The education system in the north of Ireland has left behind a large section of the working-class population and nowhere more so than in the Protestant community.
When it comes to academic underachievement, working-class Protestant boys come almost bottom of the pile. The only group that fare worse are the children of Travellers. Academic and Irish News columnist Dr Brian Feeney places the blame squarely with the DUP – ‘Private Wealth and Public Squalor’ (May 3).
The reasons for this sad situation are more complex but having said that, DUP ideology and the education policies that followed as a result have played a huge part.
We have the most socially segregated education system in the developed world bar none. The OECD’s 2012 benchmark placed us at 34th out of 34 developed countries.
Over 50 years ago the Coleman Report found that the most powerful predictor of academic achievement is the socio-economic status of a child’s family and the second most important predictor is the socio-economic status of the classmates in their school.
In other words being born poor imposes a disadvantage; but attending a school with large numbers of low-income classmates presents a second independent challenge.
The transfer test here acts as a filter for social selection and what that means is that children from better off families go to grammar school and children from less advantaged backgrounds go to secondary school.
All the research shows that high-poverty schools consistently fail to provide students an equal opportunity for an adequate education. All students perform substantially worse in high-poverty schools.
We have a multitude of research which has been carried out here and it clearly illustrates the harm that the transfer test inflicts on working-class children and how it acts as the biggest barrier to their educational advancement. The DUP knows all about this research and has wilfully ignored it. It seems as far as it is concerned, the working classes need to know their place and it’s at the bottom.
Heather Wilson, an SDLP activist from a unionist background, said: “No-one has walked over working-class unionists and loyalists like elite unionism has.”
JIM CURRAN
Downpatrick, Co Down
Will we never learn?
The 1994 genocide in Rwanda started with the slogan “We are the majority!” (‘Rubanda nyamwinshi!’)... yet many of us in many countries still promote the notion that democracy is win-or-lose, that decision-making votes are binary. At about that time, “all the wars in the former Yugoslavia started with a referendum” (Oslobodjenje, Sarajevo’s famous newspaper, 7/2/1999), and the same now applies to Ukraine... yet some people in Ireland and Scotland (not to mention Catalonia and Republika Srpska) still want to hold constitutional plebiscites which are binary. The latest crisis is in Sudan, where two generals are fighting a win-or-lose battle for total control... yet many of us still act as if politics is also win-or-lose, whereas in Switzerland for example, democratic rule involves all-party power-sharing.
In an effort to tackle climate change, the COP nations of the world have rejected majority voting (but not yet adopted preferential voting in decision-making). Is it not time our political parties started (or tried) to cooperate, no longer voting ‘for’ or ‘against’ each other on only two options, but rather, as befits a pluralist democracy, talking and then casting their preferences in multi-option votes with each other. Therein nobody votes ‘no’; thereby they seek the option with the highest average preference; and an average, of course, involves every MLA/MP/TD, not just a majority of them.
In other words, should our politicians now replace the 2,500-year-old binary vote with (electronic) preference voting, the basis of which was devised just 250 years ago in France? Unfortunately, a certain French guy did not like this ‘consensus nonsense’ very much, so he rejected preference voting and reverted to the old, very unrevolutionary majority vote. This gave him the power to choose the option. And thus, in an 1803 referendum – it was binary, of course, ‘oui ou non?’ -– he became the emperor, one Napoléon Bonaparte.
PETER EMERSON
Director, the de Borda Institute, Belfast BT14
People should look at real reason for the conflict in Ukraine
SINN FÉIN has swallowed western propaganda regarding the war in Ukraine, a proxy war planned and initiated by the US – the 2014 coup that overthrew the elected government. No mention of the 14,500 civilians killed by Ukrainian shelling before, yes, before the Russian invasion. The persecution of all speaking Russian and the burning of all Russian books in Ukraine, not to mention all opposition figures banned.
But as we are only getting one side of the story as all opposing views are deleted or banned, such as the Russian news outlets in Europe, it is not surprising. I think when this conflict is over there will be a few red faces when the truth is revealed.
Who we should feel sorry for are those half-trained, young Ukrainian conscripts sent to their deaths against a well-trained Russian fighting force, fighting on or near their own borders. The west is fighting this war to the last young Ukrainian.
It would benefit Sinn Féin and others if they could realise the real reason for this conflict was, as President Biden stated, to weaken Russia – which has dramatically failed.
JOHN-PATRICK BELL
Manorhamilton, Co Leitrim
Cynical opportunistic moment
THE headline ‘Irish to be spoken at King Charles coronation service’ was an indication to me that it was little more than a cynical opportunistic moment by the British establishment (I doubt it came directly from Charles) to advance its claim on ‘The North’. I would suggest that it went down like a lead balloon amongst nationalists, particularly amongst those who speak and espouse the language.
Incidentally, I wonder what Gregory Campbell, he of ‘curried yoghurt’ etc infamy, has to say about it all.
PETER PALLAS
Bantry, Co Cork
