Teachers for Supply

The director of graduate admissions at Oxford University has needed to apologise in court to a student suing considered one of its colleges for “selecting by wealth” after offering inaccurate evidence.

Jane Elizabeth Sherwood told a court hearing she were wrong to say that other universities had an identical admission practices. In written evidence, she apologised to the court and to Damien Shannon, 26, who’s suing St Hugh’s College, Oxford, for less than admitting students to postgraduate degrees ready to show they’ve got money to satisfy both its fees and £12,900 in living costs.

As the Observer revealed last month, Shannon claims that those without easy accessibility to capital and savings are being “disproportionately discriminated against” by this so-called financial guarantee, in breach in their human rights.

The university as an entire doesn’t consider money earned through part-time work when it judges whether a student has the means to review in Oxford. It also only has one university-wide scholarship that’s means-tested, in accordance with its own defence papers.

St Hugh’s is fighting Shannon’s legal claim and Sherwood had told Manchester county court that other universities set similar financial guarantees. In further evidence heard inside the court on Friday, Sherwood admitted this was inaccurate. Her written apology said: “The University of Exeter doesn’t require a financial guarantee from postgraduate offer holders. Nor does Goldsmith’s College, even though it does require a deposit in respect of fees for certain courses, eg the MA in film-making.”

Shannon told the Observer: “The university’s director of graduate admissions attempted to justify the financial selection policy by claiming, falsely, that two other universities were operating an equivalent policy. This was done notwithstanding my having mentioned in my previous submissions to the court that the claim was not true – nevertheless, it was repeated, although eventually withdrawn. The claim was rightly withdrawn and an apology was issued to both myself and to the court, and naturally I accept the apology entirely.”

At a primary hearing of Shannon’s case on Friday, judgment was reserved over whether the student’s human rights were breached when St Hugh’s turned him down on financial grounds after he had met their academic requirements. Judge Armitage QC said he would return to Manchester county court with a judgment at a unspecified future date.

Shannon alleged that his place at the economic and social history course was withdrawn due to “arbitrary figure” the faculty had set. The university says a guarantee was required to make sure postgraduate students’ fees and living costs were covered within the course.

Maria Hutchings, the Tory candidate within the Eastleigh byelection have been widely criticised for seeming to indicate that her son was too intelligent to visit state school.

Hutchings hopes to interchange the Liberal Democrat MP Chris Huhne, who resigned his seat after pleading guilty to perverting the process justice earlier this month.

According to the Daily Mirror, Hutchings said on Friday: “William [her son] is especially gifted which supplies us another interesting challenge find the best type of education for him – impossible within the state system. He desires to be a cardio-respiratory surgeon.”

The newest Ofsted reports for plenty of Eastleigh schools, including Thornden, Wildern and Toynbee high schools, have found them to be “outstanding”.

Her comments caused a storm on Twitter where hundreds of folks tweeted their professions and the truth that they were state educated to contradict Hutchings’ assertion.

Labour candidate John O’Farrell said: “Ten years ago, after I was all in favour of the shortcoming of suitable local schools, I organised with other parents to establish a brand new non-selective state school.

“My very own children went there and that i served as chair of governors for eight years. Maria Hutchings claims to ‘get things done’ – but clearly the alternative is right,” he told the Daily Mirror. “All she’s shown is that she’s just as out of touch because the remainder of the Conservative party, whether on education, tax cuts for millionaires or trebling tuition fees.”

The Tory candidate inside the Eastleigh byelection was struggling to preserve a reputable challenge for the Liberal Democrat stronghold after she suggested local state schools weren’t ok for her 12-year-old son, who has ambitions to become a surgeon.

The comments from Maria Hutchings, described by Lib Dems as a Sarah Palin figure for her trenchant views and tendency to chat off-message, provoked a storm of protest as political opponents and state-educated celebrities, said she had insulted state schools, including two local ones with glowing Ofsted reports.

Hutchings, who lives within the constituency and is looking for to overturn a three,800 Lib Dem majority following the resignation of the previous cabinet minister Chris Huhne, said on Friday her son was too clever for local state schools. “William is particularly gifted, which provides us another interesting challenge to find the correct style of education for him – impossible inside the state system. He desires to be a cardio-respiratory surgeon.”

The Labour leader, Ed Miliband, said Hutchings had insulted “every pupil and teacher at our state schools, including those in Eastleigh. The concept that you cannot be a surgeon in case you visit a state school shows total ignorance of what a fine job such a lot of state schools are doing.” The Lib Dem leader of Eastleigh council, Keith House, said the daughter of Mike Thornton, his party’s candidate, had left a native state school and gone directly to study medicine at Imperial College, London.

