ERICA Fidorra is a brilliant student, placed in the top one per cent of A-level candidates. She is also a young lady with a clear goal in mind for a future career in medicine, launching herself into a series of work experience roles at hospitals, GPs' surgeries and nursing homes.
Any right-thinking person could expect the medical profession to welcome her with open arms.
Sadly, in today's strictly controlled, socially-engineered world of academia, Erica has been rejected by Sheffield University which insists that 'entry gr
ades are not the only factor taken into consideration'.
We appreciate that children from socially deprived backgrounds ought to be helped overcome obstacles which are beyond their control. But at the same time students should not be penalised because they come from caring and supportive backgrounds - put frankly, because they have not suffered enough.
This academic mess is putting dogma before ability and ambition - and teaching young people that all they are taught about working hard comes to nothing when their futures are put in the final balance.
Paying the price for short term fundingCOMMUNITY groups across Sheffield are facing a grim future as the funds which have allowed them to carry out vital work begin to dry up. But this, sadly, is the price of short-term thinking and even shorter-term finances.
Without sustainable foundations built into these groups when they are set up, then it is inevitable that they will, sooner or later, reach the point at which they have arrived today.
This in no way diminishes the good work of the people behind the community groups who have injected much needed doses of civic pride into their neighbourhoods.
But the city is learning a tough lesson: that setting up an organisation is not an end in itself. If these groups are to prosper for as long as they are needed, then they should be encouraged, and helped, to establish long term goals. To do otherwise is to bring the city to its present destination.
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FeaturesMore Rotherham newsMore Doncaster newsMore Barnsley newsCheck out the very latest on South Yorkshire's roads - including live traffic cameras on Sheffield's commuter routes - with our Traffic sectionLatest sport. The full article contains 387 words and appears in Sheffield Star newspaper.
