United Kingdom

Right. There is such thing as a social contract. In that people will generally be conforming members of society if they believe they’re getting a fair shot at life.

If we don’t feel like we are getting a fair shot and the game is rigged against us, then you get rebellion, an increase in crime and anti-social behaviour.

Also because of the reasons you've said it means theres also no consequences to actions any more because of stretched public services

While this is all true, and I agree that it is a big part of it, the lack of actual consequences for the worst behaved kids at schools is why schools are struggling. You used to be able to properly expel children instead you now exclude, and unless its exceptional circumstances you have to take them back if no other school will take them. Even in the event of exceptional circumstances the kid has a legal right to education so the LA has to provide this somewhere, usually in isolation at the same school, which drags resources from elsewhere from a very limited budget.

Going back far enough and we used to have schools for this group of children that they would get transferred to who had the staff ratios and skills to deal with them properly but they mostly got shut or moved private as part of this change.

Once the kids work out that there are no consequences to their action what do you think will happen?

Couple this with kids who do not belong at a standard school because of behavioural and learning disabilities because there are not enough places at specialist schools and/or their parents straight up refuse to have them diagnosed (and the primary school deliberately omitted it from the hand over) and you end up with way too many kids who are next to impossible to manage.

I am talking about kids who you are not allowed to make loud noises in the class room, or boys that are not allowed to sit next to girls because they get grabby, or kids that throw chairs at teachers, or kids that bring knifes to school, or sell drugs. Without the schools that are geared up to handle them, and a robust process to move them to these schools that takes weeks not terms to do this is not going to get better.

Honestly the first set of students coming in at undergrad after covid that I had were simultaneously wonderful and also felt about 2 years behind where they usually are socially. It was a bit of a struggle getting them to properly sit down and think. They did absolutely thrive when you got them going though (with some kinda more experimental pedagogy) so I do still have hope.

I really feel for the students now with the high fees. They're paying so much more money to get a degree than older generations. They need to because any half decent graduate job needs a degree with at least a 2.1, so they feel like they don't have a choice but know they are paying for the certificate rather than an education really.

It doesn't excuse shitty behaviour and entitlement but I don't think it's fair to just blame them. The social contract is broken, they are still kids trying to figure out the world, they are used to being spoon fed exam questions at school, they are worried about climate change, the old people in power suck, they were really messed up by covid and the future looks pretty bleak.

By the way, that graduate job pays less than it did for older generations, in some cases a lot less as companies have taken advantage of the apprenticeship scheme by getting rid of higher paying grad jobs to the unliveable pay they get. By the way, in my profession, all the apprentices seem to have degrees as the competition is so high. They also come with a worse pension, worse benefits and worse pathway to promotions. That job will barely cover increasing rents if you're lucky enough, let alone allow you to build up a deposit for unaffordable housing.

At my highly rated course at a red brick uni, I'd say about a quarter of my lecturers were actually good teachers, about half were sort of OK and another quarter really sucked. You can tell they were there for the research and resented teaching. I paid £3k a year for the privilege of that so was slightly annoyed. If I was paying £9k or whatever it is, I'd be pretty pissed off.

The university system is broken with all the research targets, funding issues, low pay, etc.

All of this adds together to make it a shitty time for everyone! Now I've depressed myself for the day...

It’s an interesting point and appeals to my anarchist tendencies, but was it not broadly agreed that adults take decisions on behalf of minors, because an accumulation of experience and wisdom make them better equipped so to do ?

And was it not also broadly agreed that in the absence of a suitable adult, society would take those decisions, as best they could, for such children ?

Of course, one size does not fit all, but as was recently highlighted by pandemic, a great many children are, tragically, much safer in school than not.

If school as an institution were replaced, we’d still face those problems, I think.

Not sure I’m entirely with you on that one; what’s the alternative to schooling kids so that they achieve autonomy and how do you propose to make them fit in a society where is seems important to have compatibility between everyone’s behaviour if not by pushing them towards a standard ?

Part of the function of school is to get you used to doing things you don't want to do. You'll be donning bland clothes and going to a grey, depressing building every day once you're an adult too.

Calm down there Che Guevara

who cares if they agree to it, they are kids, they dont know how they should behave.

...Like you realise most secondary schools have the set of responsibilities and expectations on a single page that the child will sign in year 7, right?

It's basically just symbolic and of course you can choose to not sign it and will still go to the school, but to say that they never agreed to it, atleast in my experience is a stretch. Though obviously there is a lot more nuance in this conversation.

The reality is underfunding of both schools, as well as sports/youth clubs, the schools being unable to make effective punishments, and parents not caring what their child gets up to both online and in school likely are the key things to blame.

Plus the effect on the psyche of children growing up in a world which they know is fucked and seeing genuinely so little to improve it probably doesn't help.