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Time to abolish grammar schools
We still suffer under the delusion that selective state schools help social mobility — in fact, they enforce inequality, and once you adjust for other factors their attainment is no better than normal schools. As always, class is elephant in the room, writes IAN SINCLAIR
NICK WRIGHT considers how the isolation of Israel and a new film on the controversial Italian communist leader are creating new reference points for Italy’s left
CARLOS MARTINEZ says Cuba’s achievements in the face of a criminal blockade are startling, but the island’s future if the United States succeeds in crushing it looks bleak
AMNON BROWNFIELD STEIN reports that far-right MPs who mobbed the event organised by Hadash may have helped raise awareness of the brutality of the Israeli right
Born on this day in 1931, the heroic revolutionary faces a dangerous new wave of White House aggression. We must treat his birthday as a rallying cry to resist the illegal siege of Cuba, writes ROGER McKENZIE
RAMZY BAROUD decries the rats of Gaza, the rodent and human type. Both abound as profiteering from tragedy reaches obscene levels
LAST month a new campaign was launched — Time’s Up For The Test. Supported by a coalition of organisations and public figures including Caroline Lucas MP, Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham and poet Michael Rosen, it’s pushing for an end to the 11-plus exam, and therefore, the abolition of grammar schools and the implementation of a comprehensive education system.
In support of the campaign, Baroness Christine Blower, Labour peer and former general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, has introduced a School Reform of Pupil Selection Bill to the House of Lords.
“The Bill promotes the advantage of a fully comprehensive system. It would end all discriminatory tests which allow schools to select whom they will educate,” she says.
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