peter symonds winchester views?

Any school that is already counting gap year students as having proceeded to a university when they may not take up that place are being dishonest with parents.

Symonds puts as much effort into DDs friend who is doing one A level and two BTECs as it does those predicted to go to Top200 Universities.

I fully admit that I did not really look at the destinations when DD chose PSC over the other colleges.
We looked at where had the right emphasis at A level and then where she would be happy for 2 years.
DS is currently making up his mind and his criteria are utterly different than hers much more interest in rugby and distance to the chip shop

There are certainly RGs and RGs and I find the RG obsession on MN pretty funny. RG guarantees nothing in terms of university experience, education or a job. And although Oxford and Cambridge are both RG, it's a bit misleading to say X% of leavers get offers from RG and Oxbridge combined, since only around 50 kids/ 2.5% get to Oxbridge each year from PS. Mind you it's not only PS which does that on its website, everyone's at it. I only picked up the point that 25% isn't great really for RG, given the breadth of quality at RG universities, that's all. Then I wondered about the 41% in 2011 compared to the 25% cited by TP. That's much more interesting but probably has a very simple and dull explanation. But I'd be interested to know what it is, because no cohort blips can alter statistics that radically. But I didn't mean to make a great big thing about destinations at all. And there's no doubt the college has a good reputation, few people would quarrel with that.

Both viewpoints are valid.

I guess many, many parents don't look at sixth form destination lists when their dc are yr 5/6, except for the most ambitious.

Personally, although we chose ds's school above everything for the pastoral care, I also found it interesting and reassuring to see equal pride being shown towards the vet/med kids, Oxbridge, RG, vocational types (nursing etc) and the great success rate they also have at getting into music, art and drama schools. Shows to me that the reputation for "all-rounded ness" is, indeed, true.

Oh and I love to check out the leavers' destinations at my own DC's schools - but that's pure nosiness .

Whilst I agree that leavers' destinations are a blunt measure, I think they do provide a certain insight into a school.

For example, if a school have not sent anyone to Oxbridge, ever, I'm asking why. If the universities are virtually all non-RG (and I do take the point about all RGs not being equal), I'm also asking why.

I don't really understand why destinations lists have assumed such gigantic importance in the minds of - MN? The media?

Our school makes a point of mentioning the number of vet/med places every year and I really couldn't care less, neither of my girls want to do vet/med and I don't, personally, believe that vet/med is the ne plus ultra of educational aspiration.

I've also never 'bought' the idea that 'RG' is an automatic guarantor of quality or esteem either - this is partly because I am old, and partly because I am tangentially involved in recruitment not just in my firm (internationally) but also in a wider sense, in my profession - and I know that all RG universities are not equal and that there is not a consistent parity of esteem allocated across the board.

As far as the argument between PSC and St Swithuns goes - PSC is widely and well reputed, beyond the boundarie of Hampshire. St Swithuns not so much.

Well, we all like to think (well, on MN we do, anyway) that we've made the best choice we can for our dcs, and someone saying the place is crappy (nay, full of druggies - and thick ones at that) is bound to raise hackles.

The fact is, as TalkinPeace says, is that Peter Symonds is a) not really selective and b) you can take various non-A Level qualifications and therefore you are bound to get students who are not going to go to Oxbridge or a Russell Group university in a decade of Sundays. The acid test would be how many go on to these institutions who realistically aspire or are expected to do so.

I can answer the question TP.

The government don't release yet, though they do have all the data, because they don't see it as a priority.

But they don't re-jig the figures to take into account movement.

It's all a done deal by November. And most schools make their stats public at that point.

I tend to keep almost exclusively to posting on the education threads TP, so we're bound to cross paths. There is nothing nasty is the least about my posts, nothing at all. I'm free to respond to Brenda on the EP which I know a little about, since five of my kids have done it. And then to comment on your stats - again, utterly legit. What would not be legit is ranting, though that doesn't stop some people on these threads :). Mine is all very reasonable comment and measured, unlike some of your own. it's almost as daft to claim that I'm 'trolling' as it is to claim monopoly of a thread. At least I try only to post about things I know something about - or ask questions about things I don't.

All schools will by now have compiled their leavers' destination data for 2014, but these things take time to filter through the government, there's always a time lag. My point is that it has nothing whatsoever to do with 'settling down'. The leavers' destinations are fixed after results and whether kids drop out after that is irrelevant to that, nothing moves.

