Yipeee it's Christmas. Well nearly chums. And give yourselves a huge pat on the back for standing it for another difficult term.

From September if you look back it's been nothing but hassle. More white papers than you could shake a stick at. But hey, Boris will soon provide us with a few laughs god bless him. That ratfink Blair and Miss Kelly will hopefully soon elope together somewhere and give us some peace for a bit.
I'm with Prescott. He might look like a bulldog chewing a wasp, but he's the voice of reason at the moment. NO MORE CHANGES. WE DON'T WANT ANY THANKYOU TONY.

I still miss Ted Wragg's column and his words of wisdom and hope he is making them smile up there somewhere.

Do have yourselves a good rest over Christmas to one and all of my six or seven readers. Do drop me an e-mail over Christmas if youv'e nothing better to do. It's all downhill now to Easter, GCSE mocks, AS level entries, Coursework, Verifiers, Moderators, Inspectors (OK Billy thats enough now Ed - back into your box filled with straw)

See you all sooooon

BYEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

Love Billy

xxxxxxxx

Just heard that David Cameron has asked Boris Johnson to be the Conservatives new Minister for Higher Education.

hahahahahahahahahahahah.

happy Christmas xxxxxx

Following my rant yesterday about the new QIA Quango set up to shore up the LSC, you only need to get the Guardian to see how much money we waste in this country on non-teacing, management beauracracy.

Guardian Public Secor Jobs pages
P13 Operations Director LSDA £90,000 plus PRP + Pension
plus Finance Director LSDA £75,000 plus PRP plus Pension
P13 Director of Skills South West RDA £76,344 plus excellent benefits
P13 Executive Head Learning Disabilities Services £85,000.

P14 This is a good one...
Head of Service National Parking Adjudication Service £50,000 working for Manchester City Council

Staggering isnt it what these type of jobs pay. All of the money would be better spent buying more books, and teaching kids to read, write and add up before employing thes king of no-mark jobsworths.

The latest wheeze for 'easy' jobs in the FE sector is the Qwality Improvement Agency. This is being set up to focus on "supporting the drive for excellence in the learning and skills sector", from the corporate-looking advert in the Guardian today.

These are more overpaid jobs with handsome bonus schemes just like the LSC. More money ripped out of cash-starved colleges to fund a lot of old shite basically. It's really interesting that the QIA is based in ....wait for it...yes, it's in COVENTRY! Well what a surprise. Shut down half of the LSC last week and then open it up again next week as the QIA. Brilliant move Ruth Kelly, godda hand it too ya clap clap clap!

Jobs such as the following are available...get these fancy sounding gems.

Director of Knowledge and Intelligence (up to £65K + benefits) (Wow this does sound impressive...wonder how many GCSEs C or above you'd need?)(Essential...Applicants must have both Knowledge and Intelligence)
Head of the Chief Executives Office (up to £65K plus benefits) (Same salary as previous - hope they get on!)
Head of Communications £55,700 plus bens
Head of Strategic Partnerships £55,700 plus bens
Programme managers £55,700 plus bens (Doesn't say how many, probably 47 one per LSC region)
Programme Development Advisors £49,750 plus bens (Again doesn't state how many probably 47)
Research Manager £49,750 plus bens
Senior Procurement Advisor £50,000 plus bens
Improvement Services Advisor £42,200 plus bens
Divisional Support Managers £42,200 plus bens
Programme Development Officers £38,500 plus bens
Policy Officer £38,500 plus bens

Staggering, just staggering. What are these guys gonna do on day one I wonder? Have a meeting to set themselves some targets, like how many pencils each of them should use in a year. More meaningless drivel from the Governments spin machine the DFES.
I bet none of the ones appointed have ever taught a fecking day in their lives.

I hear there are a range of other posts that will be available soon inc...

Chief Washer up £38,500 plus bens
Head Tea Person (can't call them Tea Boys anymore..Ed) £30,000 + bens
Inspector Gadget £65,000 plus bens
Commander in chief of Chocolate Hob-Nobs £42,500 + bens
Manager of paper Shufflers £38,500 + bens
Head Pencil Sharpener and Rubber monitor £42,000 + bens.

All based in the SAME modern expansive building as the Head LSC office was. Whoopee!!!

Be interesting to see if any of the staff SACKED from the LSC for doing bugger-all end up in these jobs. I'll bet you we see the same smarmy, faceless, chinless, spineless bean-counting twits as as we did before with the LSC.

