Blair Legacy Number 94 - schools without playgrounds

[BBKing]

One of the Blairite's trumpeting calls is the so-called 'choice' of parents in the schools their offspring go to. This is an illusion, of course, the reality is that you get very little choice and as this horrific story today shows, if you perchance get your offspring into the best-resourced school and wish to comment on the way the school is run, you can generally take a hike - it's being run by big business and central government now, and they aren't interested in little things like your opinion. The result is monstrosities like this:

Britain’s most expensive state school is being built without a playground because those running it believe that pupils should be treated like company employees and do not need unstructured play time.

The authorities at the £46.4m Thomas Deacon city academy in Peterborough, Cambridgeshire, due to open this autumn, also believe that the absence of a playground will avoid the risk of “uncontrollable” numbers of children running around in breaks at the 2,200-pupil school.

“We are not intending to have any play time,” said Alan McMurdo, the head teacher. “Pupils won’t need to let off steam because they will not be bored.”

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/new...cle1752289.ece

However, a least the poor learner bees will be allowed a drink from time to time, or as the humourless <Removed> in charge (or 'headmaster' as they used to be called) puts it:

“[Pupils] will be able to hydrate during the learning experience,” he said.

I suggest that anyone who can talk like that and expect to be taken seriously has no place teaching anyone's children.

[papa smurf]

whats it called saint borstals

[downquark1]

“[Pupils] will be able to hydrate during the learning experience,” he said.

I would have killed for that when I was in primary school. Only got water at lunch time.

I'm serious, I distinctly remember putting wet paper towers under taps and sucking the water out of them.

[Osem]

Special school near here is having 50% of it's already limited outdoor space built on so that it can accommodate double the current number of pupils - half the space for twice the pupils. Mind you they're only special needs kids in Bliar's Britain so who cares about them!

[phaze9]

The same thing happened in my area the Local council sold off the old primary school to developers who turned it into some very nice flats, so what did the council do with the money they "built" if it could be called that another school on the playing fields of the local park. so now we have a very poorly designed and built school building with limited play area for the kids.

[Maggy J]

I'm fairly positive that it's illegal to have no break time.Otherwise they are going to have pupils having to visit the loo during lessons and that's going to be even more of a disruption to lessons.

I'm pretty sure though that if parents challenge it through the courts the school would have to give in.

[BBKing]

Presumably, having not provided any place to have a break, they'd argue that ealthnsafety precluded having all these children going round doing what they want instead of what we tell them, damnit, we paid a lot of money for this school, dontchaknow.

Academy schools. Just say no*

* Except that no one will listen to you.

[Maggy J]

Originally Posted by BBKing

Presumably, having not provided any place to have a break, they'd argue that ealthnsafety precluded having all these children going round doing what they want instead of what we tell them, damnit, we paid a lot of money for this school, dontchaknow.

Academy schools. Just say no*

* Except that no one will listen to you.

At the very least Staff are entitled to a break and I'm looking forward to the furore if they try to deny staff 'comfort breaks'.

[Xaccers]

Oh well, no playgrounds will go quite well with no classrooms:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/6654935.stm

A council is calling time on formal classes and rigid timetables amid plans to rebuild all 11 of its secondary schools as hi-tech learning centres.
Merseyside's Knowsley Council is replacing 1950s-style secondary schools with centres where children follow programmes matching their interests.

Pupils will be given their assignments in groups of 120 in the morning before dispersing to wi-fi zones to study.

Now I don't know about any of you lot, but when we were given time in the library to study or work on class projects, most of the kids dossed about and did no work.

[Anonymouse]

No break time? That would be illegal if they were "employees". All that an absence of unstructured playtime will do is cause the kids to goof off - or worse - during lessons, and I wouldn't blame them. Kids need to be kids.

I've never heard such utter claptrap even in this sorry country. "Employees", indeed. They'll be expecting them to do overtime next.
Hasn't anyone mentioned their human rights yet? Does Article 31 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child ring a bell?

And to turn this idiocy on its head, if they're to be treated like employees:

Will they receive Health & Safety training?
Are they to be issued with steel-toecapped boots?
Will they receive the minimum wage? If not, why not?
What about paid holidays, sick leave, bereavement leave, time off for family emergencies?
What, if any, trade union will they join?
What company will they be working for? How much will their National Insurance contributions be? What income tax band will they be in?
Will there be a company pension?
What about unfair dismissal and redundancy issues? Equal Opportunities? The Sex Discrimination Act?

And so on.