<strong>Between Rocks and Hard Places</strong>
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Abstract
I have always been interested in the twists and turns of
education policy. It’s tempting to dismiss a lot of it scornfully,
as the ravings of some semi-informed nutters. But the hard
reality is that education is a very difficult area of policy and
one in which it is hard to make an impact quickly. The
political cycle (4 years) frequently demands quicker results
than can be produced – and few education ministers
progress to serious high office. Thatcher I suppose has to be
considered an exception. But her education policy is itself
revealing. If there is a single political idea with which she will
forever be associated, it is ‘privatisation’. Her central belief
was that governments should not run utility companies –
since she believed they could be more efficiently run in the
private sector. Based on this political belief she oversaw the
most enormous sell-off of state assets (telephone/gas/water
etc) and her successor then sold off the railways. She was
an absolute privatiser. But what of her education policy?
education policy. It’s tempting to dismiss a lot of it scornfully,
as the ravings of some semi-informed nutters. But the hard
reality is that education is a very difficult area of policy and
one in which it is hard to make an impact quickly. The
political cycle (4 years) frequently demands quicker results
than can be produced – and few education ministers
progress to serious high office. Thatcher I suppose has to be
considered an exception. But her education policy is itself
revealing. If there is a single political idea with which she will
forever be associated, it is ‘privatisation’. Her central belief
was that governments should not run utility companies –
since she believed they could be more efficiently run in the
private sector. Based on this political belief she oversaw the
most enormous sell-off of state assets (telephone/gas/water
etc) and her successor then sold off the railways. She was
an absolute privatiser. But what of her education policy?
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How to Cite
KIMBELL, Prof Richard.
Between Rocks and Hard Places.
Design and Technology Education: an International Journal, [S.l.], v. 14, n. 2, june 2009.
ISSN 1360-1431.
Available at: <https://www.ariadne.ac.uk/DATE/article/view/245>. Date accessed: 24 sep. 2022.
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Reflection
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