What we must do next

Chris Woodhead's reforms must be taken further.

Teaching unions are cock-a-hoop at the passing of Chris Woodhead. But Mr Woodhead's drive towards greater educational efficiency must continue if Britain is to achieve a state education system to match the excellence of its independent sector.

Teaching unions are cock-a-hoop at the passing of Chris Woodhead. But Mr Woodhead's drive towards greater educational efficiency must continue if Britain is to achieve a state education system to match the excellence of its independent sector.

The reforms he started should be widened to encompass key areas such as teacher pay, pupil streaming, increased sports and activity options - and a much more solid and traditional curriculum.

One of Mr Woodhead's greatest achievements was his ability to work with successive governments, belying the educational establishment's view of him as confrontational. Tony Blair recently staggered that establishment by arguing that "streaming" pupils should be reconsidered. The howls of indignation were predictable; but it was local education authorities, union leaders and training college chiefs who were out of step with public opinion, not Mr Blair and Mr Woodhead.

Streaming able pupils seems an essential part of the Woodhead drive to efficiency, and it should be brought back into the state sector as soon as possible. An average-to-good comprehensive now achieves around 50 per cent A-C grades at GCSE; an average-to-good independent around 98 per cent, giving pupils twice the chance of moving on to university than those from decent comprehensives.

The reaction from the old left to such inequality was to call for the abolition of independents. But there are lessons to be learned from them - and this pragmatic government seems more likely to adapt their tried-and-tested techniques than do away with them. Streaming is one way to erode such glaring differentials, and give the brightest state school pupils a more even chance.

The next crucial post-Woodhead legacy should be an effective system of performance-related pay. I'd like to see a system that offers strong incentives to ordinary teachers to improve their earning potential - and long-term career attractions to new graduates; asystem that pays teachers a basic salary, then offers the potential to double that salary according to results and extra-curricular commitments: games, sports and hobbies.

Where's the money to come from? There seems plenty of cash to employ expensive supply teachers from continental Europe, India and Australia. And plenty to spend on "educational research".

Another area crying out for reform is our GCSE system. After 12 years of GCSEs, our kids are more ignorant than ever - and in my view, GCSEs have to be abolished. They are a devalued currency; the exam that no one fails. "Who's Harold Wilson?" "Who's Charles Darwin?" "Who's Thomas Hardy?" are standard questions from students these days. Such comments illustrate the failure of GCSE to give teenagers any sense of historical context, classical heritage, or the cultural achievements of their land.

The saddest indictment of GCSE standards was the news this June that 1,000 student teachers had failed their new basic numeracy test. All of them had achieved C grades in maths GCSE in order to get on teacher training courses.

Above all, the climate of educational egalitarianism must end. Mr Woodhead's comments on "the heart of the darkness", referring to teacher-training professors, need no reiteration. He was criticised for promoting a "blaming" culture: but no one else seemed prepared to point the finger at mediocrity and failure. As a practising teacher, I believe it is damaging and deceptive to insist that all children are equal in ability - still less that teachers themselves are of equal prowess.

Chris Woodhead left a legacy of grasping nettles. Now the biggest nettle of all needs seizing: the culture of mediocrity that stifles excellence in many schools.

The writer is an English teacher at the independent Cranleigh School in Surrey