No, They Should Not.

The level of idiocy to which this country is reducing is epitomised in the desire to infantilize all of us. This leads to the kind of absurd suggestion that children are suitable people to conduct recruitment and selection activities.

More schools should involve pupils in the recruitment of teachers, says the children’s commissioner for England.

A survey of 2,000 children aged nine to 16 for commissioner Maggie Atkinson found two-thirds would like a role in the recruiting process.

Maggie Atkinson is a fool. When carrying out recruitment and selection for any role, the prime driver is competence. To understand whether someone is competent, you have to have firstly, an in-depth understanding of the occupational standards applicable to the role. You have to be able to measure candidates against that standard and do so in an even-handed manner so that the strongest candidate is selected. This requires a competent recruitment and selection process conducted by competent individuals who have received the relevant training and have demonstrated their suitability –  against the relevant standard (you see a theme here?). That’s how competence management works. Here speaks someone who does this for a living.

Children in education, by the very fact that they are children in education, are not competent to do this and should not be allowed anywhere near the process. Children are under the care of their parents, guardians and teachers for a reason –  they are not yet capable –  or competent to do so for themselves. They are most certainly not suitable people to be involved in the running of schools or the recruitment and selection process for teaching staff. And people who think they are, have demonstrated a remarkable level of incompetence themselves.

The survey suggested some 87% of children feel they know what makes a good teacher.

This is subjective nonsense. I don’t give a flying fig for what 87% of children feel they know. It is neither here nor there. It is meaningless drivel. They are not trained and qualified, so they do not know what makes a good teacher and quite possibly do not like them when they encounter them. The only people who can say that are those qualified and competent to do so –  those who understand the technical aspect of training delivery and can accurately analyse the soft skills required. I.E, those competent in recruitment and selection against objective standards, using a robust selection process. Children may think they know best. When I was a child, I thought I knew best. As an adult, I am aware that I was misinformed. Maggie Atkinson is misinformed. And plain wrong. Given that she is in a position of influence, she is dangerously wrong.

Dr Atkinson said: “Young people are a school’s customers, and they see lots of different teaching styles over the course of a school career.”

No, the parents are the school’s customers. And it is reasonable of them to expect the school to use competent adults when applying the recruitment and selection process for teaching staff. The idea that children are competent to know what is in their best interests is infantile in the extreme.

5 Comments

  1. Yes I can imagine me as a kid sat on that selection panel.
    “Will you give us sweets, let us mess around in class all day, let us go home early and never EVER attempt to teach maths?”

    “Your hired!”

    As for “Young people are a schools customers.” I think that’s a Universities customers. Sadly. But thanks for admitting which way education is going. I’m scared now.

  2. I recall from my own childhood that those teachers who were good at their jobs were also the disciplinarians, so were not necessarily popular. That’s why children are not competent to make such decisions. They are not adults and should not be treated as such.

    It makes my blood boil, too.

  3. That’s just what an unruly class of adolescents needs – a feeling of power over their teachers!

    Because in their voluntarily limited minds, the converse will apply; consulting them about recruitment will give them the impression they have a say in retention or sacking too.

    The rot set in with ‘child-centered learning’; we have reared a generation of little emperors (and empresses) with an unprecedented sense of entitlement and education is just another victim of the phenomemon.

    Take, for example, this genuine quote from a 16-year-old boy:
    “I don’t have to learn this – you’re supposed to teach it to me.”

  4. We had a couple of disciplinarians who were also very entertaining. We knew there weas a line not to be crossed, but were still able to have fun learning.

    Personally I believe the rot started when we let the anti-smacking nutters get a foot in the door. Adult authority was fatally undermined at this point. Without a physical sanction as the bottom line kids began to realise they were untouchable.

    These self righteous loonies did not realise that often it is not the smacking that keeps the class in order but the fact that it is there as an essential part of the discipline “toolbox”.

    Of the 60 or so Teachers I had during my schooling I can honestly say that only one of them abused his right to smack. So we kept a low profile around him and remained on our best behavoir when in sight of him.

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