Top Comprehensives Measured by Ebacc Percentage

Of course some schools managed to secure good league table results from the options provided by our Government of the time, remember, of collecting multiple GCSE passes on not such equivalently hard courses. Indeed they will be shown up and I for one am very pleased these courses will be stripped out of a measure. However, there seems a lot of criticism of the teachers in this and, when my daugher picked ebacc subjects a year ago (not knowing it would be ebacc) not one person encouraged her to choose any differently. Now she is a borderline student so - if the number of GCSEs were the schools aim - I am convinced she would have been sent off to choose the multiple scoring courses. All the teachers encouraged her to pick for her future.

There will be some schools found our for not doing this by looking retrospectively but there are also many caught out innocently - for offering a cross section of great and worthy GCSEs but some not included in the measure which are very worthy indeed.

I appreciate not every child is expected to get it but it will skew choices of GCSEs and mean very relevant skills are lost. Our Government should be supporting those curriculum areas as well.

circular I asked DD, and she said that actually the GCSE structure that I mentioned was open to all pupils not just upper sets. The reason that most missed the e-bacc was because of missing the MFL. The school only offered French and German but at least they did MFL for KS4, unlike some schools.

TiP I shouldn't rely on memory! The 35% figure is the minimum expected from any school for 5A*-C inc Eng&Maths; the actual national achievement was 53.4% in 2010. I can't find an expected e-bacc percentage; the national achievement was 15.6% in 2010. I would expect Grammars to do far better than that - nearer the 100% figure! I wonder if they are frantically rewriting their entrance exams.

zanzibarmum & senua - can I join your club! I completely agree.I've had a number of children go through the exam system and those schools that achieved reasonable ebacc scores reflected my view that they provided a solid education. I have been sceptical of some schools who had managed year on year growth at GSCE levels but their ebacc scores showed lower achievements which I think is more accurate.

Senua
I think that the benchmark is that they expect 35% of kids to get the e-bacc. It is not meant to be something that everyone can acheive.
That's not what Michael Gove said when he announced it.
And its most certainly NOT what he expected from Grammar schools....

20 years ago at my school, we had to do English, Maths, 2 sciences, 1 language, 1 humanity (which included English Lit), and then you had two free choices, one of which was encouraged to be 'academic' and one 'creative'. So not that unlike the Ebac.

Senua - if the structures there at your DDs school, then I presume they are all choosing the right subjects. Are they especially weak in one area, or is it not working because the kids are having to choose between subjects they don't want to do?

At DDs school, the top sets either have Eng x2, Maths, Sci x3 OR Eng x2, Maths, Sci x2, MFL. Then 3 completely free choices.

They managed > 20% Ebac, so not too bad. Especially as many other schools further up the league had less.

My main grumble with the school is the compulsory ICT and BTEC sport/dance fir ALL sets.

IMHO the E-baac will only become a valid measure when the Humanities option is expanded somewhat ? to include, say, RE/Art/Music.

DS attends a high-performing grammar school where most boys take 11 GCSEs. However they could choose 3 x science, maths, 2 x English, French, Spanish, ICT, electronics and one of graphics/RE/PE/art/music. I don?t think anyone could claim this wasn?t a broad spread and an academic mix, but it wouldn?t currently qualify for the E-baac.

Um, dunno, circular; can only speak about my experience. I don't remember the finer details about what was compulsory and what wasn't, but I'm sure that most girls did a MFL and Hist-or-Geog (we were selective, too).
However moving on to current day, at DD's school, which I never rated very highly, their arrangement for the upper sets was that you did eng/eng/sci/sci/maths and then chose one subject from each of four blocks (MFL, humanity, tech, expressive art). So at least the structure was there to obtain the e-bacc even though only 7% of them did so last year (did I mention that I didn't rate the school?).

Senua - I agree with most of your post re the good spread BUT was that really the case 39 years ago?

I seem to remember (O"levels at grammar, 35 years ago) that although a language was compulsory, a humanity wasn't. And only a single science choice was.

But in those days, 5 A to C"s was classed as good, and you took 8 or 9 max. The 6th form 'requirements were also less stringer - just a pass in the subjects being taken, and 2 or 3 A"levels only. Possibly extra O"level or resits in the lower 6th.

