Goes back a long way, c.f. C. P. Snow and the Two Cultures book or article in the 50s. Before that Charles Babbage had something to say about the state and teaching of mathematics in British universities.
My personal view is that there has to be a wider discussion on what 16 to 18 education is actually for in the UK, or at least England and Wales (Scotland has a different system, not sure about the Province).
To what extent do we have specialised often vocational courses for students? Do GCSE exams at age 16 still actually have a function?
Then you can have a discussion about the role of quantitative and logical thought in whatever system you decide to have.
PS: I'd keep mathematicians at least 50 miles away from any committee working on this. Nice people, but a tiny minority of the communities of practice who use mathematics to make decisions.
"They hate you if you're clever and they despise a fool. 'Til you're so fucking crazy, you can't follow their rules." - John Lennon - Working Class Hero
Private schools feed into the top universities because the private schools provide actual education. The problem isnt that private schools are too good or that private schools educated people get better grades.
The problem is that the majority of pupils in state schools, be they intelligent or not intelligent never stand a chance and are recieving a terrible formal education.
Are you prepared to devote the resources necessary to provide class sizes in 'state' schools in the UK that match the class sizes found in private (i.e. 'Public') schools?
I am, many are not - in the timeframe of an election cycle it is wasted money. The money spent today would only show positive returns in 10-20 years time.
State school in the UK costs the governement £7,100 a year per pupil vs £13,700 a year for private schools (averages). The government is getting poor value for money, but it would cost ~50bn a year to send every secondary state school pupil to private schools.
It is cheaper to simply pander to your base, make the next generation of their offspring dumber and blame the foreigners or the rich people or boats or whatever gets people angry. It actually increases the size of your political base, with the only downside that it dumps your future party with a massive social welfare bill in the distant future. By then they will be burying you at a state funeral, and your decendants will be living offshore somewhere nice talking about how great the country was back in your day.
My personal view is that there has to be a wider discussion on what 16 to 18 education is actually for in the UK, or at least England and Wales (Scotland has a different system, not sure about the Province).
To what extent do we have specialised often vocational courses for students? Do GCSE exams at age 16 still actually have a function?
Then you can have a discussion about the role of quantitative and logical thought in whatever system you decide to have.
PS: I'd keep mathematicians at least 50 miles away from any committee working on this. Nice people, but a tiny minority of the communities of practice who use mathematics to make decisions.