there is a pressing need for a programme of staff development'. They suggest that undergraduate students should be given more opportunity to make oral presentations and to write in different styles for different audiences.' The report goes on to say that 'employers are doubtful that academic staff. It was not only his memory that was put to the test, but also his ability to think fast, to make a case, and to demonstrate his capabilities as an advocate.The major concern expressed by employers in the QHE report relates to communication skills: 'Employers are concerned about the range of writing abilities and oral presentation skills of graduates. Dissertations were optional.The four essays-in-three- hours examination format to which I was subjected (and which was then widespread within higher education) was a test not so much of intellectual power as of sheer physical endurance. It tested little except memory, exam technique and the ability to grasp a fountain pen for an extended length of time.When Gladstone took Finals, in 1831, he was obliged to undergo an extensive oral examination, which was central to his final degree classification. Methods of assessment are central to the educational mission of a university or college.When I read Modern History at Oxford, 30 years ago, there was no formal assessment between 'Prelims' at the end of the first term (five written papers) and Finals at the end of the third year (11 three- hour papers in five-and-a-half days, plus a compulsory but perfunctory oral examination of about 10 minutes).None of the work I did in-between (eight tutorial essays per subject per term) counted towards my degree.

Traditionalists who are inclined to wince at these words should take time to read through the eight-page Employer Satisfaction Summary recently published by the Quality in Higher Education (QHE) project based at the University of Central England. QHE asked 127 employers about the importance they attach to the qualities they expect of graduates, and their judgement of the graduates they recruit.Their responses ought to have important consequences not so much for the subject-matter of what is taught at universities, as for the way in which students are taught and, more fundamentally, the manner in which they are assessed. No one would claim a Christian child who practised their faith was intolerant of Muslims.'(Photograph omitted). The Government's Charter for Higher Education urges universities and colleges to set up channels of communication with employers to keep them fully informed about approaches to teaching and learning, particularly 'the way students are taught transferable skills such as problem solving and effective communication'. They cannot just expect an English school to change just because they are in a majority at it.'Tim Brighouse, Birmingham's director of education, said the decision of the two schools to seek permission from the local advisory council to hold multi-faith assemblies was good news - a victory for consensus rather than confrontation.But at Birmingham University, Professor John Hull, editor of the British Journal of Religious Education, fears the row will cause educational and social fragmentation. He says: 'If we start dividing our schools on religious lines, it can only lead to isolation and separation.' He believes the latest move is a 'regrettable' step towards segregation.Mohammed Mukadam, a spokesman for the parents, dismisses the professor's view He argues: 'The children need to know their own faith.

If we want the education, we have to accept the assemblies and other British ways. One parent of Indian descent said: 'We have come to Britain to live. One mother said: 'The Jews have been allowed separate services at other schools, why are we any different?Muslims are a majority at this school, so why shouldn't we be allowed separate worship?'The school's minority non- Muslim population has expressed irritation at the demands. The spokesperson added: 'All are pleased that such a constructive compromise was reached.'Nearly three-quarters of the schools' pupils are from Muslim backgrounds.Parents claim their demands for an alternative form of collective worship is justifiable, given the high proportion of children from non-Christian families.Outside the school gates of Birchfield, veiled women speak of their frustration and anger over the issue.

Meanwhile a Muslim cleric is providing separate acts of worship for a small minority of the Muslim pupils.Head teachers and governors at both Canterbury Cross and Birchfield schools have repeatedly refused to comment on the assembly issue.A spokesperson for the local education authority said the governors had 'decided in the interest of continued harmony to reflect the wishes of all parents, including a minority who wanted separate acts of worship'. They felt it would be detrimental to the pupils' wider social education to abandon normal assemblies.During the summer term, the governors at Canterbury Cross reconsidered and the head, Anne Dent, asked the local Standing Advisory Council on Religious Education for permission to lift the requirement, expected of all schools, that assemblies are of a wholly or partly Christian nature.This has now been approved and the school can legally hold assemblies based around different faiths, thus avoiding the need to hold separate acts of Islamic worship.Governors at Birchfield have followed suit and the local advisory council should reach a decision soon. The row, which has split the local communities, broke out earlier this year when a large number of Muslim parents at the city's Birchfield and Canterbury Cross schools demanded separate Islamic services to replace their children's normal assemblies. Some 200 Muslim children were withdrawn from the assemblies at the two schools but the schools' governors, the majority of whom are Muslim, refused to meet the parents' demands. Apart from the choice of 22 GCSE subjects, (how many, I wonder, did her children have to choose from?) there are clubs too numerous to list here.During the past year the rugby team visited three European countries, there were French and German exchanges, work experience in France - in a nursery, riding school and other venues - a school trip to Florida, and an expedition to Sri Lanka. There were many theatre visits; pupils have their own two bands and an orchestra - I could go on.The point is, nothing she mentions in her article to justify Public School education cannot be enjoyed at our local comprehensive.Yours faithfully, JUDY MATHESON Richmond, Surrey 22 October. A running battle over traditional assemblies in two Birmingham primary schools where Muslim pupils predominate is drawing to a close with one school bringing in a Muslim cleric to provide for some pupils and another dropping the broadly Christian nature of assembly. Research in the US has shown that for every pounds 1 invested in quality nursery education, there will be a pounds 7 return in savings on costs of juvenile delinquency, remedial education, income support and joblessness.Nursery education has measurable advantages for children and for society - but the returns won't come without the investment.Yours sincerely, MARIAN DARKE Ex-President, National Union of Teachers New Malden, Surrey 16 October From Judy Matheson Madam: Did Ms Underwood look at any comprehensive schools before writing her diatribe seeking to justify her children's public school education ('Places at the Ritz for the Favoured Few', 20 October)?I have just returned from visiting our local comprehensive.

or is he?The suspicions are that the pledge is going to be redeemed by admitting yet more 'rising fives' into already over-stretched reception classes, where they will not get the specialised nursery teaching they need.It will be nursery provision on the cheap, at the expense of the development of a comprehensive nursery education system for all three- and four-year-olds. No schoolboy over the age of five is unaware that conformism is not merely uncool, but often brutally punished by his peers. If boys don't fulfill their potential at school, it just might be because they don't feel they're allowed to.Yours faithfully, DAVID HORNSBY, Canterbury 19 October From Marian Darke Madam: The Prime Minister appears to be on a collision course with the Treasury over his promise to provide nursery education for four- year-olds .. I believe that one should not make such a big deal about this time of life. Life is a progression from the beginning. Parents who fuss about missing their offspring are, it seems to me, clinging. Bringing up children involves letting go all the time, from cessation of breast feeding, first day at school, on and on.