@ zanzi

"Why don't they just decide which GCSEs are acdemic and then count the %age getting 5 academic GCSEs?"
"because that would be pretty pointless for those who are not academic but are gifted at art, music or sport"

I think you are missing the point TiP. I think that the benchmark is that they expect 35% of kids to get the e-bacc. It is not meant to be something that everyone can acheive.
That is where education has gone wrong recently: the moment they introduce a new scheme everyone seems to think that they should be able to get an A in it. We have lost the idea that a C grade is good, B is better, A is excellent and an A is as rare as hen's teeth. The e-bacc shows that someone is an academic all-rounder. If someone hasn't got the e-bacc it doesn't make them a lesser person, it just means that their strengths lie elsewhere.

But the ebacc doesn't give a rounded education! It's a statistic based on a reasonable spread of academic subjects.

However, when it doesn't allow for choices of RE, English Literature, Art or Music it fails the rounded education argument big time.

There should be a whole list of worthy subjects and anyone achieving : One of the English papers, two Science papers, Maths and three other GCSEs from the list at A*-C should be awarded the ebacc. I am all for encouragement of a rounded education.

"Teachers complaining about the ebacc because "they weren't warned"... or "it is retrospective" suggest they can't defend their student choices on educational as opposed to league table grounds."

I'm totally with you Zanzi. The e-bacc was introduced after both of my DC made their GCSE choices but they qualify because their schools provided the breadth of subjects and I made sure that they picked them. The e-bacc is nothing new: it is only the same spread of subjects that I did over thirty years ago.
You would think that teachers would have learnt their lesson after they were shown up when 5A-C had to be extended to 5A-C including English and Maths to stop them massaging figures.

I hope that the reaction to the e-bacc is to think a bit more about giving kids a rounded education and not a knee-jerk 'what trick can we pull to get higher up the tables'.

'it does shine a light in places where some might not want illuminated' No it doesn't.it just says that the school didn't have a crystal ball

because that would be pretty pointless for those who are not academic but are gifted at art, music or sport

the real point is that league tables make great headlines but should NOT be the be all and end all when choosing a school for DCs

Why don't they just decide which GCSEs are acdemic and then count the %age getting 5 academic GCSEs

what skills do History and geography show that RE or English lit don't?

I don't think it's a surprise that targets = gaming. There are always predictable and unpredictable responses to measuring and publishing data like this. It is quite revealing, though, that league tables have encouraged schools perhaps to encourage pupils into less academic GCSEs.

I do think it's a real shame that the ebac might mean that some children don't get to study the best combination of subjects for them. I am in a professional occupation, oxbridge etc, and I wouldn't have passed the ebac having not studied a humanity at GCSE level. Sciences and languages were my strong points.

No they won't
All they will know is what the ebacc requirements were in summer 2010.
What they will be by summer 2011 let alone summer 2012 is anybody's guess.
If the May elections are a disaster for the coalition or the AV referendum goes pear shaped we could have a new government by the time current year 8's sit their GCSE's.
Ignore ebacc.
Read what the Russell Group have to say. They are the ones who really matter.

Sorry year 8s, for year 9 starting Sept 11.

I clearly can't count today!

circular: you're right. This year's year 9s will be the first cohort to make their choices knowing the EBac requirements.

My DD1's super selective Grammar School isn't forcing the kids to select EBACC subjects this year. They only get three options as it is and they aren't being forced to choose either History or Geography in those three. That having said, there is a suggestion on the options forms that students shouldn't select all 3 of art, music and drama in their 5 picks (the school perms 3 out of 5 using rinky dinky software apparently) in order to 'ensure balance'. This actually made me furious, since they are forced to do triple science and where is the balance there? DD1 has selected all 3 arty subjects in her 5 choices, although she would prefer to do history and geography with music, rather than Art and Drama.

meditrina - wont 2013 be the first year when options were taken knowing about the Ebac - ie. our current yr9s.

I'm not even convinced that those will see a drastic change.
DD's school have not made the Ebac subjects compulsory, just recommending. Their take is that the effect on Uni entrance is still unknown, so they will review again next year.