Education

School Bullying
A call for schools and teachers to do more to stamp out school bullying, which is an extremely serious and underrated problem, and which for many years, seems to have been conveniently ignored and swept under the carpet.

Uniformity Of School Holidays
A call for schools to fall in line and standardize their holidays so that children are at school, or on school holidays, at the same time regardless of which school they attend. Parents with children at different schools generally do not want to find themselves in the situation where one child is on holiday and the other not, only to find that in the week following the reverse is true. Children who have friends at different school also cannot tie up with their friends in the holidays if they are off school at different times.

School Detention
A request for the abolishment of the practice of giving children after school detention unless parents have been given sufficient prior notification and have agreed that it is convenient and also that the school can guarantee the children's safe delivery home afterwards. If these conditions cannot be met, we feel it would be preferable to find alternative ways of administering discipline. The reasons for this are explained in the accompanying letter.

Corporal Punishment
Many people now feel that corporal punishment should be reinstated in our schools as a method of dealing with some issues of serious child indiscipline. It is very clear, nowadays, that certain unruly elements in schools take advantage of the fact that they cannot be physically disciplined. Many people believe that the absence of physical discipline is not only a bad thing because their is no recourse to deal with such unruly elements, but the absence of such actually encourages unruly children to follow a road of disrespect and insubordination. The associated problems have also led to frustration from teachers, many of whom have decided they cannot continue in the profession because the situation is out of control. Not only that, but, the number of exclusions from schools has risen significantly over the last number of years because now, excluding a child is the only course of action left. Excluding children from school is in itself a problem and does nothing to help the child. If anything, it probably makes matters worse, and can send a child off the rails completely. There is a lot to be said for enduring a short sharp pain if it can prevent long term damage, which is probably why nature decrees that it hurts when you touch something hot, signalling, in no uncertain terms, that it is not a good thing to do. The alternative, would be significant damage to your body. Perhaps, when it comes to conditioning and preventing such poblems, nature knows best. I think most people would agree that it is better to undergo a few short sharp shocks than lose out on something that can adversley affect the rest of your life.

School Placement
A campaign to highlight the need for local schools for local children. In too many instances children are being told they cannot get a local school place because the local schools are full of children travelling in from other areas. This situation is not only unfair on the local children, who are often deprived of continuing schooling with the friends they have grown up with and told they have to travel miles to an out of area school, it is also compounding traffic congestion problems with many children migrating from one area to another during rush hour times.

Reduce or Abolish School Homework
A suggestion to reduce or abolish school homework in favour of 'independent study' within extended school hours (where necessary), so that when children come home from school they can switch off, relax and enjoy other activities and pastimes. It is important that children have a life outside of school and it is proven that homework is not that necessary as long as the school working day is productive. What's more it causes many problems. Nobody likes to have to take work home from the office and perhaps this should especially not be inflicted on our children. It is also often a pain for parents trying to make sure that their kids have done their homework, and can often cause tension within the family, interfering and causing problems with other activities and arrangements, and then leading to a last minute panic because something hasn't been done when it should have. If we want more productivity from our children, let them stay at school a little bit longer on the day. But let's also consider that life is not just about trying to become a mathematical genius or physicist, it is also about having a life as well and leaving room for recreational activities and fun, which are also vitally important to a child's healthy upbringing. Confining school work to school hours draws a clear line under when children leave the working environment of school, and join the social environment of home and family, just as for the rest of us. After all, they can still do some chores around the house, again, just like the rest of us. This in itself is an education to many children.

School Docking Zones
A suggestion to implement school docking zones to facilitate parents being able to pick up their children without incurring parking problems and parking penalties. A situation that local authorities, rather than put it right and make it easier for parents, have decided to financially exploit instead by fining parents when are trying to pick up or drop off their kids under the inadequate circumstances the local authorities have either created or done nothing about improving. Yet another nice little earner for them at our expense.