On a recent discussion on pensions and retirement, Newsnight chose, rather ingeniously, to flag up the age of every speaker in brackets after their name. A joke? A way of putting content in context? Both, perhaps.

It certainly made me think, if I am ever involved in an education discussion on that same programme, I will suggest that they put the name of the school each participant send/sent their child/children to after their name. No, not the name of the school they went to, interesting as that is. But their choice of school as a parent, a better indicator of their preferences/values etc. Yes, of course, I see the complications; children switch schools; siblings go to different schools etc

Let’s say we could reduce that technical difficulty, reduce the description of choice to essences, I doubt that the programme makers or some others taking part on the programme would agree to it, for a whole host of reasons.

However, I still think it would be worth doing and including the presenters. School choice is interesting. It’s also rather revealing. If the Main Presenter starts laying into a head teacher, say, about the poor performance of urban state schools and yet we see after his/her name ( Cheltenham Ladies College) just to use a random and most unlikely example….is that not a useful, qualifying fact for us to throw into the equation; one that might provoke a momentary ‘ hang on a minute, what’s going on here..’ kind of response? Similarly, if a leading liberal commentator advocates comprehensive education for the nation’s children but we see they sent their own children to a fee paying school…. and so on.

I’ll let my loyal blog readers know if anything comes of this idea….