The Hippocratih oath or the Hypocritical loathe?
Let’s cut to the chase. Today, recently slated shadow education secretary and Labour MP Tristram Hunt has called for all teachers to take an oath, one much like that founded during the 12th century Greek Corpus written either by the great Hippocrates of Cos himself or indeed his successors. In a nutshell, Hunt’s visit to Singapore, along with a brief butchers at the current most successful and world-leading educational institutions – such as that of Finland’s – has purportedly revealed that a shift of focus from the present ‘structural’ change rationale, supposedly ‘driving’ the present reformation, to a more qualitative coherence of the fundamentals is the key to improvement.
So, where on the one hand the Coalition have allowed for free schools and academies to, for example, recruit unqualified teachers; Hunt and his team clearly believe that such a policy is absolute nonsense and a mere trajectory of the ‘current system of oversight’s supposedly unethical agenda.
Here’s a thought.
Baring Labour’s stand on free schools in mind, one that Michael Gove deemed was ‘so tortured they should send in the UN to stop the suffering’, it seems only logical to first ask why is it that our heroes of education are the ones taking an oath and not the Ministers and MPs themselves? I mean – is Hunt seriously implying that teachers are not taking their professions seriously enough already? Let’s face it, forcing our teachers to take a Hippocratic oath is, as it stands, is the most hypocritical loathe one could possibly imagine. It’s a bit like making a waiter at a restaurant swear an oath that he or she will serve the best quality of food. The quality of food has nothing to do with the waiter, does it? Surely it’s the chef who should be making such a pledge, right?
Now I’m not here to criticize politicians or political parties as such, but what I am attacking is the on-going and sadly ‘trending’ attack on our teachers. Running off from the last article, surely it is a bit more funding perhaps, or more realistic academic targets that governmental bodies should be pushing for, rather than a pointless bureaucracy that keeps teachers on edge and forever stressed[2] and constantly out of the know how? It seems that it is indeed our education secretaries and our ministers that should be taking a, let’s say, ‘bureaucratic oath’ instead – one that swears to honesty, consistency and integrity, one that forces respect for our teachers rather than forcing upon them irrelevant gimmicks. Like teachers haven’t got enough on their plate as it is. After all, it’s not the politicians who are on the frontline when it comes to education – and in several other cases for that matter.
An interesting thought though is to look at a recent study regarding our teenage students, one that may bring to the fore what cutting a little slack can achieve. If GCSE’s are boosted because of an hour’s extra sleep, than an extra few hours and perhaps a couple of pounds spent looking out for our teachers could very well change things for the better – just a little bit of extra effort is all we ask.
On a brighter note, the NUT are indeed very happy with Nicky Morgan’s pledge to cut workload just as the NASWUT’s virtuous campaigns for equality amongst children has proven effective when, for example, considering a recent decision that’s been made to put a halt to the unfair geographical admissions system we’ve always used in our schools.
Contemporary writer Shannon L. Oldre, author of 300 questions to ask your parents before it’s too late, once noted that “often those that criticise others reveal what they themselves lack.” Is this a similar case for the events occurring within our education sector?
Let us know what you think…