"Accountability is something that is left when responsibility has been subtracted."

For starters, Finland has no standardized tests. The only exception is what's called the National Matriculation Exam, which everyone takes at the end of a voluntary upper-secondary school, roughly the equivalent of American high school. 

Instead, the public school system's teachers are trained to assess children in classrooms using independent tests they create themselves. All children receive a report card at the end of each semester, but these reports are based on individualized grading by each teacher. Periodically, the Ministry of Education tracks national progress by testing a few sample groups across a range of different schools. 

As for accountability of teachers and administrators, Sahlberg shrugs. "There's no word for accountability in Finnish," he later told an audience at the Teachers College of Columbia University. "Accountability is something that is left when responsibility has been subtracted." 

For Sahlberg what matters is that in Finland all teachers and administrators are given prestige, decent pay, and a lot of responsibility. A master's degree is required to enter the profession, and teacher training programs are among the most selective professional schools in the country. If a teacher is bad, it is the principal's responsibility to notice and deal with it.

(http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/12/what-americans-keep-ignoring-about-finlands-school-success/250564/#.Tv4NA-e7HkY.mailto)

This is what I want for education in this country. The rest of the article talks about state and private schools and the author believes that this is the root of the problem. I believe that the root of the problem is the way we are taught and examined; if state schools raised their game then private schools wouldn't have a USP unless they specialised in one particular area. There are five things I would love to see changed about the way children are taught in the UK:

1. Teaching should be well paid, sought-after job with rigorous standards. 
2. No illiterate 'well-I-didn't-know-what-else-to-dos' should be in the crucial role of a teacher. Teachers should be an inspiration.
3. Constant examination stress should be removed.
4. Teaching and assessment should be individualised.
5. Not all students should be encouraged to go to university. Students should be encouraged to do what they want to do or what they are good at. University does not have to come into the equation.