The challenge of change

Abstract

When I received the invitation to attend the Brighton Conference on Changing Patterns in Teacher Education in April 1975 my heart sank at the prospect of another of those recently all-too-frequent, and sad, interminable sessions, when those of us in teacher training met to wallow in a sea of self -pity and mutual commiseration, to accuse our masters in Elizabeth House of malevolently destroying a long-cherished system, to accuse the James Committee of prejudice, our professional association of betrayal, the polytechnics of territorial ambitions and the universities of callous indifference. At the present time the battlefield is covered in smoke as we dart from shell hole to shell hole seeking either a group to join (university, polytechnic or friendly college of further education) or to remain alone in our hole in the ground. When we find a lull we spend countless hours and expend reams of paper designing new degree and diploma courses which no-one wants but which we believe we could mount and which might ensure survival till the war ends. Just as we think the guns are quieter a new offensive breaks out; increasing numbers of sixth formers do not want higher education and the country cannot afford more of it. Then comes the final blow: the population figures upon which the White Paper and Circular 7/73 were based were widely optimistic. More of us must be lost; the plans on which we drew up our battle lines were based on false intelligence. Anyway, the battle now seems to be about something quite different; it is about organisation, structures, money, survival.