The Guardian from London, Greater London, England • 8

8 THE GUARDIAN' Thursday October 4 1992 Light in the darker corners of ROAD SAFETY DELEGATE DOES 96 M.P.H. ON Ml British education 99 Dawdlers are frustrating By 'BRIAN JACKSON, Director of the Advisory Centre for Education By our own Reporter consultants. Ultimately. I believe, they not only ease their personal problems but see their child's dilemma as a Many readers of the Guardian are members of ACE the Advisory Centre for Education. About half of them Join primarily to receive the journal "Where?" and build up their knowledge of education today.

Often enough they are doctors, lawyers, university lecturers, who are for the first time sending their children to State schools for reasons of pocket or principles. For years they have read about overcrowded classrooms disapproved, and turned to the cricket results. The 'Guardian" teUs them that in 1961 ihere were 8,748 children in primary school classes which contained at least 50 other boys and girls. Once this was a dry statistic; now It suddenly Becomes real and human, for their young daughter Is taught under such conditions. They are not familiar ith the Inequalities and absurdities rf the State system at its weakest So they kick.

The husbands write to their MPs, the wives form local education groups. The wives are often wiser. The other half of our members join ACE not because they feel worried and uninformed about education generally, rhey join because they want detailed nelp with their child's education which school Should I help at home? How? What about grants? When should I appiv to a university They are intensely concerned not about 11-plus. but about their child and 11-plus. They exchange large numbers of letters with Sonia Abrams, the secretary of ACE, and her network of or woman starti taking risks.

Don't aggravate these risks by imposing maximum limits which are not necessary." The motion was rejected in favour of an amendment moved by the Chief Constable of Halifax. Mr G. F. Goodman, who asked that an upper speed limit of 50 mph should be imposed on roads not subject to a lower limit, with the exception of motorways." Councillor V. A.

Foster, chairman of the Heston and Isleworth road safety committee, seconding this said that the only people who wanted to drive at 90 mph on motorways and 70 mph on dual carriageways were "the lunatic fringe." As such, they should be brought under control. "There are very many people who fail to travel at high speeds with any degree of safety," he said. A proposal that there should be fragment of a larger pattern, rrom caring a lot about one child, they come to care more deeply about the education of all children. It is this enlargement of responsibility which, to my mind, justifies our work. Dipping through the morning's post it is not difficult to pick out the characteristic problems.

Consider Mrs a surgeon's wife. She herself was privately educated, but she has sent her daughter to a State school She is very ambitious and was assuming a university career before the girl entered the infants' school. Most evenings she coached the child in basic school subjects and the girl passed the 11-plus without difficulty The great hurdle was behind her. But Immediately new hurdles appeared the grammar school is streamed," and the child must win and retain an stream place. So the coaching begins again, only now the girl has become "careless" and makes "silly mistakes" "she only got 71 per cent in biology and I know she could have got 80 per cent easily." At school she now gets lowest marks in her "best" subject a highest marks in her "worst" one.

At this point, Mrs A delegate to the National Road Safety Congress in London said yesterday that he was in the habit of driving down the Ml at an average speed of 96 m.p.h. "I like to drive fast when the road li right for it," Councillor S. J. H. Carver, representing the Blaby Rural Council and a member of the Leicester City Accident Prevention Committee, told the Road Safety Forum at Westminster.

"I agree that the biggest danger on the road is the frustrated motorist and some of you careful drivers frustrate fast drivers very much." The 1,200 delegates gave Councillor Carver's revelation a shocked reception. "Shame," called some of them. Councillor Carver said that he was not involved in accidents, that he saw to it his brakes were good, and that he had cups and medals to prove he was a safe driver at speed. "We are very glad to see you arrived with us safely," said the chairman. Sir Richard Nugent, a vice-President of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, which has organised the congress.

The conflict between the partisans for fast drivers and those for slow drivers came when Councillor E. N. Hiskins. of Lichfield, opposed a proposal which sought maximum speed limits varying from 90 mph on motorways to SO mph on rural roads and 30 mph or 40 mph. as appropriate, on urban roads.

"It is the man who dawdle on the road and does not keep to the left hand side who Is the danger. One of the greatest dangers with which wc are faced Is the frustrated driver. This man Crowds of office workers board the Birkenhead ferry for Liverpool at Woodside yesterday. There were many more passengers than usual because of the railway strike and colleges, addresses of organisations, educational statistics, or details of qualifications. Andrew for example, wrote because two universities had accepted him one offered a place for mathematics the other a place for Russian social studies.

