麻豆约拍

In 'Revision Time! What are schools really for today?' Anne McElvoy chairs a discussion about the true value of education, recorded at the 麻豆约拍 Radio 3 Free Thinking Festival 2011 at the Sage, Gateshead.

As our school system undergoes significant levels of reform, with the proliferation of academies and free schools and proposals for a new curriculum, shouldn't we be asking ourselves what school is really for? Are we so fixated on exam results that we ignore alternative ways to bring up our children and disregard the real benefits of education?

Children's writer David Almond, the journalist and school governor Fiona Millar, the headmaster of Monkseaton School Paul Kelley, literacy expert Tom Burkard who wants to set up a Free School staffed by ex-members of the military and New Generation Thinker Shahidha Bari debate the issues.