Michael Kelly: Teachers need to learn lesson from the real world

THE problem that teachers have in establishing the credibility of their profession is that all of us have been to school and have witnessed the carelessness, indifference and cruelty practised by many of its members.

I lost my respect for teachers, not after the notorious disputes of the 1960s when "the profession" withdrew from the essential teaching tasks of supervising sporting and other extra-curricular activities. I still retained some degree of neutrality even after teachers insisted on their right to smoke in school, refusing to set an example to young people in this most important of health issues.

It was only after my attempts as a convener of the Corporation of Glasgow's education committee in the 1970s to abolish corporal punishment in our schools that I lost all faith in this trade. The proposal was met by howls of protest from teachers and their unions. Pointing out that Poland had abolished corporal punishment for children before the French Revolution seemed to strain their knowledge of both history and geography. Their antediluvian attitudes succeeded in postponing this progressive measure for years. They would be defending it to this day if they had not been overruled by wiser politicians. They do not form a profession. They are an interest group jealously protecting their bloated rights.

Once again their credibility comes under scrutiny. The Donaldson Review into teacher training is being confronted by evidence from the Scottish Council of Independent Schools (SCIS) claiming that teacher training colleges recruit students who have a poor grasp of basic skills such as spelling and numeracy and whose personalities are not suited to bringing the best out of children.

Mind you, it is a bit of a cheek for SCIS to dare to open its mouth on this subject. We are hearing a lot about discrimination in Scottish society. What greater discrimination is there than allowing privilege and wealth to buy the huge advantage of perceived better education? And how can they call themselves independent when, instead of training their own apprentices, they steal those educated by the State to serve in their elitist organisations, weakening their hard-pressed public-sector rivals and reducing the chances of poorer kids receiving a decent education?

However, their evidence on poor recruits is echoed by HM Inspectorate for Education which, even more significantly, pointed out to the Donaldson Review that Scottish education is less successful than other countries in closing the gap between the achievements of children from well-off and less well-off homes.And yet this was one of the objectives of the McCrone Report in 2001 which, in addition to reducing the working week to 35 hours, awarded teachers an enormous pay rise of 10 per cent with more to follow. It also bizarrely provided for a maximum of 22.5 hours of class contact - the first time a "profession" had its obligation to do one part of the job restricted so that it could do other things within the same job! They even got to bunk off early as the agreement decreed that "all tasks which do not require the teacher to be on the school premises can be carried out at a time and place of the teacher's choosing". In the pub?

And, of course, there was no mention of the short working days or the superbly long holidays that they, but no other professionals, bask in.

This was the modern equivalent to Aneurin Bevan's buying off the opposition of doctors to his proposals to reform health services by "stuffing their mouths with gold". But at least he got the NHS out of it. What has McCrone delivered? Well, it expected "an appreciation that teachers are committed and talented professionals who aim to develop and realise the potential of every child". To this pious hope was added the demand that their work be "carried out within the framework of social inclusion which seeks to engage every child in learning and personal development". More significantly perhaps, it referred to addressing "teachers' esteem" and "professional autonomy".

This mixture of hard cash and emollient sentiment seems to have had little effect. If recruits to training colleges are unable to add up or to spell whose fault is that? Why, it's down to the current crop of teachers, many of whom also struggle to master the same basic skills. And who taught them? Why, yesterday's teachers.

Even more damning was the reaction of Tony Axon of the lecturers' union, UCU to SCIS's claims. His absurd comment was that "people may complain about spelling and grammar but these days we sit at a computer which works out much of that for you. Are those skills really as important as they used to be?" Spot the deliberate grammatical mistake that Tony kindly inserted to make us think.

If that is the prevailing opinion in our colleges then we are indeed in a sorry state. For a start those of us who write for a living are more aware than most - but surely not a teachers' lecturer - that computer checks cannot meet the subtleties of English grammar much less of style. More to the point is that if you cannot spell you cannot reach the roots of words and therefore cannot make the connection between one and another. If you cannot handle grammar confidently you cannot communicate exactly what you want to say. Most other professionals would think these essential skills for teachers.

The Donaldson Review when it reports next month can at best only bring long-term solutions by improving the selection of student teachers and by laying down better training regimes.For an immediate fix to this spelling sickness in our schools we need stronger headteachers willing to discipline their recalcitrant subordinates and authorities willing to sack more of those who fail to perform up to a minimum standard of competence. The record over the past three years is to dismiss only two out of Scotland's 50,000 teachers. That's a fail mark even by the low standard of continuous assessment favoured in our schools over real exams to disguise sinking educational values.