Those who value choice and diversity of provision in schools will give hollow laughs if they measure Peter Peacock’s professions against the Executive’s recent lamentable neglect of classical subjects.
There can be no choice where there are are no teachers, and so far the Executive has discouraged the continuation of the only teacher training course in classical subjects in Scotland. This is culturally bankrupt given the renaissance of interest in the Greeks and Romans indicated by the numbers of classical students at universities, of novels and films with classical themes, and interest in classical art and archaeology.
Only in our schools are pupils to be denied this part of their cultural inheritance if nothing is done to encourage and supply teachers. I know of young and excellent graduates who are being refused the opportunity to train because of the current Executive planning blight on classics. If choice is to mean anything at all, this has to be addressed.
Ronald A Knox Department of Classics University of Glasgow
