Solving the crisis in our Secondary Schools

It’s that time of the year when Guernsey moans about the poor GCSE results from our secondary schools and then fails to do anything meaningful about it.
 
Difficult problems demand radical solutions which is why I have invented the KTF Programme (© pending) which is guaranteed to bring our results up to scratch.
 
At the start of the GCSE year our teachers already produce a list of predicted grades for all of their pupils. By this time it is therefore already clear, give or take a 10% margin of error, which students will fail to obtain the minimum acceptable levels of qualifications.
 
What I propose is to enrol the bottom 90% of those designated failing students into the KTF Programme and remove them from the exam system. The remainder will go through the year, sit the exams, and, if predictions are correct, the school will obtain a near 90% success rate.
 
Problem solved.
 
Not only is the school now performing above expected standards but precious resources available to that year group are no longer being wasted on those who will never make the grade. Instead, efforts can be concentrated on improving the performance of those more likely to succeed.
 
The details of the KTF Programme are still to be worked out but I strongly recommend that whatever form of euthanasia is decided upon it be both humane and cost efficient.
 
What should be borne in mind is the overall cost saving to our community over the longer term. A lot of the KTF Programme cohort will always be a future drain on our society either through the prison system or any of the other multiple agencies presently dedicated to saving the unstable and unsavable. A large number would otherwise also be a constant drain on our social service system which this programme now removes.
 
Not only is there a reduction on the overall population of this already crowded Island, the overall quality of our society cannot be but constantly improved by this radical programme.
 
It has much to recommend it.
 
I am sure that there will be some critics of this proposal and I must say I agree. Why wait until the GCSE year to make this cull? Why waste five years of effort and resource on the unredeemable?
 
Admittedly there are a large number of children who are late developers so I would propose only enrolling the bottom 10-20% of the Year Six cohort in the KTF Programme which will allow for any potential late blooming. Even this low proportion will reduce the burden on our secondary schools and in itself will undoubtedly improve results come GCSE time.
 
For the critics of this phase of the KTF Programme I would remind them that we are only talking about a maximum KTF intake per year of some 70 students out of about 350. A small but significant drain on an already hard pressed system.
 
Is this not a sacrifice worth making for the overall good of the Island?
 
There is also the potential spin off advantage of implementing the KTF Programme in that it might encourage a more focussed approach by Guernsey students themselves and perhaps evoke more interest and participation of the parents in the education of their offspring which again may result in improved grades come GCSE time.
 
As usual I suspect that our Education Department will fail to take notice let alone implement this scheme despite the fact that it will solve what is seemingly an intractable problem for them. It would seem that they are too busy administrating an already broken system to spend time on actually fixing things.
 
So, same time next year then?



PS
This suggestion should be taken seriously but not in the way proposed. Euthanasia is never the solution but the question needs to be asked; why are we continuing to try to force education on those who we already know cannot meet the standards set for a successful school?
 
Remove even the bottom 20% of those failing individuals from our secondary schools and you will give the schools a chance of actually succeeding at their primary job, which is educating our children to the minimum required standard set by the UK.
 
What to do with this 20% is a different question but I suspect that a small dedicated school with professional remedial teachers might be the answer.