Gove and his Building Fund

Is it any wonder that people are put off politics when they have to try and decipher through the playground nitpickings of its leading characters?

He kicked me first, but she bit me first, but he called me a name first but she gave me a funny stare!

Politicians – this is what you sound like. You are so egotistical and determined that you are right that you forget to look at the facts in front of you. Playing tit for tat games with statistics is bad. Playing tit for tat with statistics when it is affecting the state of our education and thus dramatically affecting our children and young people is just plain abhorrent.

Mr. Gove today stated that his party was providing more capital spend over the next four years than New Labour had provided over eight years. So there! And, he added, he was doing that even though there was a 60% drop in funding.

Now as I have stated before, I ain’t too good at numbers. So when Mr. Gove says that in four years he is going to spend £15.8bn compared with Labour’s £20bn over eight years, then even a numerically challenged person like me can see that there is a shortfall of £4.2 bn.

Is that right or do I need to go back to class?

Obviously, there is the issue that if they then spend an additional amount of money subsequent to that should they get re-elected, then there is every possibility that they will indeed match the figure that New Labour spent. However, as it stands, that is not the case. They have not spent the money, and meanwhile, there are overcrowded schools and dilapidated buildings throughout the country that are not fit for purpose, let alone being creative environments in which our children should be allowed to learn.

http://blogs.channel4.com/factcheck/factcheck-goves-schoolboy-error-on-funding-for-school-buildings/8312

The fact that Gove looks like an overgrown school child who has just returned to class from a playground tiff makes the whole of this political ball-play even more amusing, if only it weren’t for the fact that once more, the poorest in our society are taking the blame, the suffering and the neglect.

Having read the article with the link above, there is only one real statistic of note within all this tittle-tattle, and it is this. In 2014/5 the capital budget for education will be about the same level as 2002/3 in real terms. Added to this, there is the fact that the Department of Education’s capital spending decrease is far more significant than other governmental departments, and Mr. Gove cannot talk his way out of that one.

It is as it is.

It is at it is and there is still a huge programme of school structural redevelopment to take place.

Just because there were different phases of the Building Schools for the Future initiative, whereby some schools were selected to be prioritised, did not mean that other schools not in Round One, Two, Three or Four were fit for purpose.

All it meant was that their needs were not quite as dire as the needs of those who went forward in Phase One.

Of course, that is before we even get onto the issue of Academies, and I am not sure where all the funding came from for some of the spanking new schools that rose from the proverbial ashes.

Well actually I do.

However, I do know that these institutions managed to spring up pretty quickly when both governments were trying to sell the Academies policy to voters and parents alike, irrespective of whether this was the right thing for the children involved.

Capital spending on school buildings has been atrocious for many years. The audacity of the Conservative party to stand there and announce how generous they are being is stupefying when it is clear that the demise of many a school’s physical structure was largely due to the gross lack of funding between – let’s say 1979 and 1997.

And New Labour should not be patting themselves on the back too strongly. Their policy on education with its disregard for the holistic and progressive view of education misplaced far too much money on initiative after initiative in the holy mantra of raising standards. They didn’t rush immediately to address the buildings or the wider purpose of education.

In the eighties and henceforth, important buildings that represented the development of education were left to rot; from the School’s Board buildings of the 1880s to the modern flat roofed 60s style.

The school where I taught managed to get some local authority funding in 1983 in order to build a new school hall but the incompetence within the design left a huge void of unused space below this spanking new room. The cold that came from below on many a wintry day meant that you could not possibly do physical activity in there or hold an assembly without putting loads of floor mats down – which would probably not be allowed now due to health and safety regulations.

And talking of which, this design built a set of stairs that were so steep and dangerous, it was a miracle that no child ever fell down them and cracked their head open.

But no amount of money poured into the school hall development was going to compensate for the rest of the building, which remained a Victorian masterpiece of draft-ridden rooms and ceilings that bulged worryingly.

We survived. We did our best but this building was not fit for the purpose and style of teaching that we chose to adopt.

This particular school was not in Phase One, Two or Three of the Building Schools for the Future. It remains as it is with a few alterations; plugging the gap or possibly sticking a finger in the dyke waiting for the water to eventually break the bank.

According to the catastrophic financial forecast from Mr. Gove, with or without his inflated suggestions of expenditure, this school will remain, in essence untouched since its construction nearly 130 years ago.

There are such wonderful examples around the country of schools that are fit for purpose and have been built specifically to consider the needs of the 21^st century child and the type of pedagogy that we know is the most appropriate for their needs.

It is just a crying shame that all schools cannot be rebuilt in this way, by thoughtful architects and teachers working together, to create the type of environment that is particularly conducive to learning, both inside and outside the actual building.

Our children deserve more and the politicians should keep their immature and ill-thought mouths shut until they have worked out how to stop bickering and get on with doing something to support the development of quality education in the 21^st Century.