e. entrusted with the running and writing up of a dig) you need at least a relevant BA and preferably an MA/MSc, about 5 years field experience on a range of site types, including a few years of supervisory work and report writing, and then have to sit a ghastly oral exam complete with dreaded arefact identification and dating test!  To merely work on a dig, you just used to need one working arm and a willingness to stand your round.  In 2009 sole possession of Greysuit-style pictures of the Minister of the Environment are probably your only hope of a job.)

When I had something to hire people for, what I was always looking for was some evidence of genuine interest backed up with gumption - if that meant someone who was taking an OU course while washing bones as a volunteer in a shed somewhere, or someone who'd been slogging it as a digger for years without darkening the doors of a university, they'd be probably have been in ahead of the straight-to-PhD brigade in a shot.  Attendance at local history society lectures and public conferences, and reading of popular archaeology magazines was always a dead giveaway of a likely prime hand - the highly qualified and experienced but utterly useless numbnuts who clogged up our office over the years were sure to have never opened a journal or been to a talk since they left college. The number of my colleagues who proudly claim they haven't read an archaeology book in years scare the hell out of me.

As to dropping standards, my old man never went near third level, but he can beat me round the houses all day on almost any aspect of history and geography, despite my degree in both and one-time third-level teaching of same - not to mention grammar and spelling!

[TheEdge]

it's not like she was stuck with the ghastly Merchant of Venice

Here is the SUCK i got stuck with at school :-

"Romeo and juliet" asshattery of the greatest order
" To Kill a Mockingbird" was ok
" KES" bull
" Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry" was about a black family and the Klan very good from what i remember
" The Great Gatsby" sucked
" Watership Down " my god kill me now
"The Secret of nimh" primary schoool nonsense
"David Copperfield"  Man did i hate this
"Great Expectations" and this
" sense and sensibility " threatened to drop english so they gave me :-


" Catch 22" liked it but still dont understand why i like the main character as he should be shot for treason or being an effing coward


I was stuck with that at this level many moons ago, shakeinghispear has no place in schools nowadays.
 You want to read that drivel do it in history or even better at Uni.

[TordelBack]

TheEdge, your shrivelled heart is unto a thing of pure blackness.  But I'm with you on Sense and Sensibility - it does no-one any good to read an entire book while screaming "get a fucking grip woman!" every two pages.

[Proudhuff]

I'm surpirised that Thrill hasn't been here contrasting and comparing Macbeth with Slaine!

[Jim_Campbell]

"Romeo and juliet" asshattery of the greatest order

If they didn't show you the Zeffirelli film, then they want shooting. If they did and that's still your response, then you have no soul.

Cheers

Jim.

[Dog Deever]

Polanski's MacBeth is well bad!

Ahem. Anyway... the  play should be nuked from orbit. Poor old Mr and Mrs MacFinlay got a real rough deal here, as did their descendants. Then some twat writes a load of shite about them and it sticks forever! If it was expunged from memory, like the truth about MacBeth was, I would be happy!

Still... Polanski's Macbeth is well worth a peep.

[Roger Godpleton]

I fucken'  loved English at school and I would strongly suspect have gotten a lot more out of University had I ignored my AS grades and not studied Philosophy instead, even if this meant going to (duh-duh-duhh) a poly.

-Macbeth
-Lord of the Flies
-The Handmaid's Tale
-Sassoon and friends
-The Duchess of Malfi
-Hamlet
-A Clockwork Orange (I chose this myself)

[SamuelAWilkinson]

TheEdge, you are a man without soul or heart! Watership Down alone from that list should have reduced you to a quivering wreck!

As for Catch-22, you think you should dislike Yossarian because he doesn't want to die?


Your mouth is full of all kinds of wrong.

[Peter Wolf]

This is pissing me off now this teacher training business.Why is it after everything that has gone on so far which has led up to this point now with the economy am i hearing this bullshit idea about Bankers being prioritised for teacher training courses as if to say the FuckTard Govt seem to think that they are more important than anyone else ?

Why is this ??

Its not as if they left their jobs without being given payoffs and lumpsums of cash so why are they being prioritised first ?

Fuck them all.Let them live off their savings if they saved any and if not then tough shit they can go on the dole.I dont see any reason why they should be fastracked into employment before anyone else who may be better qualified.Fuck the bankers as they contribute nothing to anyone else except line their own pockets.What do they know about dealing with kids and controlling a classroom ? If there is a shortage of teachers then they could be sourced from all sectors of society instead of a fucked up scheme that assumes that Bankers are the right stuff for teaching especially Maths.

