So what exactly is the point of having 75 per cent of Year 10 pupils study EBacc GCSE courses by 2022?

The branding around the mandatory menu of English, mathematics, history or geography, the sciences and a language has an unsavoury whiff of a mouldy old recipe doused in a fresh dressing.

As an educator for the past 19 years, my gut reaction is this: do these politicians really know what they’re doing? It looks to me like they’re grasping at straws rather than developing a considered strategy.

The result, of course, won’t be some historic game-changer in terms of curriculum, it will be more work for teachers. Such reforms always have the same effect - and teachers know it.

Needless and endless rebuilding

A survey in 2016 found that education professionals believed that “the biggest generator of workload, say teachers, is constant change caused by government policy”.

The result? Yet more teachers will try to leave.

Even if the government came up with a policy that would actually benefit teachers and pupils, we are so cumulatively exhausted from the needless and endless rebuilding of the education system, we wouldn’t notice. Government policy has become white noise.

It is in this minefield of legislative mayhem, that the EBacc edict has landed and the one unsurprising outcome of this bureaucratic nightmare is that it will bring on yet another “planning headache”, as Russell Hobby, former general secretary of the NAHT headteachers’ union describes it. 

Sourcing qualified specialist subject teachers to deliver, making the learning attractive to huge proportions of our children who are not interested in learning traditional subjects in a traditional way and ensuring pupils reach the unrealistic targets set by the government, are just the tip of the iceberg.

If we can try to forget our collective change-fatigue for a moment, which is virtually impossible at the end of term, it is worth asking will the arbitrary EBacc target actually do anyone any good?

I am compelled to remind the decision-makers that one size does not fit all. Not all children are driven by academic pursuit.

When are we going to start celebrating vocational routes? We know that many of our European counterparts have strong and respected work-based educational flight paths that are treated as equal to academic ones. 

Alienating youngsters

Unfortunately, in this country we are still hung-up about the academic route being the only ‘respected’ way - but this does not square with the diverse types of children who attend English schools. Then I see quotes from Ms Greening such as this one: “This will mark an important milestone in driving towards the government’s ambition that the vast majority of pupils - irrespective of background - have access to this core academic suite of GCSEs, which is central to a broad and balanced curriculum.”

What exactly does the cheesy alliterative phrase “broad and balanced” mean in terms of engaging the pupils who frankly find our present curriculum boring?

The EBacc-style approach only alienates youngsters who want a more practical and hands-on approach to education and training. Who defines what is ‘broad and balanced’? And will it successfully mould our future workforce to respond to our economic needs of the future,  dare I say it, post-Brexit? I think not.

The “irrespective of background” smacks of that sticky, unpleasant veneer of political correctness that doesn’t address why there are so many young people who find school painful.  When are the backgrounds of British pupils of 2017 going to be reflected in the policy-makers decisions, instead of harking back to archaic concepts of Victorian schooling?

This EBacc directive will only alienate school refusers further, as Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders explains: “What schools and colleges offer should be driven by the needs of their students and communities, not by centrally set targets.”

Our schools and communities would be much healthier if we could offer a broader education that meets the needs of the society we want to have in 10 years, where more children are engaged in being part of building toward a stronger future.

All of which raises the question: where is the vision in this EBacc manoeuvre?

If the Department for Education aligned our workforce needs for the next decade with educational policy change, educators would feel empowered to prepare a highly skilled and creative work force that could make Britain a great economic leader.

Unanswered concerns

John Kampfner, chief executive of the Creative Industries Federation, says. “The creative industries have been identified as one of five priority sectors in the government’s industrial strategy in recognition of their economic contribution... However, the Department for Education has not answered the sector’s concerns, by continuing to sideline creative education in favour of academic subjects.”

This country is revered internationally for art, fashion, drama, dance, music, literature.  The more it is taken off the agenda of mainstream comprehensive education, the more it will become a career option for the middle and upper classes only. 

Toby Young, director of the New Schools Network naively states: “The idea that schools need to drop arts subjects in order to do well in the EBacc is nonsense, It has its roots in the idea that children are either good at arts subjects like music and drama or good at academic subjects like maths and physics, which simply isn’t true.”

Has Mr Young ever taught in a classroom?  Do any of the key policy-makers have a clue about what everyday school life actually looks like? I think not. A blinkered focus on academic prowess leads to children having less time to develop their artistic talents because they are overloaded with intervention, homework, after school, Saturday, holiday sessions to ensure the ridiculous academic hoops are jumped through.  How can anyone have an iota of desire to be creative when they are overburdened with meeting stifling standards?

I know the arts changes lives. I was saved from destitution from free music lessons in the 1980s led by Ken Livingstone via ILEA and the GLC.

A month ago one of my disaffected students was given the opportunity to be involved in a poetry workshop with the international poet Jane Duran.  All of us were wowed by my students final poetry piece and I have since been pestering her to attend writing classes in her spare time. This exceptional gift would never have been picked up in English lessons based on government expectations that predominately focus on traditional skills such as essay-writing and SPAG.

This latest intervention in the curriculum by the government will leave no time for nurturing the creative seed of our future working class writers, actors, musicians, designers.

Hannah Sokoya is an education consultant based in London

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