Labour, whose candidate, John O’Farrell, is seen an intruder within the 28 February poll, sought yesterday to drive a wedge between the coalition parties over tax policy by calling on Lib Dems to support Miliband’s call last week for a mansion tax on homes worth over £2m. Miliband said his party would call a parliamentary vote within the following couple of weeks after which table an amendment to the Finance Bill that will deliver a mansion tax if the Lib Dems offered their support.

“Here’s a chance for Nick Clegg to prove he can keep a minimum of certainly one of his promises,” Miliband said.

Today on guardian.co.uk, Labour MP Geraint Davies, praising the plan to revive the 10p tax rate calls on Miliband to apply the by-election to flesh out the “one nation Labour” concept. “The risk is of reverting to the 1992 Labour brand, ie, all heart and no mind versus the Tory brand all mind with out a heart,” Davies writes.

Back to nature

If the concept of being cooped up in the home with the children fills you with dread, take them along to the Epping Forest Field Centre, near Loughton in Essex, so as to be running family activity events from pond-dipping to stargazing (18-20 February, activities about £6pp, booking required, 020-8502 8500, field-studies-council.org/centres/eppingforest.aspx).

Down in Surrey, Painshill Park near Cobham is running Wild Woodland Camps Monday to Friday for eight- to 13-year-olds. There’ll be an additional theme for every day, from wild winter art to bushcraft, and youngsters would be ready to try their hand at bivouac-building, archery, animal tracking and orienteering (18-22 February, £35 an afternoon, booking required, 01932 868113, painshill.co.uk).

In North Yorkshire, families can follow a bird-themed trail round the beautiful grounds of the ruined 12th-century Fountains Abbey and Studley Royal Water Garden. But when the February weather’s bad, head to Swanley Grange Learning Centre for nature-themed crafts and bird box making (16-24 February, site entrance adult £8.60, child £4.50, family £21.80, 01765 608888, nationaltrust.org.uk/fountains-abbey).

For budding scientists

Brighton Science Festival

The Brighton Science Festival would be in full swing during half-term with heaps of kid-friendly workshops round the city (01273 777628, brightonscience.com). Help solve an imaginary crime using real forensic techniques consisting of fingerprinting, analysing hair samples under a microscope and identifying tyre tracks at a whodunnit workshop (20 February, £10pp, family ticket £30) or find out about dinosaurs and fossils on the Booth Museum (18-20 and 22 February).

Flight would be the focus this week at Enginuity, one of the great museums to be found on the Ironbridge Gorge industrial heritage centre in Shropshire (16-24 February, adult £8.25, child £6.95, 01952 433424, ironbridge.org.uk). Children can build and launch their very own rocket, how one can generate water from electricity and construct an earthquake-proof tower.

With its number of anatomy specimens and surgical instruments, the Hunterian Museum on the Royal College of Surgeons in London (rcseng.ac.uk/museums/hunterian) would possibly not seem an obvious destination for a jolly day trip, however the museum is operating hard to shake off its fusty image with family-friendly tours of the gallery (free, 21 February) and the likelihood to satisfy a 17th-century barber surgeon and his choice of leeches (£2, 20 February).

Get creative

The Wimpy Kid Show at Northcott Theatre, Exeter

Exeter would be a hive of creativity with two festivals designed to inspire budding artists and authors. Extreme Imagination is a children’s literature festival at venues round the city (16-24 February, artsandcultureexeter.co.uk). One of the highlights are The Wimpy Kid Show at Northcott Theatre with a view to bring to life Jeff Kinney’s best-selling books with activities, quizzes and movie clips (18 February, £5), and a dragons, myths and tales event on the Killerton estate, offering children the possibility to create stories and follow a detective trail round the grounds (16-24 February, site entrance adult £8.70, child £4.35, family £22, nationaltrust.org.uk).

In the West Midlands, stop-motion animation would be the theme of a workshop for youngsters aged 11 and over on the Public in West Bromwich (21 February, £4pp, 0121-533 7161, thepublic.com). Children will discover ways to create a brief film using a storyboard, digicam and animation software.

Visitors to Belsay Hall in Northumberland are invited to go into the mystical world of Lewis Carroll by following an Alice in Wonderland Trail round the gardens (16-24 February, site entrance adult £7.70, child £4.60, family £20, english-heritage.org.uk). There are six characters in finding along the way in which and a certificate for all who complete the path.

