Nice People Thread No. 15, a Cyber Summer

vivatifosi

Imo, unitary authorities and libraries do not make great bedfellows, as you just can't get the economies of scale that you can with a large county. You have to be a really big city to get the same resource base.

Pyxis

PasturesNew wrote: »

Standard Password: Pa55w0rds99%Suck

I must admit, I do have a couple that are not dissimilar from the sentiment in that one!


And no, neither is my MSE password!



(Thinks: is it dissimilar from or dissimilar to?.............. trots off to google........

Edit.......trots back from googling..

Well, it looks like the jury may be out.

Some say that as it is 'similar to' it should also be 'dissimilar to' and others say that as dissimilar means different, it should take 'from'.
Another source suggested that as 'not dissimilar' means the same as 'similar' IYSWIM, it should be 'dissimilar to'.
The plot doth thicken!

To my own ear, either sounds sort of ok. I shall hunt further.

GDB2222

vivatifosi wrote: »

Imo, unitary authorities and libraries do not make great bedfellows, as you just can't get the economies of scale that you can with a large county. You have to be a really big city to get the same resource base.

My borough (not mine, you understand, but where I live) has a population of 380,000. They share a few services with neighbouring boroughs, but not many. Surely, instead of closing most of the libraries down, as they are doing, there could be economies of scale by making this an across-London service or even a national one?

vivatifosi

Most libraries belong to consortia where they share resources and make things work as well as possible, but ultimately the budget holder will drive policy, and that will always be whatever local authority runs it.

Pyxis

Having looked in some dictionaries, it would appear that either may be used, so I suspect a lot depends on context.



While looking, though, I discovered a new word - thunder-plump - meaning a heavy fall of rain during a thunderstorm.
:T :T

PasturesNew

I've always thought that it'd have been better if all authorities/councils had the "same website" structure and functionality - and where they don't provide a service the page should simply say "we don't do that here".

Then, if you had, say, "office opening hours/contact page" for one council/authority - and you had a link to it, all you would have to do would be to replace the authority name in the link with your own authority name and voila, the page would appear.

That'd make sharing of information by people easier.

e.g. My bins go out on these days www. MyTown.uk/DirtyStuff/BinsDay

And you'd see that and just type: www. YourTown.uk/DirtyStuff/BinsDay

It'd be much easier/cheaper to have developed that, to maintain it etc.

Instead they all get shiny websites bespoke-written ... bespoke maintained by in-house IT departments ... in buildings... all paid for ....

But - if that did happen - some numpty would put the core skills/management teams in London, at the highest prices possible for staffing and buildings instead of picking a non-descript town along the M4 and saying "that'll do".

PasturesNew

And another thing if I were in charge .....

Why do schools all work differently? I'd have one syllabus, using one set of text books as core books - so if/when kids moved schools they'd step straight into "the same stuff" they just left. They could still leave some flexibility in there for "stuff only we do".

And school dinners - why isn't there one nutrition department working out all the menus/recipes? They could provide a central database/bank for schools to be able to pick/choose their menus/meals and press a button that then said "that's fine" and print them out .... or "that's all pies, please stick a salad somewhere instead".

Same with uniforms - why aren't they all made to one design ... and schools simply pick their colour scheme for jumpers?

It seems to me that a lot of councils/authorities spend all day reinventing the wheel.

Pyxis

PasturesNew wrote: »

And another thing if I were in charge .....

Why do schools all work differently? I'd have one syllabus, using one set of text books as core books - so if/when kids moved schools they'd step straight into "the same stuff" they just left. They could still leave some flexibility in there for "stuff only we do".

And school dinners - why isn't there one nutrition department working out all the menus/recipes? They could provide a central database/bank for schools to be able to pick/choose their menus/meals and press a button that then said "that's fine" and print them out .... or "that's all pies, please stick a salad somewhere instead".

Same with uniforms - why aren't they all made to one design ... and schools simply pick their colour scheme for jumpers?

It seems to me that a lot of councils/authorities spend all day reinventing the wheel.

I think a lot of that does go on, you know. Certainly a lot of schools stick to generic uniforms and list shops that stock them. Certainly at Primary level all the supermarkets stock the same style of dresses in red/green/blue checks.

I think the curriculum is fairly standard these days too; I think a lot of teachers would like more flexibility.

PasturesNew

Pyxis wrote: »

I think a lot of teachers would like more flexibility.

There can be flexibility, within sameness....

e.g. 1066 is in the curriculum. But some schools might do it first and hang everything off it - others might do it in the 3rd year. Those close to the location might do a special project and exhibition for parents' evening ....

But if they all did it in the first year - that'd be sameness. If there were 20% allowed in the curriculum for "catch ups if the pupils are dense, or special projects" that'd allow flexibility

This'd reduce the alleged "extra hours" they have to put into lesson plans too - and enable them to share experiences/notes/good ideas if they're all doing the same thing at the same time.

A core "lesson plan" could be compiled easily enough ... with those with a keen interest expanding it if they wish by using some of that 20% slack.

I changed schools aged 13 and the new school did an entirely different style/type of maths. Back then it was called "old maths" and "new maths" .... and the two were as different as French and German! I had no idea what the teacher was going on about as I sat in "new maths" with my head full of "old maths".

vivatifosi

Re why do councils do things differently. There are a few things..

Unitaries run differently from county/district
The priorities are set according to local need/who is in charge.

There is a drive by government to make websites more similar. They are now supposed to all have websites that are placename.gov.UK and there is some work being done on making things more similar. However that depends on what money/resources is available to make changes, given that there were other priorities that need money, eg elderly care.