What really bugs me with this is the BENEFITS PACKAGES AVAILABLE WITH THESE JOBS. Bonuses and Benefits earned on the back of hard-working teachers. Whenever did we as teachers ever get any BENEFITS?

Talk about Lions led by Donkeys. Same old FE eh!

Oh I forgot the web address if you want one of the jobs. (Hands off the Pencil sharpener post, that's mine)

It is www.loadofoldbollocks.org.uk
or www.nofeckinmoneyforfe.con

no seriously its
www.qiacareers.org.uk

Love Billy

xxx

NATFHE Strike Day 16th November 2005

Following Sir Andrew Foster's report published today, once again it emphasises how FE are the poor relations in the education game. FE has for decades been every governments kicking dog and poor relation and we who work in it are sick to death of it. We in FE demand fairly funded colleges. We see new buildings in schools, academies, super-teachers on £40 grand plus and want some of that too. The University sector too has had more spent on it and better treatment for its staff.

Why is it for example that sixth forms get more that FE Colleges - are students with two A-levels in Psychology and Business studies valued more highly in society than a student who has just qualified as a plumber? In Blairs Britain you are right it is. Its down to class really. A-levels = middle class = more cash, City and Guilds = working class = Lower class proletariat = less money. Give that middle class lot more money and that working class lot less. Short and simple.

This is one reason why I will be supporting the industrial action on the 16th November, the same day as the AOC Conference. We want to show Ruth Kelly how strong we feel about the way this government has persisted with the starvation of funds from FE and maintained the inequalities between institutions and teachers across education as a whole.

We demand a fair and just funding system, that's all.

BBD

Fozzies report today on FE...yipeee!

Well wadya think FE folk?
More of the same i'd say. Failing Colleges again isn't it. The big stick treatment and lets close those failing colleges shall we. Wonder if the guy ever went near an FE college in the twelve months it took to write the report?
Nah, probably not, never her saw him in my college, mind you the Principal isn't here much either.

So heres my first skim through assessment of Fozzy Fosters end of course report.

Foster A.
Improving Morale in the sector: 0 out of ten
Improving salaries of FE staff: 1 out of ten
Use of Blair's spin & new labour jargonese: Spot on lots of points here Fozzy - lots of meaningless waffley-shite.
Crapita Inc and Acme Colleges to be running colleges soon: Aye, Looks likely.
Key Skills....aye yes he's quite keen on that one 5/10

Feedback....You must must get out more Andrew and talk to the actual practitioners in the field. A good try on this assignment, but do keep up the progress you've made and one day you will be able to get a real job in a factory.

Total score 36/100 FAIL There, Fozzy got my retaliation in first mate...

.

I was really sad on Thursday when I read of Ted Wragg's death in the news. For me and I guess lots of other people in education, Ted was a hero and a father figure who brought a bit of common-sense logic to the education scene over many many years.

I used to love Ted's back page column in the Times Ed supplement every fortnight and it would always make me chuckle after a week at the chalk-face. I am really very sad now he's gone. Like John Peel, there isn't anyone around who can fill his shoes, he was so unique. I did have the ultimate pleasure of hearing Ted at an after-dinner speech in 1993 at Exeter, his old stomping ground and he was an absolute hoot at the dinner, I'll never forget it. He told one joke about the guy who finds Chris Woodhead, Kenneth Baker, John Major and Norman Tebbit in a train carriage and finding he only has three bullets, proceeds to shoot Woodhead three times. Ted told it so straight-faced and far better than I ever could and I can still raise a smilae just at that.

So rest in peace Ted in the great University in the sky. No more Swinethorpe Comp, Mrs Smegma the Ofsted inspector or any more mindless DfEE circulars to read now old mate, you will be really, really missed old chum. God bless you Ted.

BBD

Phew. Made it. The half-term break is nearly over but yours truly has spent it working, catching up on all manner of paperwork, prepping lessons for next week, making sure my kids are entered for their exams, checking last years retention and achievements, quality and so on. We should be getting an OFSTED inspection this year so everyone here is panicking a bit.

Its been a busy 7 weeks since the start of term and only another seven to Christmas. My groups have settled down nearly and are starting to learn now. We have just started Key Skills testing, we have had kids on outward bound week and some really good outside speakers in to put Public Services and Sport in context.

