What worries me most about the figures for disadvantage cited in The TES editorial is the 70 per cent who do not achieve the required qualifications (“No prizes for popularity but Ofsted has a point”, June 26).
A recent government report called Improving Opportunity, Strengthening Society, pointed out that in 2007 17 per cent of white pupils on free school meals achieved five A*-C grades at GCSE including English and maths. So what of the other 83 per cent? Does anyone care?
Many will face a life of deprivation, have children who become the future underachievers and the cycle will go on. Given that literacy and numeracy are the most popular subjects in our prisons, it should not surprise us that many inmates are the same people who were failed by the education system. It is time we developed a properly resourced “cradle to grave” education strategy that would give people the subsequent chance to make up for the early failures of the system.
