This is why I never get anything done on Sundays. I have just been on Twitter and read a link to an article by Diane James about the EU’s latest initiative. They are proposing a common curriculum, or at least that is what I assume. She naturally interpreted it as an attempt to push pro-EU propaganda in the schools. Equally naturally, I think she has totally missed the point.
But it did get me thinking. If the EU is going to be a serious single market comparable to that of the United States then there is going to need to be a common approach to education. This will enable firms to easily hire across borders, and to make it easier for the workers to move. Improving labour mobility and increasing opportunities sound like win win scenarios, to lapse into business speak for a moment.
While the details are inevitably going to be a problem for lots of people in lots of places for lots of reasons, this does seem to be something that is inevitable and on the whole quite a good idea. If people are going to work together they need a basic common culture. We are obviously off to a good start on that in Europe in the first place as we do already share a great deal.
So this is something that the UK cannot ignore even if it does somehow manage to overcome the obstacles to actually leaving the EU. We are still going to need to talk to Europeans and we can hardly not prepare our young children for the world they are going to be living in, i.e., one where we live in Europe.
The obvious policy to adopt would be, naturally, to adopt all or most of the European educational programme and incorporate it into our own educational system. In fact that is pretty much a certainty as to what is going to happen. The smart move would be to look at it carefully and see in what ways it can be improved still further to give the UK’s students a positive advantage. I am not sure how that could be done, as I am not at all sure what skills the rest of the century is going to need. I wonder if anyone does. For example who would have foreseen what a lucrative profession being a trade negotiator was likely to become. But just because something is difficult doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try your best to do it.
What I am not sure about is whether this educational initiative has arisen now rather than sooner because previously it might have been blocked by British Conservatives. If so, then it could be one of the few Brexit benefits. Although we are not going to be part of the club, at least for a little while, we will still get the advantage of the single market being more coherent. And it might be a good opportunity to shake up our educational system as well. I remember thinking a few years back, and indeed tweeting it, that I quite liked the UKIP were stirring things up a bit. This might be a good example of how they have done so.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/884365/EU-plan-school-curriculum-plans-Theresa-May-Brexit-Brussels-Diane-James
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