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Connexions
Blogged by James Preece on 23rd January 2009
My Story
I know quite a few people who work at St Mary's College in Hull so I can tell this story and the person concerned can remain anonymous.
They were in school one day when somebody enters the room and says they are from Connexions. For anybody who isn't familiar, Connexions is the UK Governments careers advice service. Anyway, person from Connexions starts to put posters in the room. My friend looks at the posters. There are a few about jobs but there is also one about always using a condom. In a Catholic school. Great. My friend takes it down.
Jackie Parkes Story
So I go into parent's evening last night. Comment on the fabulous Newman display in the entrance hall apparently borrowed from the Oratory. As I go in the hall notice a Connexions stand with 2 women seated & various booklets. Make a mental plan to check on way out.
So out we go & I stop by & ask ' Excuse me can you tell me if yr Connexions service is adapted to the needs of this being a Catholic School?' Well they were dumbstruck.. 'what do you mean?'.
So I pick up the main Connexions booklet.. 'your daughter should have had one of these' I said she did & we sent it back to school because of the information contained in it & the school apologised saying it shouldn't have been sent out!'. I asked could I keep their copy...'err no!'. So I pick up another booklet..I don't think this was Connexions..so I flip to the back & read in a very LOUD voice ( by this time Mary & Rosie had legged it!)..' Marie Stopes, Brook Adivsory, Family Planning Association..descs of abortion & contraceptive services..etc'
The 2 women didn't know where to put themselves..went pale in fact..so I walk off with that one..catch the Head Teacher on way out ' can I have a minute? ' sure..' can u just take a look at this?' HT ' Oh I'm really sorry...that's the NEW girl'. Yeah right!!
Conclusion
Connextions are the UK Governments 'careers advice service'. As part of this careers advice they hand out free condoms and promote contraception. UK Catholic schools welcome them in with open arms - Connextions promise not to promote contraception in the school but then, oh, sorry, oops, they keep forgetting.
Even if Connexions had a perfect track record for never accidentally promoting Contraception in Catholic Schools, what the Schools are doing is allowing Connexions to promote themselves to students as a great place to turn for all kinds of advice. They give them a national free phone number to call (where I am quite sure they don't ask if you were referred by a Catholic school) and there is a website to visit.
The Connexions website has links through to the lovely Sexperience website from Channel 4 and r u thinking? featuring this lovely page.
If we have a proper Catholic school I expect that the governers will mention this and the school will bend over backwards to provide an alternative careers service, perhaps in partnership with the Diocesan Vocations people.
Don't count on it.
Reader Comments
kate said...
It's one of the dangers of allowing outside agencies into your Catholic school-nobody checks.
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Philip said...
The principle of subsidiarity has been reversed. Instead of the state HELPING FAMILIES obtain the education they want for their children, the state is using schools (even those nominally independent of the state) to HELP THE STATE achieve its wider objectives. And the schools are not strong enough to stand up (partly because they do not understand that the relationship with the political authorities has become peverted - and many welcome it). The Catholic schools are simply following the path of the adoption agencies.
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Mark Dobson said...
I'll start off by saying that I'm still not really sure what subsidiarity is, though I think I have an idea.
I think saying that the principle of subsidiarity has been reversed suggests that the state has previously been operating on the principle of subsidiarity, and I'm not sure that's true.
Of course, perhaps you didn't mean that at all. It's only a nuance.
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James said...
I think he probably means that the present situation is the reverse of the principal of subsidiarity.
If I understand it correctly, the principal of subsidiarity says that the parents are the only people with the right to teach their child and that schools act on their behalf as subsidiaries.
The government works on the basis that they are the only people with the right to teach children and parents might be allowed to help with some homework now and then.
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Philip said...
James is correct, I did mean that practice was the reverse of what it should be. The principle means that the role of the state is to help (subsidium means to help) lower communities (including the family) achieve their legitimate aspirations where that is appropriate. Thus the state might help parents get an education for their children by providing financing. It is not for the state to dictate the details of that education. If we take the adoption agencies we might have expected the state to help all the charitable adoption agencies in their work (maybe by social services putting mothers in touch with them) what we have instead is the adoption agencies helping the local authorities in a process that the local auuthorities control (and which has now been effectively taken over by central government leading to all the rows of last year).
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Richard said...
Seriously disturbed (but not surprised) to hear reports that Connexions has infultrated the school I went to.
I remember just before I left in 2003 that we were using an electronic registration system organised by Connexions. It's sinister that they can fluff themselves up to be a nice, helpful organisation that assists people in their career paths when really their motive is to rob kids of their childhood and expose them to the Russian roulette of condom use.
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