Would you send your child to a grammar school ?

Er...for one thing, some of the kids who are not in this magic top set are perfectly well-behaved and getting on with things.

For another, the physical proximity to them doesn't leak, you know. My kids seem quite happy to know people - hey, even sit next to them at lunch - who are not Top Set. Sometimes they're even badly behaved. (And, as Wuldric pointed out, some of the Top Set kids and/or those in a grammar can be a less than angelic...)

You are the parent, she is the child - end of discussion. She goes where you send her, assuming that she has the grades to do so.

I am all in favour because it's really just an extension of setting. Having taught mixed ability, I really don't think it works very well. I am also in favour because I think that lots of less academically able kids are forced to trudge through subjects they can't cope with and will not pass exams in. It might be better to have schools with a more vocational focus. Admittedly these different courses could be taught alongside each other in the same school, but I do think that bright, academic children are better catered for in a GS environment. Expectations are high, behaviour is often better, motivation is strong.
I should add - I have never taught in a GS, I just went to one myself. I enjoy teaching less able students as well as able ones, just not in the same class at the same time!
From a selfish pov, my kids seem pretty bright. I'd like them to have the advantage that I had in my schooling.

even the best comprehensives only hoped to gain roughly 70% of pupils gaining A* to C, at GCSE.

what's with this 'only 70%' - in an unselective intake that suggests to me that they may be pushing more kids along an 'academic' pathway than is necessarily a good thing.

I don't get this MN mystique about grammar schools. I really really don't get it.

Grammar schools have kids that are monumentally badly behaved. Just because the kids are bright does NOT mean that they are well behaved or good influences or hard working. For the most part, they are scruffy, bad-mannered and loutish. I'm told this is normal for teenagers.

DD attends a superselective grammar school. Her manners and conduct at home are appalling, as are those of most of her peers. 76% of them will get all A*/A at GCSE. But they are still pretty shambolic, frankly.

It is all down to degrees really isn't it Beer.

If the school was having a problem with knife violence and massive truancy I would be trying to get my DC's into a alternative school,of course I would.

But that's an extreme,and I think some lax discipline and a number of the pupils being disengaged (whilst clearly not being ideal) isn't necessarily the end of the world.I would have thought it's not uncommon tbh purely because of the nature of the beast (come on,these are teenagers after all!)

It's back to what I was saying about the attitude the child brings to school. Self discipline and determination are skills every bit as valuable to teach our kids as times tables and english imo.

Why are you all in favour?

Because I don't think one size fits all, in a nutshell. We did the tours of a variety of schools and chose the one which seemed like the best fit (to DD as well as to us). It wouldn't suit everyone.

Whether we like it or not, people are always going to come up with some way of dividing schools - a method which is (at least in part) based on a child's ability and needs seems not unreasonable to me compared with various other means (money - private; money - buying a good catchment ; religion of parent ; pretended religion of parent)

"I have been on MN a very long time, and I have yet to see a parent admit their child is at a poor comprehensive, with low exam results and with worrying behavioural and truancy issues."

Could that possibly be because there aren't quite as many of them as you think there are?

I don't even know how you would find out what a schools league table score is. With my DC's infant school and primary I have gone with the catchment school - the closest school where most of their mates live nearby.
It'll be the same with their secondary school tbh. They will be schooled with their peers unless they particularly decide they want to sit the 11+ and if they pass they particularly want to go to the grammar.
I hope I will teach them enough to know that education is what you take from it,and you need to have your own goals and focus on them for you. In a happy environment with their friends - not isolated, nor with any expectations of what they should become,because of what I would like them to become.

And how would you feel about your child failing the test and being sent to a secondary modern school?

Why are you all in favour?

I would send mine to a GS like a shot if I could afford to live anywhere where they had them. I went to one myself and am all in favour. (I'm a teacher btw).

"If you add together the results from a grammar school and its attendant secondary modern, you get something virtually indistinguishable from the results of a comprehensive in a similar catchment.

If that's the case is there a problem? From the way people talk about secondary moderns, wouldn't you have expected the comps to do better overall?"

Why? Isn't it more pertinent to say "from the way people talk about grammars, wouldn't you have expected the grammar schools to do better overall?" Otherwise what's the point of having such a socially divisive system?

League tables are a pretty good way of comparing academic achievement in a selective school. They don't really seem to say much about whether a school is serving all pupils well - the ones who no matter how hard they try or how good the teachers are just aren't going to get a C at GCSE or equivalent.

They aren't all from grammar schools, you know.
Yes, I think everyone does know that. My niece got a stellar set of GCSEs from a comp and is now at Cambridge.

If you add together the results from a grammar school and its attendant secondary modern, you get something virtually indistinguishable from the results of a comprehensive in a similar catchment.

If that's the case is there a problem? From the way people talk about secondary moderns, wouldn't you have expected the comps to do better overall?

You know that day in the summer when there are pictures all over the papers of girls jumping for joy clutching their exam results? They aren't all from grammar schools, you know.

If you add together the results from a grammar school and its attendant secondary modern, you get something virtually indistinguishable from the results of a comprehensive in a similar catchment.