Gary Bland
Working in Bermondsey & Old Southwark to Make a Difference
Caring doesn't cost yet the rewards can be invaluable. Be selfish, say yes to helping others.
Education
Ave. 5 A-C GCSE pass % - Southwark Private Schools : 100%
Ave. 5 A-C GCSE pass % - Southwark Comprehensive Schools : 67.5%
(source Southwark Council website)
The improvement from 56.3 last year is good and the pupils, teachers and parents should be congratulated, but with decades of decline under the LibDems and Labour is something the council should be utterly ashamed of.
WHY SHOULD PEOPLE WITH MONEY GET ACCESS TO THE BEST EDUCATION?
I often hear people say that those with money can afford to provide a good private education to their children, but have you stopped to think why these people will often go down the private route?
Just because some people may have a generous income or savings doesn't mean they should be put in a position whereby they feel their only option is to pay for an excellent education. There should never be a question mark about what school you should send your child to. This will also stop the home location/school lottery.
EDUCATION IS THE ROUTE TO WELL-BEING
Education and well-being are intrinsically linked and I believe it is the responsibility of the local council, and therefore the councillors, as well as the government of the day, to ensure everything that can be done is done to ensure our children have the opportunities to be everything they can be, and to improve the quality of their life and the life of their own children.
I believe we must have a radical change in policy, not just election speak, and I would like to see Southwark as the UK's leader in this endeavour. I would work hard to:
encourage more school buildingsignificantly reduce class sizes to 16 for secondary schoolslocal schools for local children
Did you know, the average cost of a private school place for 11 to 16 year olds is £12,000 per year, but the average cost per pupil in the public sector is £20,000 - it make you think doesn't it.
GUARANTEED FREE NURSERY PLACES
I want to work for parents to have free nursery places. This includes the development of council run and private nurseries. Although this should be means tested.
This will enable the most needy to get back to work and not rely on benefits. Working gives people pride and children pick up on this state of mind.
"Become a student of change. It is the only thing that will remain constant."
Anthony D'Angelo
"Only the educated are free."
Epictetus
"Education is the best provision for old age."
Aristotle
"I had a terrible education. I attended a school for emotionally disturbed teachers."
Woody Allen
"Education make a people easy to lead, but difficult to drive: easy to govern, but impossible to enslave."
Peter Brougham
"No matter how good teaching may be, each student must take the responsibility for his own education."
John Carolus S.J.
"Those who profess to favour freedom and yet deprecates agitation, are men who want crops without plowing the ground."
Frederick Douglass
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simplier."
Albert Einstein
"It is a greater work to educate a child, in the true and larger sense of the word, than to rule a state."
William Ellery Channing
"I was thrown out of college for cheating on the metaphysics exam; I looked into the soul of the boy sitting next to me."
Woody Allen
"Next in importance to freedom and justice is popular education, without which which neither freedom nor justice can be maintained."
James A. Garfield
"Read not to contradict and confute, nor to believe and take for granted... but to weigh and consider."
Francis Bacon
"We think too much about effective methods of teaching and not enough about effective methods of learning."
John Carolus S.J.
"The true teacher defends his pupils against his own personal influences."
Amos Alcott
"In all affairs it's a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted."
Bertrand Russell
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