Just think on Tuesday it's November the first. Seven weeks to Christmas and half the academic year will be done. The hard part has been done now. I can lighten up a bit from now with the kids and start to enjoy it. Still, I'm getting a bit too old for this job and really want out ASAP. It gets tougher every year and i'm not enjoying it like I did, when every lesson was a buzz and an adrenaline rush. All I get nowadays are migraines and trips to Boots to buy more Anadin Extras.

Heads down were going in for round two.

Love

Billy
xxx

Yes Tony it's time to go. So us teachers have decided to help you out as you ride off into the sunset.
After all the pain of reform, reform, reform all the teachers in schools and colleges have had a little whip round and chipped in to buy you a little two-wheeled present. It's a second-hand one but all we could afford
We really hope you like it. Looked after, it could give you years of service.

We teachers are saving up again now to buy a tandem for Ruth kelly and that nice Steven Adonis (unelected) who you Mr Blair, put in charge of the education department. What have they done the pair of them apart from write lots and lots of meaningless papers non of which teachers quite understand.

When you eventually do retire Tony, why not think about re-training to become one of us - bet you hadn't thought of that. With all your experience, you could quickly rise up the ranks and be a head in no time at all. If you join next year mind you'll have to work until your'e 90 as the new changes come into play for teachers pensions, so better make a move soon.

Sorry to rant on about this but Blair and his cronies have really arsed up the schools and colleges in this country and the sooner he's gone the better for all.

Here lies Education, buried in a landslide of White papers.
It was once fun to work as a teacher until all the reforms came along.
Reforms - more frequent than a number 73 bus.
The more the reforms came and the more the staff left.
So, sod off Blair.
Sod off Kelly and thanks for nothing.

(Billy I didn't know you were a poetician - Ed.)

BBD

Reform, reform, reform. More pain on the way for the troops in schools and colleges announced today to a public who bored with it all. Why can't Blair piss off and retire and let's get someone else in to set the priorities in another area that needs sorting out. Education has had reform after reform since 1997 and staff are sick to the back teeth and tired of it.

Why is it always education that has to be reformed? Why can't the Government be reformed instead? After eight years of Labour we've seen more White Papers than you could paper the House of Commons with, more painful reforms than the Tories managed in eighteen years.

So to Tony and Ruth - shove off, we don't want your reforms.

BBD

SCOOP

I read in the Gruniad today that tomorrow (Tues 20th) sees our very own FE sector up for debate in the Commons. Centre-stage, wow, I'm impressed. Quite a lot has happened in the FE sector over the last week and now this. Parity with the Schools sector - we want it, we deserve it. 13% difference between our salaries and schools and we want the same funding per student as the Sixth-form sector. I'm so sick of FE playing the Cinderella role. I want to get glammed up for a change and be thought of as an equal with the schools, sixth forms and university types. Fe's always been the poor relation. So come on Blair, Kelly and whoever is FE Minister this week. Let's have it.

Can you guys see it happening? Fingers crossed it's delivered.

Watch this space

Billie

xxx

I read this week that Alan Donald the 'latest' Pensions Minister, wants to increase the pensionable age for teachers beyond 65, until 70 for some staff. What bloody nerve the Government have. They really are going to face a massive backlash over this issue as the Pension is the only thing left in the FE sector.

I have been unfortunate to witness during my 25 years in colleges, a number of colleagues who have suffered heart-attacks in college, some needed bypass operations, some developed mental illnesses, some suffered cancers and others develop all other manner of nervous illnesses, all in the line of duty brought about mainly by stress. I once witnessed a senior colleague faint in a meeting and carried out on a stretcher. I have only ever known one teacher in FE reach 65, who was actually still teaching on the day he left.

I came into FE as a lecturer in the early 1980's. It was a great place to work then. Nationally agreed 21 hours contact per week plus departmental duties. Time off if you worked in the evenings. Holidays were comparable with schools. Silver and Puple book conditions of service, a nationally agreed pay award. Burnham conditions, a career structure that started at L1, then L2, then SL, then PL. These are all long gone. It went downhill from 1993 when the Tory government brought colleges 'Incorporation'. At the college I was at at the time we all had a celebratory party. Yipee and pictures in the local newspaper showing how happy we all were. Then the Grim Reaper showed up. The Uriah Heap style, Further Education Funding Council - the FEFC, the fore-runner of the LSC knocked at the door. They didn't actually knock, more like blew the hinges off. All good things we had fought for since the dawn of education went flying into the abyss.

