[WS:] I do not understand why you keep bringing this up - it is not germane to the argument that has been made here.
T: On the contrary, this was the original point that I objected to most strongly and then your objection to my objection took it onto a different track. This is where the problem lies, in your zeal to expose my 'populism' and 'conservativism', you have lost the plot. I argued that in a properly leftist, that is, radical approach, you must take an all-sided view first of all. You have never said where you stood on this. Cox rejected it in upper case letters. And I accept that I will not agree with him on this. What say you?
To reiterate - the argument here is that exclusive focus on teachers and their attributes as the sole "cause" of the failures in educational attainment is a diversion from real issues - a diversion in which both right wing union bashers and privatizers and left wing populists find common ground. I do not think that the teaching professionals are any worse than other professionals - surely they are bad teachers, but there are also bad doctors, bad engineers, bad managers, bad IT specialists, etc.
T: You see this is where you don't want to admit that you don't know the severity of teacher under achievement in a country like South Africa. We have teachers teaching grade 12 maths who have not passed this subject at grade 12 themselves. Such 'teachers', I have been at pains to argue, nevertheless have a kind of sheltered employment in which they do not in effect have to do anything to rectify this situation. The situation in fact is given a spurious 'political' veneer. This is the empirical situation that you and yours just refuse to recognise, because it doesn't even have a place in your scheme of things. Hence my charge of blinkeredness and parochialism, which I do not withdraw.
Tahir
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