Could we give him the address of a vocational guidance firm of which he had heard because he wanted them to test him and advise which was the more suitable course? We provided the address, gave him details of their tests and fees, and advised him, too, that in our view this was not the way to resolve his problem. He wrote again, having paid several guineas to take the tests. The result, the firm informed him, was that he was equally suited to either a mathematics course or a Russian studies course. Mr R. again wrote, asking what jobs these two degree courses trained people for, and expressed discomfort at the social studies course since he did not want to spend his life as a social welfare worker or a hospital almoner.

We inquired if he had talked this over with his headmaster, pointed out that he had confused social studies with social work, and illustrated the wide range of jobs (many the same) that had been taken by people reading either course. So the correspondence continued, Mr R. concentrating on exclusively vocational aspects ana asking for all manner of details, addresses, facts. Decisions out of focus Sonia Abrams provided the addresses of the National Union of Students, the Russian Cultural Attache, the Bureau for Educational Exchanges, the possibilities of changing courses once at university, and handled requests for details of Leningrad University, the possibilities of going there, and of being financed. But as the letters switched to and fro, something more than an exchange of facts was taking place.

An enterprising youth was learning that a university was not a vocational training course and that decisions taken on that assumption were decisions out of focus. Mr R's deeper problem his Ignorance of what a university course was is characteristic of our times. Many are first-generation university entrants. Their families have little knowledge or connection with university life. To the Mr Rs breaking through for the first time, university means a future job.

It often makes them narrow and gauche in their approaches, and the regular medical and optica examinations for applicants for driving licences was defeated. One delegate suggested that the best medicine for young drivers at the peak danger age of 24 was a very strong bromide." The Chief Constable of Halifax was again successful with an amendment which called on local authorities, either independently or jointly, to provide off-the-road training grounds for learner drivers of motor-cycles. This was passed in place of a similar proposal which included the learner drivers of cars. Young motor-cyclists got their provisional licences and went straight on to the road without any training whatsoever, he said. They should have to pass a test of some description before being allowed on the roads.

The position is becoming worse and worse each year." A. writes to ACE for anvice on oooks and techniques to improve her coaching. Her situation is not uncommon. She nas decided on State education, and what is normal for others has been a ENGLAND KEEPS HER LEAD Excellent win over Denmark choice on principlp for her. And yet she does not want her daughter to suffer for her principles and she must make sure that the State education Is From our Chess Correspondent "Aladdin's cave" of stolen property A Nottingham man whose home had been converted into an Aladdin's cave of stolen property, specialised in stripping bouses "right down to the carpets, refrigerators, and even gas cookers," it was stated at Bedfordshire Assizes at Bedford yesterday.

Raymond Henry Reynolds Hatt, 47, property owner, painter and decorator, of Corporation Oaks, Nottingham, was imprisoned for five years for housebreaking and thefts totalling 36,000. He pleaded guilty to four charges and asked for 43 other offences to be considered. Mr D. Cowley, prosecuting, said States 13 and one adjourned. The Russians are finding their best form in the middle rounds and after winning 3i to i against Czechoslovakia are likely to make a four-zero victory against Austria.

Leaders in Final Group are: England 15, Spain 14 and one adjourned, Switzerland 12 and three adjourned, Israel Hi and three adjourned. MAN HAULED UP 50FT. ROCK PACE Attempt to save dogs An inspector of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, John Goodenough (28), of Bradford, 27 SUMMONSES IN A YEAR Fined twice in a day was hauled up a 50-ft. sheer rock face beneath his sitting-room a trapdoor yesterday as part of an effort to save two Lakeland terriers which are Varna, Bulgaria, October 3 England had an excellent 3 to win against Denmark in round six of Final Group of the World Chess Championships. They thus kept the tournament lead which they took by half a point when Penrose won his twice-adjourned rook ending with Raisa, of Finland, in the morning session.

Penrose scored his second point of the day when he won a pawn against Petersen in a Sicilian defence and simplified to a winning ending. Clarke had a slight initiative with the black pieces against From but the Danish player succeeded in reaching a drawn knight ending. Golombek was in good form against Horning refuting a risky pawn sacrifice and emerging with an ending with a rook for a pawn. A blunder Littlewood played a Kings Indian Defence against Claussen and won in good style by a neat temporary queen sacrifice when the Dane blundered in the early middle game. The American Grandmaster Bobby Fischer had his first defeat of the tournament in the morning session when he lost to Ciocaltea of Rumania.