Its a childish simplistic assumption that Bankers should automatically be better at maths.Does a banker have anything near a degree level in maths automatically ?

For Fucks Sake dont let them teach economics in the further education system either.



Bankers = Good at maths .Perhaps but dont just hire them on that association as its stupid.Its as stupid and childish as the assumption that New Labour / Liberals/ Marxists / Socialists- the Govt have any real understanding of business/economics and are good at maths just because they are Politicians and are therefore clever by default and have been elected to manage and run the UK economy when the evidence that says exactly the opposite is everywhere.

F - ing Govt

GGGGGGGRRrrrrrrrrrrrrr





I dont know it just gets more and more stupid but living under a New Labour Govt i expect nothing less.

[House of Usher]

Here is the SUCK i got stuck with at school

I'd've hated Romeo & Juliet, To Kill a Mockingbird, Kes, Roll of Thunder..., The Secret of Nimh (juvenile), David Copperfield, Great Expectations. I'd have hated anything by Dickens. Sense and Sensibility wouldn't be my choice of Jane Austen. I'd've coped with Watership Down, but would still have hated that.

But how in Grud's name can The Great Gatsby have sucked?? That book is a gift to any English Lit. class! Sounds like you missed the point of Catch 22 entirely. I'd have hated that too, and would sooner have read Sense and Sensibility...

For my own part, I got: Henry IV Part 1 (good guy), Oliver Twist (wanker), I'm the King of the Castle (wanker)
...also we read Macbeth, The Merchant of Venice and Brave New World. For larks.

Then I did A-level, and I got: Measure for Measure (boo!), The Tempest (Hooray! - big time), Chaucer - The Prologue (boo!), Paradise Lost - Books I + II (hooray!), Uncle Vanya (boo!), Persuasion (hooray!), Howards End (hooray!), Jude the Obscure (hooray! - but a bit depressing)
...also we read Hamlet and Pride and Prejudice. For larks. (actually, for analytical practice).

...and for French I got École des Femmes, Candide, L'Etranger, La Peste and La Symphonie Pastorale. I failed French, but I enjoyed all the books except Moliere.

Having read 13 books at school I liked and 8 I didn't like, and being penalized in exams for not responding to the text the way examiners wanted, was enough to convince me I didn't want to do an English degree. But on the plus side it gave me the grounding I needed to open up pretty much any work of literature and just start reading.

[House of Usher]

This is pissing me off now this teacher training business.Why is it after everything that has gone on so far which has led up to this point now with the economy am i hearing this bullshit idea about Bankers being prioritised for teacher training courses as if to say the FuckTard Govt seem to think that they are more important than anyone else ?

Indeed. But I think it's more like sign of desperation on the part of government. There aren't enough top maths graduates going into teaching. Believe it or not, banks do hire maths graduates. But the government's not just thinking about helping out redundant bankers. It's also thinking about enticing new maths graduates into teaching who can't now look forward to accounting jobs or whatever it is mathematicians do in the city: "We know there are a lot of fantastic mathematicians, for example, who would have once perhaps gone into the City but now actually might be more interested in a career in teaching" - Cabinet Office Minister Liam Byrn.

Its not as if they left their jobs without being given payoffs and lumpsums of cash

Yeah, it's hard to see why city fatcats are going to be lured by a starting salary of £20-25,000. Which is where, I think, newly graduated maths students come in.

If I were some selfish c*** of a city banker I wouldn't want to work as a schoolteacher. I would live on my own investments, as you suggest, Peter. Except that the culture of city twats was to consume as lavishly and conspicuously as possible because the cash was going to continue rolling in forever. So a lot of them are broke. Good!

I dont see any reason why they should be fastracked into employment before anyone else who may be better qualified.

Well, they wouldn't be. They would have to offer the fast track route to anyone who is equivalently qualified. That would have to include any new graduates in priority subjects. I think a lot of bankers would be surprised at the amount of non-teaching work involved, like lesson planning, paperwork (including producing stupid on-paper evidence of lesson planning, not to help you teach, but to produce to satisfy quality auditors), individual learning plans, inclusivity, etc. Not many of them would stick it for long.

Its a childish simplistic assumption that Bankers should automatically be better at maths.Does a banker have anything near a degree level in maths automatically ?

