Sunday 13 July 2008

Armed forces 'get free education'

According to the BBC news site:

Service personnel are to be given university education free of charge after they end their duty with the armed forces, it has been reported.

The UK government will pay tuition fees to study for GCSEs, A-levels, university degrees or other qualifications. This is in part a response to a recent Ministry of Defence survey of 9,000 servicemen and women suggested that some 47% of Army and Royal Navy respondents and 44% of those in the RAF regularly felt like quitting.

The armed forces have a long heritage of providing excellent training - immersive, highly focused and using a motivational base that is a million miles away from the cosy world of formal education.

I would not be surprised if many service personnel vote with their feet as they fail to connect with the teaching practices and environment that is far more abstract than their own personal experiences of training.

Immersion, simulation, teamwork (not operating as isolated individuals), lots of spaced repetition and practice is business-as-usual for those in service - but largely missing from most of our education and training efforts.

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