Fischer was again in poor form against Donner of Holland and adjourned a piece down with a lost ending. Leaders in the championship finals are Soviet Union 16 and one adjourned. West Germany 15 and one adjourned. Yugoslavia 15, United quite as good as the private education she might have bought. (In actual fact, it is very much better than the girls' private school Mrs A had in mind.) Yet the mother's anxieties are kept alive by stream-ing, 11-plus, more streaming, and the whole paraphernalia of highly competitive learning.

Polite comments On the 'girl's school reports there are only brief verbal comments Fair," Good of a polite and empty nature but there is a mass of numerical data that looks highly specific Language: (1) Comprehension 75 per cent; (2) Composition 73'per cent (3) Grammar 69 per It is easy to understand how Mrs A comes to take the difference between 71 per cent and 80 per cent so seriously and why her daughter's unconscious revolt against unnecessary and oppressive irental coaching should come out in topsyturvy marks and bold patches of carelessness." Here was an intelligent and capable woman Once she perceived the whole, she perceived her part in it Pressure eased on the girl and coaching, with its disturbing confusion of parent and teacher roles, was replaced by a home In which learning was natural and enjoyable. A child who would never have done badly did well. There are many Mrs As. But for every such situation in the postbag, there are 50 direct requests for purely factual information names of schools trapped. A winch slowly pulled up Mr Good-enough by a rope fastened to his belt Below him was a mass of jagged rocks.

David Ian Fawthrop (24), of Radcliffe Road, Oldham, admitted at Rochdale yesterday that twice in five' days he drove without a licence in his untaxed and untested car from Oldham lea 10 a -veriiaoie Aiaaains cave" containing thousands of pounds worth of stolen property. In it. Hatt arrayed groups of stolen goods in order fur coats in one row, gloves in another, and he had even priced them. A complete set of housebreaking tools was also found there. Mr Cowley said the offences (all but 10.535 worth of the goods had been MORE WORK FOR SSAFA Welfare problems The retention of some 9,000 National Servicemen for an extra six months has increased the work of the overseas department of the Soldiers', Sailors', and Airmen's Families Association by 44 per cent This was staled by Lieutenant-General Sir Reginald Denning, chairman of the Association, at the annual meeting In London yesterday.

About 95 per cent of appeals against retention necessitated reports by SSAFA on situations leading up to the appeal. Branches of the Association had investigated some 1,600 appeals already, and many more would follow. "Welfare problems of the regular forces are steadily increasing, mainly because of the increasing proportion of wives and children. Due to earlier marriages, army estimates anticipate there will be 104 to 110 wives and children for every 100 men serving. Lack of married Quarters, therefore, will present even greater problems.

The resultant separation between husband and wife causes more distress and bitterness than anything else." to Shawforth to see his sick mother. He was fined a total of 41 10s. less understanding don sniffs a more is worse dismissal of their type. But these are one of the minor problems to be faced as university entrance is extended, enriched, and made more equal. It seems that ACE has some small part to play in opening out such students.

recovered) were committed between August. 1961. and April. Hatt struck Inspector Thomas Halhead said that The inspector then threaded a wire rope through a metal ring halfway up the face. This enabled the winch to drag away two large boulders.

Somewhere below the rocks are two crossbred Lakeland terriers, aged two and three and both called Peggy, which vanished into a crevice on Sunday when they were chasing a fox. Mr Goodenough said We will have to shift about 200 tons of rocks and it may take until the weekend but we are earlier in the day Fawthrop had been in warwicasmre, rvoitingnamsnire. South Yorkshire. Lincolnshire, and fined 30 at Royton for the same three Derbyshire. He would call at houses offences.

The penalties Imposed on Fawthrop yesterday brought his total of motoring fines to 117 10s, in not giving up the job. wnen me owners were sbs. I and remove the entire contents in his van. Mr Justice Elwes described him as a man of superior intellect and highly educated who had played for high stakes and lost. Detective Chief Inspector L.

Gill said Hatt was a successful businessman exactly one year, on 27 summonses, A strike of busmen at Blackburn, which would have coincided with the rail stoppage, was averted on Tuesday night at a meeting between the transport committee and the men's representatives. In the Guardian yesterday, it was inadvertently stated that this threatened strike, arising from a dispute over working schedules and sick pay, was at Blackpool. The chairman, Mr Frank Evans, told Fawthrop, who was also banned from MANCHESTER CATHEDRAL anving tor two years you nave broken nearly every law there is for a Thurjday I a Holy axnmmunloa iLMAf nuwell, 10 0- UltJtu (TCfUoor. Main Short nervier. Rmmwi, Brrt.

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