Only the ones with maths degrees.

Its as stupid and childish as the assumption that New Labour / Liberals/ Marxists / Socialists- the Govt have any real understanding of business/economics

I've never seen any evidence that the New Right have any real understanding of business or economics either. They're very prone to putting their faith in the advice of economic gurus and giving jobs to their best mates from school and university.

[Peter Wolf]

This is pissing me off now this teacher training business.Why is it after everything that has gone on so far which has led up to this point now with the economy am i hearing this bullshit idea about Bankers being prioritised for teacher training courses as if to say the FuckTard Govt seem to think that they are more important than anyone else ?

Indeed. But I think it's more like sign of desperation on the part of government. There aren't enough top maths graduates going into teaching. Believe it or not, banks do hire maths graduates. But the government's not just thinking about helping out redundant bankers. It's also thinking about enticing new maths graduates into teaching who can't now look forward to accounting jobs or whatever it is mathematicians do in the city: "We know there are a lot of fantastic mathematicians, for example, who would have once perhaps gone into the City but now actually might be more interested in a career in teaching" - Cabinet Office Minister Liam Byrn.

Its not as if they left their jobs without being given payoffs and lumpsums of cash

Yeah, it's hard to see why city fatcats are going to be lured by a starting salary of £20-25,000. Which is where, I think, newly graduated maths students come in.

If I were some selfish c*** of a city banker I wouldn't want to work as a schoolteacher. I would live on my own investments, as you suggest, Peter. Except that the culture of city twats was to consume as lavishly and conspicuously as possible because the cash was going to continue rolling in forever. So a lot of them are broke. Good!

I dont see any reason why they should be fastracked into employment before anyone else who may be better qualified.

Well, they wouldn't be. They would have to offer the fast track route to anyone who is equivalently qualified. That would have to include any new graduates in priority subjects. I think a lot of bankers would be surprised at the amount of non-teaching work involved, like lesson planning, paperwork (including producing stupid on-paper evidence of lesson planning, not to help you teach, but to produce to satisfy quality auditors), individual learning plans, inclusivity, etc. Not many of them would stick it for long.

Its a childish simplistic assumption that Bankers should automatically be better at maths.Does a banker have anything near a degree level in maths automatically ?

Only the ones with maths degrees.

Its as stupid and childish as the assumption that New Labour / Liberals/ Marxists / Socialists- the Govt have any real understanding of business/economics

I've never seen any evidence that the New Right have any real understanding of business or economics either. They're very prone to putting their faith in the advice of economic gurus and giving jobs to their best mates from school and university.

Thanks for clarifying that and thanks for understanding what i was saying as well.

What gets me about this current Govt is that they chose to introduce/follow an economic model that was put forward by Alan Greenspan and the Fed which even if you have a rudimentary understanding of economics or less than like i have it was obvious it was going to end in tears and failure.So if i could see this happening then why couldnt Gordon Brown ? Why couldnt anyone in Govt or in the banking sector ?

Its nothing more than gross negligence on the part of Gordon Brown and its unforgivable and Gordon Brown doesnt have a solution because all he is interested in is pursuing a globalist agenda which is partly or even the cause of the economic situation which he still advocates to this day.

The buck stops somewhere and it stops with Gordon Blair.[that was a typo but i left it in anyway]

Its really not that difficult.

Bankers wether they were just traders on the floor or the Bigshots all chose blindly to ride the gravy train for as long as they could and if X amount of the banking sector failed to see or understand where it would ultimately end or chose to ignore it then they all should reap what they sow but its unfortunate that the knock on effects or fallout of it affect everyone else as well .

I do attack the Left a lot but not without good reason and the chances are that Conservatives/Right would have adopted the same economic policy 11 years ago if elected are very very high indeed as there is a bigger picture going on than UK party politics.

[Dark Jimbo]

The Edge - Please be joking.

[House of Usher]

I also had to read Where Angels Fear to Tread, which brings me to my chief complaint about how A-level English was taught at my school... we spent a whole term reading three books for practice we could have done without. Hamlet was brilliant and I've no regrets about that one, but we didn't need to read any Jane Austen or E.M. Forster additional to the prescribed texts!

Tonight I taught the first chapter of Of Mice and Men. Really enjoyed it. The class seemed to as well.

[Roger Godpleton]

I should probably point out that I did actually enjoy University and my horizons were genuinely expanded even though there was a whole bunch of my being depressed.