‘In a more socially mobile society, everyone should have a choice, be aware of that choice and be able to exercise it. From birth people should have equal opportunities whether at home, school, further education (FE) college, university or in training…Everyone should be recruited on merit no matter which school or university they attended. The old boys’ network must no longer be a passport to success…those from disadvantaged backgrounds should not be held back because they don’t fit in’
UK Government’s Social Mobility Commission, 2019.1
If we were to shine a light on every pupil, how many would not be able to make progress? Blandford2011.2
‘The continuance of social evils is not due to the fact that we do not know what is right, but that we prefer to continue doing what is wrong. Those who have the power to remove them do not have the will, and those who have the will have not, as yet, the power.’
Tawney, 1912.3
The demise of meritocracy?