ABSTRACT
In the enterprise culture that is now so much a feature of the modern-day education system, the vocabulary of the business world has been allowed to become increasingly applied to describe the work of schools (Thompson and Barton 1992). Value for money, performance targets, development plans, appraisals and value added are all concepts that have become commonplace in every type of school since ERA88. Simply by listening to media reports about standards in schools, a casual listener may be left with the impression that the fundamental role of schools is synonymous with that of commercial businesses. Despite whatever reassurances we can glean from more familiar terms such as ‘entitlement’, ‘differentiated learning’ and an ‘inclusive’ education system, the increasing influence of the enterprise culture and its innate vocabulary does not and cannot work in favour of pupils with SLD/PMLD.
