reporting the fact that the Education Secretary in Britain has announced the first new state grammar school for 30 years. Most of the clippings say that this is almost certain to mean the death knell for comprehensive schools in Britain. It appears to be the British Government's aim to give parents greater freedom to choose the school that suits their children.

The people sending us the clippings appear to be trying to send a message to the Minister of Education. A note attached to one clipping said, "...it will be realised that all that is needed in Bermuda is top flight teaching staff who are allowed to get on with their work and are paid accordingly''.

Another pointed out that what Bermuda needs is good schools no matter what system it develops.

Indeed, the Education Secretary in Britain has said, "I am determined that choice should not be between good and bad schools but between different kinds of good schools.'' That may well be exactly what Bermudians are asking for.

Bermuda's parents want to know that the schools are good and are going to meet their children's needs.

Bermuda has tolerated a rather strange five tier school system. There was education abroad at a wide variety of schools from the excellent to the embarrassing, about which there was too little guidance. Then there was private education in Bermuda which was seen as being good education but did not necessarily meet a high standard. Government supplied vested schools which were generally the best of the Government supported schools in terms of both academics and plant, were allowed to choose their students and often had a higher entrance standard than the private schools. The top three tiers catered for the rich and the bright. Tier four was rather average Government schools, followed by five where students were unashamedly dumped when no-one else wanted them or, more importantly, when they could not pay for local or overseas private schools. Naturally, the latter schools developed an unacceptable stigma.

The situation continued for many years because the movers and the shakers in Bermuda were not involved, having a social contract to educate their children privately.

To his great credit, the Hon. Gerald Simons decided to do something about the archaic system because he wanted to help those who were damaged along the way in this archaic maze and who were generally categorised as "falling through the cracks''. Mr. Simons implemented a widely based Education Planning Team and largely accepted their suggestions, thinking they represented what Bermuda generally wanted by way of education for its children. But, we think, the suggestions contained a basic flaw. The EPT results seem to have been fuelled by unhappy teachers. The system they wanted appeared to lower standards and did not fit with what parents wanted. EPT wanted comprehensive education and one mega high school. Parents, basically, wanted a choice of good schools with equal facilities. Any number of parents wanted all sorts of changes and took the opportunity of being consulted to have their say.

The Minister was determined to get a better system. Parents and teachers were determined to have their way. We think the Minister would have been grateful for a cohesive answer from parents. The teachers started out leading towards an easy comprehensive system and wound up seeming to have been used for political purposes. Then the recession and cash raised its head.

No-one has come out of the great education debate very well. The trouble is that there are as many opinions on education as there are people who have been to school.