Mumsnet Talk

I understand that no grammar school can guarantee a place before the official deadline of 1 March 2012. However, does anyone have any idea why Sutton Grammar School are refusing to publish the results of boys who have not passed the exam? I have had a series of most infuriatingly patronizing and evasive replies from their registrar who blankly refuses to honestly answer specific questions. If anyone is in the same position as me, I have been in touch with the School Admissions Adjudicator who says that Sutton Grammar are not only permitted but encouraged to provide parents with information about the results before parents apply to other schools. Does anyone have an explanation for their behaviour? One is tempted to think that their selection process is secretive enough to be unfairly discriminatory.

The Bournemouth Grammar schools make the results of those who are unsuccessful available to parents after the letters of acceptance go out. The results of the successful students are never released to avoid any unofficial pecking order being set up.

Maybe it is to discourage parents of high high fliers from then deciding to aim for a more exclusive academic institution ???

Very interesting. Or could it be that there are selection criteria other than pure academic performance and some successful applicants might have results lower than those who have been unsuccessful? There is something rather fishy going on.

To deter people who see that they have narrowly missed a pass from starting to plan appeals in advance perhaps (although non qualification appeals are unlikely to work with so many boys successfully passing but stuck on the waiting list)?

To prevent getting stuck in lengthy correspondence with angry parents about the outcome until March?

I guess the real reason is there is nothing to be gained from knowing. The "results before parents apply" only exists to encourage (and soon to force) schools to tell parents if their child has passed or failed in advance of the CAF deadline. It doesn't say anything about releasing actual marks.

If there were more sinister forces at work and they wanted to select by other criteria surely they'd just cheat when marking the papers eg bung an extra 10% on the essay marks where its all subjective and hard to trace? I am definitely not suggesting anything underhand is going on at all and don't know why you think lack of marks indicates this. My guess is that they don't see why you need to know at this stage and think it will just open themselves up to loads of arguments even before appeals and offers start if they tell parents the figures now.

This is exactly what parents are encouraged to think!

If exam scripts and results are withheld from public scrutiny, how do we know that they are not adding a 10% extra whenever they want? Has anyone challenged the marking of these papers or seen an examination script? And what is the meaning of a "standardized" score? Surely, if there were a standard, one single 11+ exam would be sufficient for application to any state grammar school! There is no accountability or transparency here. Instead, there is secret allocation of places behind closed doors by an arrogant bunch of bureaucrats who are given the liberty to exploit people's gullibility. This by the way applies to schools like Sutton Grammar. There are other schools like Nonsuch for example who, to their credit, operate a completely open and transparent system.

Why would they do that???
They know nothing about the children who sit the tests apart from their current school and their address.

If the schools had a chance to interview the children, ask them to prepare a presentation, ask them to submit a reading list and insist on meeting the parents then I'd buy your theory of sinister selection techniques but what would the schools have to gain from fixing the scores of one boy unknown over another?

Sometimes an ink blot is just an ink blot as opposed to an elephant or a cloud

I thought standardization was about awarding extra points to those children who are August born so that they are not at a disadvantage to those who are September born and potentially a whole year older than the youngest children taking the test.

I can't see any good reason why they wouldn't give the parents the results. Ours gives the standardized score to all parents in their acceptance or rejection letter, and if you want the raw scores before standardization, you can get them over the phone if you ask.

Hi incandecent!

I am the Registrar at Sutton Grammar with whom you have been corresponding, and feel it appropriate to greet you on a public forum as you have take your dissatisfaction with us to a wider audience.

I would like to assure you, and other readers of this thread, that you will receive your son's marks after offer day on the 1st March - unless he is made an offer of a school place. We don't pass on marks in such a case so the boys join on an equal footing.

And please also allow me to assure you that the only adjustment made to scores is that which accounts for the difference in children's ages.

BTW, for all readers who are not quite sure what standardisation is - briefly, it is a statistical technique whereby the mean score on a paper is called a score of 100,and marks are added to or subtracted from 100 depending on the extent to which the individual's raw score deviates from the mean.

Ooh, interesting to get a response directly from the school! Thank you Admissionslady!

That makes complete sense.

Incandecent, I don't see why you are getting your knickers in a twist if you have already received this response.

Admissionslady, since you're here, could I possibly derail this thread to ask roughly how much difference the age-adjustment makes? If you've got two children who've both scored 90% - one born 1st September 2000 and one 31st August 2001, what kind of adjusted score would you expect them both to end up with?

(applying to grammar next year, though not yours)

Am I the only parent interested in their child's progress at school rather than magic numbers? A standardized score of 326, 785,1500 means very little to me. I want to see the specific mistakes my child made in an exam so that I can do something about them. Isn't this the primary purpose of exams? Besides, mistakes are made by examiners as well as students and the only way to discover this is by public scrutiny. This is the very reason the law allows students and parents to see examination papers and examiners' comments. Even top universities like Oxford and Cambridge nowadays give feedback from admission interviews! This shows respect for the applicant and effort involved, and puts the institution beyond reproach. Why are admission exams at Sutton Grammar School an exception?

So, thank you, Admissionslady, for your typically evasive response. You must be worried to enter into a direct discussion but you have yet to answer my questions: - 1. Why are you withholding the results until 2 March when the Admissions Code advises you against it? 2. Why do you keep examination scripts a secret?

I haven’t got time to waste on further lengthy discussions but I look forward to Sutton Grammar complying with the laws of this country and responding to my request for information under the Data Protection Act.

I know school admissions time is very stressful for some but tbh incandesent you're sounding like the stress has got to you a bit too much.

I really don't think you are doing your child any favours by airing this in public.

I'm also interested in the process of standardisation but admissionslady I don't understand your explanation - is anyone able to explain it in any other way please?

My child has nothing to lose or gain by making Sutton Grammar's admission practices public. Such practices are allowed to persist because of public apathy.

Isn't this the primary purpose of exams?

no, the primary purpose of this exam is to selective children on the basis of academice ability for entrance to the school.

You seem to be confusing this with on going internal assessment once a child has started at a school.

I do think you need to try to relax.

sorry select

incandecent - It's not the school's responsibility to enable you to see the progress and mistakes your son has made.

But why is it so bad? What have you got to gain from knowing now instead of on March 2nd?

If you want to know where your child needs help from the papers, can't you just pop down to WH Smith and get him to do a sample paper?

I want an answer to two simple questions: 1. Why is Sutton Grammar School withholding information from parents until 2 March 2012? 2. Why are they refusing access to their examination scripts?
Unless someone can answer these questions, we can all relax and go back to our knitting.

I thought that had been answered already.

So did I Rainbow.

Apart from anything else, don't you think it takes a bit of time to mark all the papers, then work out the standardized score, then liase with all the LAs that need to know so tha they can make the right offer?

I really can't understand why you want to know now. I remember what the wait was like after my ds did the 11+, it is horrendous, but the pressure really seems to be getting to you.

Even if you knew your child's score, you wouldn't know it in relation to everyone else's, so you still wouldn't get to know if you were going to be offered a place. The same goes for seeing the papers. Unless you saw everyone's, you wouldnt know if the marking was consistent. I am really intrigued as to why you want to know, I feel like I must be missing something.

Standardisation explained here

why should they???

I don't understand why you feel you are entitled to this information, which is after all, theirs to do with as they wish.

your son applied to the school following their admissions criteria. You have to wait like everyone else.

<<wonders if admissionslady is secretly hoping that incandecent's DS ends up in a different school>>

I wondered that too!