Molio
In that case please could you explain why the 2014 leaver data has not been released by the Government.

and please stop trolling me.
I've hidden every other thread I find you on.
This one is about the college my child attends.
Its a shame I had to find your nasty posts on it.

he'd still, not he's still

Absolute bollocks TalkinPeace. Virtually every other school in the country collates its leavers' data the same year. 'Settling in' my Aunt Fanny! The gap year kids get lumped in with the successive year groups usually, which tends to work out fine.

And bollocks again to the second point. A single kid won't skew stats in a college with 2000 kids so that 820 kids in that kid's year going to RG drops to 500. Do the maths TP. He's a single kid. Even if he was given a quad of his own at Cambridge he's still only be one kid. One of my DSs' got 6A* at A2 (mostly sciences not including maths but including humanities) and his results barely caused a ripple. So yes, bollocks. Sorry, but you really don't have a clue.

Gentlybenevolent
Of course its not the data from the 2014 A Level results.
Those kids have barely settled in at their colleges and Universities, or for that matter gap years.
They wait a year to see what kids actually do after leaving school and college.
Destinations data has to be a year behind to be vaguely accurate.

Molio
I guess 2011 was the freak year.
That was the year they had the lad who got 7 x A* at A Level (sciences, Maths and computing)
PSC have certainly not slipped back compared with other mega 6th forms, let alone the deadly rivals up the M3 at Farnborough

I can't open it up for some reason at the moment but if 41%/ 820 kids has fallen to 25%/ 500 kids in the space of two years, then why? Has there been a massive expansion in that time at the college? Or have I got those figures wrong? It does say 41% in 2011 on the website.

That link doesn't go to 2014 cohort data though...

Here is the data set
www.gov.uk/government/statistics/destinations-of-key-stage-4-and-key-stage-5-pupils-2012-to-2013

Getting 25% - ie around 500 pupils - into Russell Group universities including Oxbridge is a fantastic achievement in a state run environment where many of the pupils are outside the scope of such institutions
eg those doing BTEC PE and other non A level courses.

Yeah, its crap compared with St Swithuns, but that is because, as the OP informed us, Symonds students are too busy taking drugs

No TP my kids are fine where they are but that's not even relevant. PS is such a huge college lots of people are going to know kids there, but actually one doesn't have to have any connection at all to comment so please lighten up. I queried what you said because if you really do mean 25% to RG including Oxford and Cambridge then I'd say, ok, it's not bad but it's not great either. In fact I'd be asking the question: why did 41% go to RG including Oxford and Cambridge in 2011 if only 25% went in 2014? There may be a very good explanation, but I'd want to know what it was. That said, I've heard pretty good things said of PS although it's hugeness isn't something all the students take to, clearly.

Molio
The league table and what I wrote are quite clear.
Do you have kids planning to attend Peter Symonds?

25% into Oxbridge and Russell Group or 25% into Oxbridge? The latter would be very impressive but the former not especially - there are a lot of RG unis.

Nevertheless, according to the OP they're still a bunch of stoners!

just looked at the KS5 destination data that came out yesterday.
Peter Symonds got 25% into RG & Oxbridge.
Not bad for a college that has kids doing Btec and that only demands C grades for the core non A level subjects.

Slightly worried that Op thinks her DD might be future Prime Minister material.
Just what the country needs ,with her extensive knowledge of real life...

Brenda ,
I see your point now . I had read your comment as a direct comment on the EP , not the Telegraph thing in general . See , I was missing the obvious - told you I could. Thanks , though for explaining .

I think their articles sometimes seem to try to put the wind up people and induce panic that you're not doing the best for your child if you're not shelling out £££ for a school that's in the know . Whether it be IGCSEs or IB or that really clever dcs are all off to Harvard now, there's this undercurrent that state school pupils are ignorant of how things really work.

Just a view (and I am only thinking of humanities here ) is not the value of the EP or any similar extended essay , as a means of encouraging a pupil to think and read more widely around a subject? So as far as university goes this is the benefit of doing one - i.e. to encourage that habit of learning , rather than in the physical essay produced. So if a school encourages this in other ways , or the pupil does it naturally not such a big deal. But I don't work in education so it is just a personal view. I would agree though for those doing a large number of A2s there needs to be a realistic assessment of workload.

Brenda , what did you mean by "And sometimes it's pure advertorial for private schools." Not trying to be obtuse , promise , but probably missing a nuance (or indeed the blindingly obvious ) wouldn't be the first time