>>it's also a question of having the correct "required" subjects at appropriate stages, a real selection of optional/selected subjects,

Bollocks. All you need to teach someone are a teacher that knows teh subject, and a teacher that actually knows how to teach. Preferably the same person, tbh.

>>the right framework for providing a taste of different subjects

Do you mean a school?

>>I mean a way to identify what people are good at and what they enjoy, so that they can learn useful and engaging things

So some kind of system where people can learn a bit about everything, like about crevasses and arêtes for instance, so they can understand what they like/are good at and want to study in more depth? Like at, for instance, a university or something?

And I disagree that school is a system that doesn't work for most people. Surely it doesn't work for some people, but most? Come on, Peter. Could schools be better? Hell yes, mainly be teaching teachers how to actually teach, and teaching Heads how to be proper administrators.

What I'd like to see is a system where the party with the most votes wins, not one where the most seats does.

I think in the last election more of the population voted LibDem, however the cons won more seats and thus the election overall (kinda).

For example if out of 10 seats 4 are won by the LD and 6 by Con, Con take power. But 8 million people in total may have voted LD in the 4 seats and only 4million in total voted Con in the 6 seats. So twice as many of the population may have wanted a LD government than a Con one but because they won less seats the Cons take power.

I have a politics blog. I'm not supposed to blog about politics due to my job, so i don't engage in any partisan/party stuff. I mostly blog about how politics work, about parliamentary procedure and a lot about the UK coalition since i figure blogging about UK politics will be less against the rules than blogging about Canadian politics.

So naturally, i've blogged a fair bit about the referendum. The past couple of weeks, the keyword search activity on my blog has been really interesting. I'm getting so many hits from people in the UK looking for info about AV, trying to clarify the crapola the No side has been spouting, etc. So much so that i've started writing targetted blog posts to address some of the most common issues people seem to be looking for (if i didn't already have something written). UK visitors have pushed my little blog into the top 10 among Canadian political blogs. I will miss the traffic boost once this thing is over and my blog returns to its usual anonymity.

On a related note, we had a general election on Monday which resulted in a Conservative majority (boo!). So i ran the seats that weren't won with 50%+1 of the vote under a simulated AV count and it resulted in the Cons losing 19 seats and their majority. Plus the 2nd and 3rd place parties would have commanded a majority of seats, so could have formed a coalition or something. Just saying'.

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/armando-iannucci-why-do-i-want-to-change-the-system-the-answer-really-is-as-simple-as-1-2-3-2279171.html

And his dog had no nose!

well fuck the lot of you education experts - try doing the job if you think teachers are generally shit. In my experience the vast majority of teachers are fully committed, hard-working people who care a lot about what their students get out of being in school. They put in ridiculousy long hours and put up with a load of crap from kids who don't want to be there. And my experience is 6 different educational settings that covers the range from selective grammar schools, further education and bottom of the heap secondary moderns so I'm pretty well-qualified to comment.

If you really want someone to blame, look at society and parents. Education and being educated is looked down on in the uk. It's seen as being ok to be ignorant. A significant minority of parents offer no support to schools, teachers or the principle of being open to new ideas.

The only other jobs where you have the potential to be told to fuck off, to your face, on a daily basis are things like police and health care. But fuck it, schools and teachers are an easy target aren't they :@

Dragging the thread back onto topic, I'm voting yes.
I was already voting yes, but the nasty tone and lies within the 'No' campaign has just made me more committed.

I don't think anyone's dissing teachers particularly, they're asked to do an impossible job because the system is fucked from top to bottom. We have a enlightenment/early industrial education system in a postmodern/post-industrial/information-driven world, and it's not at all appropriate.

Having said that, in my experience, the vast majority of teachers were shit.