Mike Kent is spot on with his assessment of education (“The old days were good”, 30 November). I, too, was at Sir Michael Wilshaw’s talk at the London Festival of Education where he castigated London education in the 1970s and 1980s. Why tar all schools with the same brush? Some schools weren’t very good, and others were. Just like now, in fact. However, although Mike mentioned “the fads forced on teachers by their political and educational masters”, I don’t think he went far enough. Worryingly, things seem worse today than in the 1970s. Fortunately, there are a number of articles in TES questioning the folly of current practices, and Mike has been pointing them out longer than most.

Colin Groves, Westgate, Kent.