Michael Gove has got more right than wrong as Secretary of State For Education - the first of whom that can be said in a very long time but the idea of scrapping GCSEs is wrong on so many levels.
Teachers have taken a pounding with 'new initiatives' over the last 45 years and major or minor; well-intended or malicious; intelligent or stoopid; political or non-political - they have all had one thing in common - they have not been allowed to work.
Some have failed under their own steam and others have been sabotaged en route to the chalk-face by that veritable plethora of useless educational bureaucrats who work entirely to their own agendas.
These periodic assaults on the work being done in classrooms never enjoys anything greater than a limited success. In education the word 'initiative' used as a noun induces panic.Furthermore, if the introduction of GCSEs had one advantage, it was to remove the administrative and logistical catastrophe of the GCE and the CSE working against each other. Syllabuses were constantly limited by the demands of having to 'double enter' all borderline candidates into BOTH exams in order to ensure the best results. The waste of teaching time was phenomenal.
I could talk on this matter for a very long time but suffice it to say that my heart is sinking at the very thought.
(I may be retiring earlier than previously thought!)