Conditions deteriorated. Strikes at colleges. Several winters of discontent. The reforms went slowly at first. Then, a light in the distance. Four years later in 1997, Tony Blair came to power on the anthem of ahem...education, education, education, yours truly thought, yeah, wow, whoo - hoo, we're now going to really go places. I voted for him and encouraged others to do the same. FE would be on the up and we would get back to normality and parity with schools. I'm still waiting. I guess you are too. Bliar lied, cheated and conned the FE sector big style. He, ahem...'reformed' the FEFC and replaced it with the LSC. Teaching staff left in droves to the sixth-form and schools sector. Teaching staff had to jump through more hoops to meet more and more Funding body targets. Funding to colleges was cut if people didn't complete or pass courses. Adult and leisure courses were chopped as they were not part of the Government's skills agenda. We had to take in more dissaffected kids from schools as they couldn't handle them. Contact times increased so that staff had to teach longer hours and then still had to mark and prepare classes on top of that. Not only that, staff had to attend nonsense like quality days, take part in self-assessment days, team-building, to try and make us comply with the new regime. It was more students, less money, bigger classes. It led to bums-on-seats, no resources and more staff off on the sick.

So each year, conditions have got steadily worse and worse, thanks mainly to Mr Blair, and a succession of education ministers who have systematically shit on people in the FE sector since 1997 - for over 8 years.
In 2003 the Blair Government said it was going to review Public sector pensions because we 'didnt have enough money in the kitty to pay for them'. Before the election in May 2005, the Governments proposals were dropped, but the've reared their ugly head again and this week at the TUC conference, and thanks to Alan Donald, the pensions issue has been stirred up once again.

People in FE have got to make a stand here. Blair and his cronies have to be given a bloody nose on the issue of Pensions and Donald told to fuck off or we will be teaching until we're 70. (Sorry for the language everyone but it's what Bob Geldof would say.)

My message to Alan Donald and Tony Blair tonight is this, mess with our Pensions gentlemen, and you will unleash hell.

A very angry and passionate Billy tonight.

/>

Announced on Sunday (Why do the Government pick a Sunday to announce such a load of old tosh?) were our glorious leaderene Roof Kelly's latest plans to expose under-performing teachers according to the BBC. This scam (sorry, scheme) would make schools and colleges publish details of pupils' achievements that could damage staff morale, unions have said.
The proposal, a central part of (yet another) Education White Paper, will let parents use the data to complain to the inspection service Ofsted.

Education Secretary Ruth Kelly said the plan was not about "teacher-bashing".

Yeah right Roof. Sounds just like that old TV programme "The Prisoner" to me. Grades awarded 1 - 5 for staff, teachers asking each other is 1 a high score or is it the other way round?

"Where am I?"
You are in the college
"How did I get here?"
You are number three...
"Who is number one?"
"What does that mean?"
Congratulations number three you have just been Ofstedded
"How do I get out of this F£$%^*g job?"....
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

For the rest of the year expect staff walking round the corridors zombie-like with large numbers painted on them. Great. Well done Roof. What number are you then? And how are you getting along with that nice Lord Adonis chap?

How did induction week go for you?

Monday - chaos, what else. No classrooms and the painters are still in from the summer and three kids are sent home covered in paint. Cover for a colleage who is off sick having thought the afternoon I could have a long lunch - wrong.

Tuesday more chaos - classrooms ready but stink of Dulux and we have to have all the windows open. The place resembles some cheap TV makeover job where the only colour they had was trade off-white, so everything got done in that. Meanwhile down the corridor in the management section (off-limits to kids and staff) the new blue carpet, potted plants, air conditioning and colour scheme to match the college logo looks (jealously) nice. Team building with the kids in Public Services National Diploma - a map reading exercise which comprises a quiz to find all the fire extinguishers in the college. They will find this very useful in later life I tell them as they already look pissed off and it's only Day 2.

Wednesday - crisis. Our new Head of Faculty calls in sick. She's only been here a month and the signs for her long-term committment don't look too good. With no timetables for the day we are all in shtuck. Lets watch a few videos...a brief respite. Star Wars IV and an analysis of what Lucas meant by "the Force". This takes up all morning and the kids love the debate. We do the shields exercise to get them all standing up and talking about themselves.

Thursday - from crisis back to chaos. Head of Faculty decides to come back to work and we all receive our timetables for next week. 25 hours contact. Not too bad. Go to the Gym to tone up at lunch time.

