I was interested to see Anthea Millett's article, which was written before the Universities Council for the Education of Teachers had prepared its response to the publication of the Coopers and Lybrand funding and allocations study and the circulation of the subsequent Teacher Training Agency consultation document.
I welcomed the "hope that UCET will come to the table and work with us". We should indeed be pleased to "come to the table" as this is something UCET has been attempting to do formally for some time. I assume that the article will, for instance, be followed rapidly by a response to my letter of early October on behalf of UCET/Secondary Heads Association/National Association of Head Teachers requesting a meeting with Anthea Millett.
Far from being beastly to Coopers and Lybrand's "incisive analysis", UCET's response describes the report as "lucid, well-informed about teacher education and thought-providing". Alas, in important places the TTA's consultative version bears the same relationship to the report as the television version of The Final Cut did to the Dobbs' original. We acknowledge that we owe it to the schools to secure a proper basis for funding initial teacher education. One is left to wonder, therefore,why the TTA chose to exclude partnership schools from their consultative exercise.
MARY J. RUSSELL
Secretary
Universities Council for the Education of Teachers