This at the same time as they are claiming a salary of around £194,000 per annum for their services.

A graduate tax would mean that those who earn most from their degree pay most – and mean that students no longer leave univeristy with such huge debts hanging over their head. I left university with more than £10,000 in student loans, and I’m one of the lucky ones. Those who graduate now will have at least double that, as they have much larger tuition fees than I, and that is put on their student loan account, rather than having to be paid up front like mine were.

However, a graduate tax would mean that the expense of degrees would be shared out unequally across the graduate community, as those who earn more would pay more. It would mean that people who graduate but never use their degree would pay nothing towards their education. Plus, the money would take a long time to come through the system as the new graduates would have to work their way up to earning a decent amount of money first.

Of course, there appears to be no detail to this proposal – such as what level the graduate tax would start being paid, and how much that would be. Which would make a big difference to whether it is a practicable or prefereable solution or not. But, in principle, it’s the best one out there. Well, other than making university education actually free and paid for through general taxation like it should be.

I’ve just started paying back from Student Loan, and it will take me years to pay it off. And mine is probably not much more than half what these graduates will owe.

I feel sorry for them. So here’s a little song for gradutes of 2009 and 2010:

After having already suffered under Gordon Brown’s failure to sort out our education system, this generation now bears the heaviest brunt of his economic mismanagement.

Well duh.

Those who have just got qualifications are effectively unemployable in a recession. They have no work experience, no skills, nothing of any real use to employers who are suffering from the down-turn and considering getting making employees they already have redundant or cutting their working week.

Entering the world of work straight from school or university is always hard. Unless you are one of the lucky few to get on to a graduate scheme – now even harder than before – you will struggle to get a job.

I am so very very glad that I am not due to graduate this year. It was hard enough for me to get a job in 2007, which I got through a temp agency, but those jobs are few and far between now. The firm where I work [and worked as a temp] did not hire any temps to do the jobs that were hired to do back then due to the downturn, instead having temporary transfers of those on the graduate scheme from other areas of the firm where they were not needed.

Getting a foot in the door will be far far harder for school and university leavers during 2009 than in 2007 and even 2008. They will definitely be the true victims of Gordon Brown’s economic mismanagement. Getting a job for them will be harder than ever before.

Dyslexia is a cruel fiction, it is no more real than the 19th-century scientific construction of ‘the aether’ to explain how light travels through a vacuum…

It is time that the dyslexia industry was killed off and we recognised that there are well known methods for teaching everybody to read and write.

Dyslexia does indeed exist. Some people find it hard to learn how to read and write due to a neurological difference.

However, one could accept that there is a tendency for children to pigeon-holed as dyslexic when they aren’t for various reasons – but I can’t accept that it is to cover up for poor teaching. However, the fact that one in six leave school without any “good” [A*-C] GCSEs shows that there are issues with our educational system. But I don’t think it is the teachers themselves who are at fault.

The teaching methods Stringer advocates – synthetic phonics – can help children who suffer from dyslexia, but that it helps certainly doesn’t show that it doesn’t exist – just that there’s a way to minimise its effects.

On Friday, I attended the first day of my "Professional Skills Course" – part of my continuing development to be a fully qualified liar lawyer solicitor. When I do qualify, I’ll be obliged to attend a certain number of courses as part of my "Continual Professional Development".

I know these things are often scorned. I’ve finished my education, I know have a full time job, surely I’ve had enough of lectures and workshops?

Well, I think definitely not. Yes, you don’t need to be on a course to learn things. Constant reading of the relevant professional media should ensure that you stay on top of matters, and know when things change. It’s part of the job.

But, how much can you truly ‘learn’ from that? I often try to read some legal news when it comes to my desk – but it doesn’t take much to get bored, and even that file that’s been waiting for months starts to beckon you to do some work on it. Even if you are ‘reading’ it, it’s not always going in. When you’re in education, you often hear about "ways of learning" – and participating is the most productive. You’re able to discuss what you know (or what you think you know) with other delegates, and reach a conclusion.