Friday - TGIF. No kids today. Chaos? - couldn't care less now its weekend and can at least start planning my classes for next week. Most of it Iv'e got in hand but do some searches on the web and find some good stuff.

God I love this job. Some fun kids this year - should be more stories for BBD.

Billy xxx

If you've watched any of the early episodes of the X-Factor, you will have seen the staged predictability of the show with its highs and lows, good, bad and uglies - and that's just the panel members.

I think they should bring in the same technique for appointing FE staff. It might go a bit like this.

TANIA aged about 20, enters stage left, long blonde hair, blue eyes. Dressed in a smart black suit, heels, looking very much Miss Selfridge. Putting her briefcase down she moves centre stage to face the panel.
------------------------------------------------

PANEL: Hi, and you are?
TANIA: Hi, my names TANIA.
PANEL: Well you are looking smart today. (Panel mutter among themselves)
PANEL: And do you think you have the X-factor to start a career
in teaching in further education?
TANIA: O'h, yeah, its me dream you see. I love Science.
Me mum and Dad right, they know I can do it and
I've got talent.
PANEL: OK then Tania, what are you going to perform for us?
TANIA: I'm going to describe Newtons Third Law of motion and how it
affects our everyday lives.
PANEL: Wow, well, the college is very short of sciene lecturers
at the moment, so, off you go.....
TANIA: Well, there were this geezer called Newton and he were in
hees sittin in is garden one day, when this ruddy great
lemon fell on his head, and...
PANEL: Hang on a minute, you were doing well until the Lemon.
Newton wasn't hit on the head by a bloody lemon,
it was an apple.
TANIA: Nah, you're wrong , thats not what I was taught at skool!
PANEL: (all with arms folded - scowling)
And what school did you go to luvvie?
TANIA: Blogginsthorpe Academy Skoowel - one of them new jobs that
that Charlie Clarke built. It were brilliant.
PANEL: Look Tania, its obvious, you haven't got a clue, you don't
look right, your hairs a mess, you cant speak properly
and you have NO TALENT to teach.
TANIA: (Through streams of tears) Well it's me dream, me dream.
PANEL: Well, How do you fancy being an Assistant Principal instead?
£48K, Car, no teaching, you can surf the web and look
out of your window most of the day. Do you think you could
do that?
TANIA: Oh could I, PLEEEEASE give me a try, I'll make you proud,
I will honest.
PANEL: When can you start? How about Monday?
TANIA: Well, I'll have to ditch my job at the bettin office.
PANEL: OK then, look forward to seeing you back here on Monday
at 8.30 Tania. (Tania exits)
PANEL: Phew, strewth, how many more do we need?
SHARON and LOUIE:
That's one Prinicipal, another 8 Assistant principals,
Three Heads of Department,
16 FT lecturers, 176 PT lecturers...god, we'll be here till
bleedin Christmas.

(And they were)

Staff - the most precious asset any organisation can have.

Following up on the proposed new GCSE courses, a colleague has written to suggest the following new course. Going back to basics a wee bit but none-the-less a surefire hit with the LSC, as it will bring in loads of much needed funding for colleges.

GCSE in Chimney Sweeping Technology. Covers the historical aspects of chimney sweeping. How to train and select small children (or tiny people) for the very purpose of climbing and cleaning sooty chimleys. (come on, all that ended some time ago Ed.) How to make useful trinkets out of soot, brush and bamboo selection and a special section written by Dick Van Dyke on rooftop dancing and communication skills. Learn how to say "cor, blimey guvnor, is that the time", in your best Americockney accent. The course links well to Key Skills in IT, Communication and Number. For example, instruct learners on how to bag and weigh soot and calculate the radius of a brush head. Learn how to communicate with rich and famous people and speak poshly prior to shinnying up the chimney for a few coppers (come on now Billy, that's enough now Ed.)

BBD :-)

Tomorrow (Tuesday 30th Aug) beckons a new term for all of us who work on planet FE (Hip Hooray!). I wonder what it will bring?
Another year of broken promises for FE by the Government?
More administrative red tape than you can shake a stick at?
More jobs and money for the waste-of-space LSC?
More inspections and quality reports for hard-working staff to put up with?
More honest hard-working staff leaving the sector to work at Tescos for more money and better prospects.
More meaningless appraisals thrice a year with your line manager that end up with no extra money - just extra work?
More attractive bonuses for the bean-counting staff of the LSC?
Higher exam pass rates (Well what else)
Lower salary increases than any other public-sector organisation.
Do you know our College have not offered staff a pay award this year and there are dozens more like ours. The pay differential between FE and schools / sixth forms has increased year on year since new Labour came to power in 1997. FE STAFF ARE NOW PAID 13% LESS THAN SCHOOLS
FE has been well and truly shat on by this poxy Government and the Tories since Incorporation in 1993.

