ABSTRACT
In stressed cities all over the world the contemporary urban school seemed a confusing and disturbing place to the newspaper reader or parent of the 1960s and 1970s. Conflicting reports from teachers, children, journalists, government departments and educationists aroused general interest and concern simply by begging the question: what really does go on in schools? In Britain the Great Education Debate, officially initiated by the Prime Minister in 1977, formally put questions of the kind that everyone was asking: what is wrong with schools? Who is to blame? Who, if anyone, is right in their analyses and answers?