Travel in time

Evacuee Experience Family Days, Weymouth

The ever-popular Jorvik Viking Festival returns to the streets of York this week attracting some 40,000 visitors with its mixture of battle re-enactments, guided walks and family-friendly events (16-24 February, jorvik-viking-festival.com). Visit the Viking encampment (complete with longship) on Coppergate Square, participate in a sword-fighting workshop (£3pp) or test your hand at Viking crafts equivalent to leatherworking, willow weaving and rune stamping.

Young historians will jump on the chance to be an Egyptian curator for the day on the Mercer Art Gallery in Harrogate. Children six and over can handle ancient Egyptian artefacts, discover ways to record and label replica objects, and create a display case (19 February, £2pp, booking required, 01423 556188, harrogate.gov.uk/museums).

Twentieth-century history will come under the spotlight at Nothe Fort in Weymouth, Dorset, that is running Evacuee Experience Family Days (18, 20 & 22 February, £7pp, 01305 766626, nothefort.org.uk). Normally available to high school groups only, the experience should be open to families this half-term with lessons in a 1940s schoolroom, air raid drills, and a taste of rationing in a wartime kitchen.

Child’s play

James Bond cars at Beaulieu Motor Museum

Wannabe 007s can race a James Bond-style Aston Martin on an enormous eight-lane Scalextric track at Beaulieu National Motor Museum in Hampshire (16-24 February, adult £20, youth £12, child £9.95, family £52.50, 01590 612345, beaulieu.co.uk). Youngsters aged 16 and under (sorry Dads) can compete for the fastest track time of the day and win Scalextric prizes. If you happen to can tear yourself clear of the track, the Bond in Motion exhibition is definitely worth a trip, with its selection of iconic Bond vehicles, from high-speed bikes to Aston Martins. There’s also a half-term quiz trail to check your knowledge of 007.

The V&A Museum of Childhood in Bethnal Green, east London, could be going back to the 1980s this half-term with a brand new Wave Kids activity week (18-22 February, free, museumofchildhood.org.uk). Take part an inventive retelling of Shirley Hughes’s popular children’s book Alfie Gets in First, design your personal Pac-Man badge or Care Bears greeting card and tackle the infamous Rubik’s Cube to win a prize.

For something more active, Ropes and Ladders in Llanberis, Gwynedd (01286 872310, ropesandladders.co.uk) offers outdoor activities for children from four years old. There’s an adventure ropes course specially for less than-eights, and high ropes activities for bigger ones. All equipment and instruction provided. Low-level course £10 per child, high ropes £20 per child, booking recommended.

Niall Ferguson misses the purpose (On history, Gove is correct, 15 February). I studied history at a state comprehensive until last year, once I was 17. My main criticism of the syllabus i used to be taught is that it left me clueless in regards to the global impact of British colonial rule, other than a couple of smug lines in a textbook about Victoria ruling the waves. Michael Gove’s proposed changes only glorify this aspect of Britain’s past. The German education system feels it’s its duty to drill into students the atrocities committed by their forefathers within the second world war. It’s embarrassing that teenagers emerge from British schools with out a awareness that the drastic wealth division between the west and the remainder of the arena is predicated on an uncomfortable legacy of slavery, bloodshed and shameless plundering. Yes, these abuses were conducted by our distant ancestors – but we must always remember after we walk the streets of Liverpool and Bristol that such cities were built at the spoils of a lucrative slave trade. If our awareness of those parts of our history was heightened, perhaps we would consider carefully about allowing an African asylum-seeking mother and her son to starve to death in Westminster, as happened in March 2010.
Rebecca Grant
Manchester

• While it’s mildly amusing to read history professors’ bitchy comments about their differences on Gove’s new curriculum, the failings surrounding what’s appropriate for the study room aren’t so simple as Niall Ferguson asserts. Find out how to engage learners is all about imagination, thinking skills, being a detective, enjoying blood and gore and yes, having fun. But we are facing real issues of limited time and pop culture it’s in favour of fashionable contemporaneity. Lists of assumed heroes and some heroines isn’t sufficient. The Gove model is more corresponding to a motley selection of nationalistic stories aligned to English studies. Perhaps we must always delay the study of proper history post-16 to encourage the event of potential professors.
Nicholas Tyldesley
Bolton

• Niall Ferguson asks if it’s acceptable for youngsters to go away school “knowing nothing concerning the Norman conquest, the English civil war or the fantastic revolution but plenty (well, a little) concerning the Third Reich, the recent Deal and the civil rights movement” In an increasingly diverse yet economically ailing society, it is vital for its democratic functioning for citizens to know the character of prejudice with the intention to combat discrimination, and to grasp something of Keynesian alternatives to the present government’s economic policies.
Michael Somerton
Hull