This morning I stayed in bed to catch up with my sleep.
Later I skimmed the news on line. Here are some results.
Headline:
“Keir Starmer says he wants to offer Burnham ‘big role’ in government to avoid leadership contest – UK politics live”
Good grief! The guy’s not won his election yet!
Another headline:
“Students could be required to pass GCSE English to access university loans”
Goodness! Back when I was sixth form tutor it was understood that you needed GCSE English and Maths as standard requirements when applying to university. We regularly insisted students without those qualifications resit them, sometimes alongside the advanced courses they were embarking on.
However, I read this:
“Under one proposal being discussed by ministers, a pass in GCSE English would become the national threshold for students to access government-backed tuition and maintenance loans through the Student Loans Company.
The change would affect more than 30,000 students each year who enrol on full-time first degree courses without formal qualifications such as GCSEs, as well as being a potential financial disaster for universities that teach large numbers of such students, often through franchise arrangements with external partners.”
So there you go. The push to get more and more people into university, and universities agreeing to franchise arrangements to teach large numbers of such students has led to this situation.
But there is also perhaps a hidden racist agenda here. It’s an insistence on GCSE English, not Maths, the other basic for almost all degree subjects, that is being stressed here. Good English speakers required!! Or am I becoming a little paranoid?
And then there is this article about footballer Harry Kane, who apparently has a dream:
Harry Kane’s American dream begins: ‘I’m coming into this in the best way possible’
He admires the mentality of US sports stars, the belief that “anyone can achieve success if they want it badly enough, if they pursue it with all their heart. It is known as the American dream.”
With so much negative stuff coming out of the US at present, I personally have no dream of going there but good for Harry Kane. I hope he has a successful World Cup season.
A friend of mine was getting agitated about the whole World Cup thing the other day. A lover of football, he was distressed at the amount of corruption in the organisation of the competition, never mind the arrant racism regarding certain teams and referees and such. Mind you, he’s still watching the games.
It’s a funny business team sport. Fans say they support their local team - or the team of another city that they have selected - but the members of the team usually have little or nothing to do with the city they play for. Like commodities, they are bought and sold for the skills they possess. Surely trading people, even if the people concerned do rather well out of the deal, is morally suspect!
That’s all.
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
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