Benedetti strikes a chord (13 July)

Our last music specialist had five primary schools to cover every week. When she retired she wasn’t replaced for almost a year.

While I agree specialist provision could, and should, be built into the “McCrone” cover provisions, that would mean LAs employing music, and other, specialists rather than general primary teachers who can be redeployed in other posts as circumstances change. Employing more music, and other, specialists would require a commitment to the principle that primary pupils deserve to be taught specialist subjects by appropriately qualified teachers.

We saw significant improvements in the provision of primary specialists during the 1970s, ironically a time when the country was in financial difficulty. Factories were on short-term working and we sat in the dark two nights a week because of power cuts. Yet, in our primaries, we had specialist teachers for music, PE, art and fabric craft and instrumental instructors for strings, and brass, and sometimes both.

Flyonthewall75

`Exit packages’ total pound;4 million (6 July)

l Why are these people called “Education Scotland”? It is an insult to those who provide education. Did anyone notice when HMIE deserted their posts for five months to help schools implement the “Curriculum for Excellence”?

Who thought up this title? Perhaps a competition should be held to come up with a proper name for Education Scotland and Curriculum for Excellence. What about “Support Scotland” and “Curriculum for Change”?

Dingerone.