Schools admission criteria......

In what way does it mean they may not be disadvantaged? The number of children in care/previously in care and pupil premium will be very small I’m sure. So I doubt it’ll have that much affect on the admissions anyway. It certainly doesn’t for our grammar schools.
What makes you think those families don’t value education & what makes them not “normal”???

So you think looked after children aren't also in homes where the parents work hard and value education? Why do you assume that pupile premium kids - so low income families - don't value education and work hard albeit more likely in minimum wage than upper management?

What you mean is why can't us nice middle class nuclear parents have priority over those kids who have had to face more challenges in their lives just to get to the same academic point.

You look at the majority of school admission criteria, in any part of England, regardless if they're grammar or not, and I can guarantee that children in care/pupil premium will be top of the admissions pile. It maybe that the grammar school has changed their policy more recently, but that's probably to aline with most other schools. If there's no sibling criteria, which for a grammar is probably unlikely, then distance is your next criteria. My son goes to a state non-grammar school and the admissions criteria is the same - children in care, pupil premium, sibling and distance. We got into the school on distance. Passing the 11+ at both the girls and boys grammar school in my area, is not a guarantee of a place. It depends on the pass mark, and some children who pass aren't offered a place, because other children obtained a better pass mark, so they fall down the list. It then comes down to criteria on top as well, in some cases. Unfortunately, it's how the process works. No child deserves to go to an under performing school and receive a poor education. I don't think the grammar school are being unfair, they are simply following their own policy, and unfortunately it does mean some children won't be offered a placement.

Wow, imagine thinking that a child in care is not on a back foot already.

Take a look at the numbers of looked after and pupil premium children currently at the school. This should reassure you that most places are given to what you call hard-working families.

It's a selective school, you can't honestly think they should be giving places to siblings over kids who scored higher.
When your older child passed, would you have been happy for her to lose her place to siblings who scored less than her?

But different types of SEND require different adjustments.

Two schools local to me (1 primary, 1 secondary) have 'Deaf base' they employ a teacher of the deaf, they have interpreters in classrooms.

It would be crazy to not give priority to a Deaf child.

I’m starting to wonder if the OP is here for the journo quotes, or something.

It's hard to believe, isn't it? I taught a girl last year who was in yr8 and had lived in 6 different foster care placements all over the city.
Another girl had turned up at her foster carers without even a toothbrush. I genuinely think some people have absolutely no idea. None.

I’m starting to wonder if the op even knows what “children in care” means tbh because there’s surely no way anyone thinks like that

@FancyBiscuitsLevelI think they do weight the exam? Well in the Kent test anyway - the pass mark for each section was 106 last year and this year it was 108. I assumed this was so that roughly the same number passed each year.

My son gets pupil premium. I work hard and so does he to stay academically in the top few percent of his school. Don't presume anyone getting pupil premium is thick or doesn't care about education.

Exactly they don’t all provide the same care, so some parents of children with an EHCP are going to be drawn to the schools with the best SEN provision for their child and they will apply for that one.
I know it would be unfair for a child in catchment to not get a place, but it would also be unfair for child with an EHCP to be in a school that provides inadequate care and support for their needs that the child in catchment may not have.

I know some children have SEN but don’t have an EHCP as they can be difficult to get even when the needs are still there. So I know there will be children in catchment whose parents have moved close to that school clinging on to the hope that their child will get a place based on catchment rather than EHCP.
But you could argue that those families have the money to move which is an advantage they can still use if they need to. Whereas you might have a family whose child does have the EHCP but lives out of catchment and the parents don’t have the money to move anywhere, so the criteria just closes the gap a bit.

It’s horrible and we’re all just trying to do what’s best for our children. But I do think care and attention should be given to the absolute most vulnerable first.

I’d really like to see the figures behind this post, please.

You are very unreasonable to be resentful of children in care or low income. I bet there isn't a high proportion at the school anyway.
Why would a grammar prioritise siblings when it's supposed to be about ability?
If a child doesn't get into grammar on the strength of their ability they'd probably have struggled anyway. No fun being bottom of the class

^^This! Well said! 🙌🏻

Well said! OP sounds misinformed and insufferable. Love the way her daughters dyslexia is seen as a genuine struggle, but spending your life in the care system is disregarded. Good (read middle class), hardworking (read middle class) families should always be considered first of course 🙄

any child that isn't in care or pupil premium is on a back foot.

Those inconvenient children in care, they get everything handed to them on a plate… or a bin liner when they are moved from home to home with little belongings after years of abuse or neglect.

Did you just say your daughter is on the back foot versus kids in care or on pupil premium?! Have a word with yourself!

Bit rich moaning that an unfair system has been made less unfair when it doesn’t suit you anymore.

I think that ‘mostly’ the level of early trauma (with the huge impact this has on very young children and their developing brain) outweighs a lot of other types of disadvantage.

DC are at a grammar. Percentage of FSM entitled children is just under 3%. In their year groups of 150 that equals 4.5 pupils on average. Hardly the difference between getting a place and not getting a place. You’re being ridiculous OP. And PP and looked after children have been critera 1 for years. Kids in this criteria don’t often feature heavily in grammar schools, for exactly the reason they are put at criteria 1.

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I can't see how the admission criteria has changed. Children in care and pupil premium has been at the top of every admission criteria for many, many years, a decade or 2 before COVID.

I agree with this my kids get pupil premium we’re not rich but can’t say they have a bad life.

kids in care though have definitely struggled no family to look out for them. What a heartless mindset to begrudge them this. It’s not like they’re going to actually stop ops child going to that school when they’re a tiny percentage of the population

Children in Care and Care Leavers have a battle to achieve educationally those who are privileged cannot possibly imagine. Only 6% of care leavers access higher education compared to 49% of their peers. There is no guarantee that they are able to remain at the school of choice either.