But hey ho hum, lets go to work with a smile chums! Soon be Xmas.

BBD

Yes, we all knew it didn't we. They're er, up again.
One girl got 17 GCSEs with A*, a record.
Now come on credit where it's due folks, remember us teachers that helped get these results.

The worrying trend is GCSE modern languages which seem to be on a downward spiral recruitment wyse. As the dominant language of the commercial world and the Internet is English, one wonders where it will all end. Will everyone on the planet by 2050 really ALL speak English?
Good to see GCSE's in vocational subjects taking off. What we really need is more caterers, hairdressers, plumbers and motor mechanics rather than language specialists anyway, so fair play ti the awarding bodies, the schools and the pupils here.
I'm thinking of writing a new GCSE in ferreting, that will include how to look after your ferret, ferreting in a post-modern society, the economics of running your own ferreting business and ferreting as an Olympic sport for 2012. Pilot schools in Barnsley have been identified where ferreting is the main sport after fishing and welly-throwing. Available through the AQA in 2007.

BBD

More revelations from Edexcel today, the awarding winning exam body who have announced today that their administrative staff have been brought in to mark RE GCSE exam papers.
Come to think of it the GCSE exams are so simple anyone could mark them.

Example
Q1. Name one of the 10 Commandments.

Q2. Complete the following, Jesus was the son of Mary and -------

Q3. In the Old Testament, how long did it take God to make the earth?

Q4. Name one of Jesus's disciples (hint none of these were female)

Hey ho, expect more funny tales from Edexcel, OCR, and the rest this week as the GCSE results reach a 100% pass rate. God - they will be giving GCSE's away with petrol soon.

Billy

According to Private Eye's "Number Crunching" this week,

50% Drop in students taking A-levels in French or German in past 10 years.

96.2: pass rate in 2005.

Makes you think doesn't it.

One College Principal in todays press has stated that, "Suggestions that the (A-level) exams are being dumbed down are ridiculous".Yeah right pal, maybe not all the exams but is Media Studies that difficult a subject yeah?

Once again the A-level results have improved over the previous year. 97% of those taking an A-level will now end up passing the course.

The media always ridicule this figure which has improved year on year for the past 18 years. Credit is rarely given to the hard working teachers (and students) who struggle to achieve the standard year on year. Colleges are paid by results remember, and so there is a tempatation to coach students rather than teach to the syllabus to get them to achieve. In coaching, staff will work to past papers for a large proportion of the year setting examples in class, homework etc, based on these questions. Feedback is given on where the students need to improve, what they missed off etc.

By covering a large number of questions, and mapping what questions come up in either the January or June series for a four year period, staff can predict what type of question will come up. By analysing the examiners comments which are also published each year, a full picture can be seen of exactly what type of answers are required.

What's needed is a complete overhaul of the A-level system as recommended by Tomlinson recently in his report - in order to get back to teaching rather than coaching.

I've worked in a few FE colleges over the years and I have to say I love my job apart from two things.

1. Bureacratic timewasting Red-tape nonsense
2. Bad Managers

Some of the Managers in my college have been promoted well beyond their abilities and really only got the job because they were the internal candidate and the college executive management team of selectors thought this would be a safe bet. Most managers are untrained for the role, and are either bean-counting accountants, piss-poor communicators and crisis-management fire-fighters rather than offering strong leadership and supportive advice to staff, and people who can plan and think.

Put simply, you wouldnt trust most managers to run a whelk stall.

The decisions made are beyond compare and most colleagues are bewildered by some of the decisions made - usually after meetings have taken place that are not agenda'd. Managers who tell you one thing then do another when you are not in college for a day. Managers who tell other staff what they think of you and send notes to the Principal about you rather than meet to thresh out any problems.

The government should run a number of training courses for these people who most definately need it. On the agenda should be;

Listening to your staff
Communication skillsD
Problem solving
Thinking outside of the box
How to conduct a meeting
How to get some charisma