Nick Tate’s new utopia is to be built, I see, on an extension of the national curriculum instruction manual (TES, February 13). The nation’s social, political and cultural identity is to be founded upon the “common experiences” of children controlled through a centralised and implacably policed curriculum.
This doctrine, with its obvious denial of the values of personal autonomy, pluralism and the celebration of difference, is inimical to our democratic tradition and to our culture of freedom in an open society.
The attempt to make connections between a national culture, a national social life and a set of values imposed and upheld by the state is, in fact, a hallmark of fascism.
How fortunate we are that children, like their parents, are resistant to taking on values through externally imposed and controlled “common experiences”.
JEFF COUPE
Chair, education performance review Warwickshire County Council 241 Clifton Road Rugby
