Run by former soldiers, they could be a real boon for problem pupils
Michael Gove, education minister, is a "veni, vidi, vici" kind of man. An advocate of free schools, his heart lies with an education system marinated in the classics. He has never seemed comfortable with khaki. It came as a surprise and a joy to some when he announced last week that when the education bill becomes law, one group of pupils at least will discover it's a case of goodbye Mr Chips, hello sergeant major.
Gove wants "disruptive pupils" to have access to "military-style education" run by former soldiers: a kind of boot-camp baccalaureate. Should we be alarmed? At present, expelled pupils attend one of the 400 pupil referral units (PRUs) that Gove rightly says are "not up to snuff".
A teenager, often semi-illiterate, and with multiple family problems, is chucked out of school ? to the relief of many fellow pupils and staff ? and sent to a PRU. He or she is then given large chunks of what in posh schools is called "study time". In PRUs, that translates into: "Clear off and cause trouble somewhere else."
What Gove is proposing instead is a course in which there is a strong emphasis on physical education, basic skills and the opportunity to experience what it's like to take responsibility without the expectation of failure (ie, camping for two nights and coming home intact � la Duke of Edinburgh awards). Boot camp will also offer experiential learning: for instance, understanding maths via map reading. The emphasis will be on collaboration, team work, self-discipline and self-respect ? all led by ex-soldiers.
If the teaching doesn't adopt the Foreign Legion school of pedagogy ? break 'em down before you build 'em up ? the experience could be the best intervention some young people have ever had. And why not extend it to more than just those overtly sending signals that school isn't lighting a spark?
There are currently at least 16,000 pupils excluded from school. In addition, there is an unquantified "ghost army" of young people who attend but whose assets are deep-frozen, unrecognised by the system or who truant or who are phobic as a result of bullying and live in a limbo land of solitary confinement at home but are still registered at school.
Boot camp clearly won't work for all. But we know from a mass of research that while it has a rightwing resonance, in practice, minus sadism, it may encourage a young person to understand that what he or she does can and does have an impact on their lives. They do have control.
The Department for Education is in talks with Peter Cross, head of SkillForce, a charity that uses former soldiers to teach pupils on the brink of expulsion. Cross says: "Many of the veterans have served in Afghanistan. They are used to solving problems? they adapt this for the youngsters and they treat them like adults? it teaches them about responsibility, compassion and courage."
Such soldiers reward effort ? and demand more. Acknowledgement of effort and the expectation of high aspirations are too often jettisoned early if pupils are labelled "less academic". In most PRUs, such demands are utterly absent. The left has a strange tic about discipline. It frequently reacts as if it comes in only one model and that's brutalising. But self-discipline has also been a salvation. For instance, 40 years ago, a teenager "good with his or her hands" would enter an apprenticeship. If male, he would "grow up" with a group of older men whom, by instruction, osmosis and approval, would give guidance on the right and the wrong way to behave. In many areas, particularly in the north, that's gone.
So, while boot camp may help, what next? Gove is admirable in his newly revealed understanding that life skills ? learning by doing, teamwork and fresh experiences plus adult figures who demand more, irrespective of IQ ? add up to a significant proportion of the foundations of a 21st-century education.
But in the new era of free schools, how does that translate into the classroom? And why is there no connection between Mr Gove's epiphany and the country's youth services which, without the help of squaddies, daily encourage young people to make something of themselves, yet which face carnage in the cuts?
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jan/30/michael-gove-boot-camps
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