Plus, being stuck in a ‘class room’ for the day, you’re put in the mood for learning. You’re out of the office, so you might as well put some effort into it.

I know some professionals don’t like going to such courses. Refuse to even – "We’re too busy". But they do serve a distinct purpose.

To get out of the office on expenses.

Enjoy your next course.

A major review of the curriculum for England’s primary schools suggests that six broad “areas of learning” could replace individual subjects…

It also calls for children to learn more about well-being, happiness and healthy living. (BBC)

And what are these so-called “areas of learning”?

• understanding English, communication and languages
• mathematical understanding; scientific and technological understanding
• scientific and technological understanding
• human, social and environmental understanding
• understanding physical health and well-being
• understanding the arts and design

As part of this, it suggests that our kids are taught in less depth about, well, anything. Including about our history and about the world in which we live. Instead they’d prefer to teach them IT stuff which they are almost certainly better at than their teachers.

What a load of rubbish this report contains.

Teachers should not be prosecuted for having affairs with their sixth formers, a union chief has said.

NASUWT general secretary Chris Keates said it was an “anomaly” that a teacher who had sex with a pupil aged over 16 could go on the sex offenders register… because a teacher could legally enter a relationship with a sixth former at another school. (BBC)

Teachers who have such relationships should be prosecuted, found guilty, and punished appropriately if they have a sexual relationship with any pupil at their school. Whether they are 11 or 18.

It isn’t because 18 year-olds shouldn’t have relationships with older people even if they still are at school, but because of the position of authority which that teacher inhabits. Whether that child is of the age of consent or not, it is wholly inappropriate for their to be any form sexual relationship between them.

Teachers are undeniably in a position of authrotiy and responsibility over every young person in their school, whether or not they teach them directly. The law must remain clear that any sexual relationship between them are regarded as a sex offence.

One could even say that this should be extended to include an period after either have left that school as well, since that authoruty still exists – if I came across one of my old school teachers, I’d be hard pushed to not automatically refer to them as “sir” or “miss”, and I left school five years ago.

What the NASUWT’s revision would do is open every sixth former to the possibility of seduction by an older teacher.

It seems that even depsite bringing Peter Mandelson back, Brown certainly isn’t willing to fully embrace a Blairite agenda – just a spun Brown one [about as bad as each other].

All well and good.

However, there is just one thing that made me stop and think about this story. Contrasting his name – Adonis, throwing up images of musclar Greek gods – and his image.

Adonis by name, not adonis by nature.

The rise in the number of graduates seeking employment isn’t matched by an equal rise in the number of graduate jobs available. But the rise in students numbers has also meant that a large number of less academically able people have gone.

This would be a good thing, were the point of a university education simply to improve the education of the populace. But it’s not. The sheer cost of going to university – with student debt topping £3 billion – makes it more about an opportunity to improve job prospects. And for those at low-ranking universities who study arts degrees, it doesn’t do much for them.

This is why the attempt by Labour to get 50% of 18 year-olds to go to university won’t – and could never – work. There simply aren’t enough graduate jobs, as has now been proven.

A report on assessment by the all-party children, schools and families committee will condemn the way the results of national exams are used both as political capital and to compare how good schools are without taking account of their intake.

Because so much rides on them, tests are distorting education, with schools forced to narrow the curriculum and spend months cramming pupils. (The Telegraph)

Surely this is just common sense? Excessive testing, such as is currently carried out in our schools, massively limits the educational opportunities on offer. Way too much time is spent focusing on the tests – both their specific curriculum and “how to take a test” – which restricts the amount of time that can be spent actually on real education and expanding the minds of the students – ie. stopping teachers doing their jobs.

Of course, tests cannot be totally removed from education. But they can and must be restricted to their proper place, or we’ll have a generation of people who know nothing beyond how to take tests. Grade As and A*s across the board – but no knwoledge to back it up.

The harmful tyranny of tests must end. Or we’ll all suffer.