A Good School

Honourable daughter no 2 (14) told me last night that hugging has been banned at her school on pain of detention. I offer this as a (negative again, I'm afraid) definition of a good school in an imperfect world. 'A good school is one where an excess of hugging is a serious problem.' I have always thought that any school that has a truancy problem should be closed immeadiately, the same way that shops close if the customers don't turn up. What is it about education? From age 2 kids cannot be prevented from learning and pestering everyone with continual questions - Why this and how that - they are insatiably curious. Yet a few years in school and all that is gone; how do they manage to do it? More important, why don't they find something better to do?