Anyone else disappointed with their state choices?

MumTryingHerBest - "With regard to attending church, pretty pointless if the school is oversubscribed (which many faith schools are) and you fall outside the distance cut off (which for many high performing schools is very small, 224 metres for my nearest secondary...)."

This statement is not correct at all - one of the main reasons that some popular faith schools are so successful, high achieving and oversubscribed is because their catchment areas are huge, with pupils coming from up to 15-20 miles away. These popular faith schools are flooded with applications from organised, middle class families willing to send their dc on long bus and train journeys (with associated costs) in order to access high quality education with like-minded people. By creating a much bigger pool of applicants, and introducing a number of admissions hurdles, eg weekly church attendance for 5 years (come rain/shine/illness/holiday), baptism, confirmation, supplementary forms, reference forms, banding tests, aptitude tests and in the case of some schools, services to the church, these schools raise the quality of their intake; committed, knowledgeable families living further away tick more boxes on the application form than many of the local population of church goers. The London Oratory School does not have a catchment area; only 3.2% of pupils live within 1 km, and only 29% live within 5 km - 3% live more than 20km away. Michael Gove lived 4 miles away from The Grey Coat Hospital School when his daughter gained a place, however he met the church attendance criteria very well.

What do you mean by "not quite"?

Sorry - didn't mean to offend or be generalist. OP said in her original post that she was stuck for childcare and work reasons and then said in a later post that children who went to the local church school were there because their parents had been organised enough to commit to 7 years attendance.

My point was that other people make sacrifices for education - whether that be "finding faith" for 7 years, changing jobs etc. But of course I realise that is more difficult for some that others.

Have you looked at what happens to high attainers at your local school?

Well you don't need to pay. You are choosing to pay.

Which is fine. Your DC your choice. But it's not a need. It's a choice.

mandy214 Church goers are richer ?? Really OP?

This web site might be of interest:

fairadmissions.org.uk/map/

If you click on the schools on the map it highlights how socio-economically inclusive they are. Quite an eye opener in some cases.

mandy214 - As another poster said you do have choices. You can move, you could go to church, you could home educate.

Interestingly our local mayor said this too, in response to the impending shortfall of places at local schools.

What you appear to have overlooked is that, for some, those points may not be options that they can realistically consider.

If both parents have full time jobs how do you propose they HE? Not every child works at their best at 7pm in the evening and spending the weekend teaching your kids does not really give much in the way of down time. For many low income families, jobs are not undertaken to pursue a career but as a means to financially support their family.

Moving house often incurs costs and your also assuming that everyone can afford to buy a house in the catchment of the schools they most desire or the best performing schools.

With regard to attending church, pretty pointless if the school is oversubscribed (which many faith schools are) and you fall outside the distance cut off (which for many high performing schools is very small, 224 meters for my nearest secondary and 200 meters for a local primary).

Church goers are richer ?? Really OP?

Think there is some (misguided) stereo - typing going on.

As another poster said you do have choices. You can move, you could go to church, you could home educate. I appreciate that you might not want to do any of those things for convenience / moral / career reasons but you can't say you don't have a choice.

The best way to compare schools is on the numbers making 'expected progress' - easy to compare on the DFE website
This is clear indictor of the quality of teaching to all pupils, which is not possible to tell from the %A-C numbers.

My ds is at a school with 7% high attainers, but I fully expect him to get As and A*s. I need to be more proactive than I would be if he was at a school with 80% high attainers, but if he was a low attainer in a school with 7% low attainers I would have to be too.

Ds has a friend who just achieved 11A* in a school that was measured as inadequate in the last report and requires improvement in the previous report. It has never done well and we were sure Ds would not attend that school and he didn't.
It has to be said that the girl was well above average and had strong supportive parents, however my reason for saying this is to show that the school is not always the be all and end of the child's achievement.

And from your first link mumtrying

The Telegraph independent school league table is created using data supplied by the Independent Schools Council (ISC). Many schools boycott the tables, which means that not every school is listed.

Which is what I was trying to explain but not doing a very good job of.

Mum trying - I have just checked your earlier link and it does feature on that one (within the top 20) but it doesn't feature on your second link. It is actually the first time I have seen the school feature on a published league table.

We moved house for secondary school having paid for Indy throughout primary due to crap choices. We researched schools thoroughly and moved into the priority area for the school we wanted. DD started in year 7 this week. If you feel that strongly about your choices then you have 2 options; pay up or move. DD school got 89% A* to C this summer inc Maths and English. Worth the effort we feel.

But they still don't subscribe and submit data because as I explained they don't want to be on the league tables because they don't agree with them and think that they are Damaging to all round education. Of course people can look up the stats themselves and see where the school would slot into the league tables because the stats are available on the schools website. Despite not being on the league tables (including the indie ones) there is no doubt that it is an excellent school with an excellent reputation and many children competing for each available place every year.

Iamnotloobrushphobic they don't qualify for most league tables (including some indie ones) because you cannot fully compare Igcses with GCSEs.

The link I provided was an IGCSE league table of indie schools.

Interestingly your school is up with the very top performing indie schools. Hardly representative of independent education sector on the whole is it given that the majority of independent schools don't gain results as good as this.

Very true. It's the reason my child chose this school over the other 2 indies he was offered places at. He didn't want to be the child who is seen as being clever anymore. He wanted to be amongst other very able children as he had spent years at primary dumbing himself down to try and fit in socially. The state grammar he was offered a place at also has many many very academically able children and that was the second choice. Like I said in my opening post, I'm sure he could achieve in an academic sense at any school but the choice was made more on being amongst a similar ability peer group (and it was my child who made the choice).

Bertrand Granted, it's not a huge socio economic/cultural mix at our grammar. But there is a definite mix, there's no denying it.

Probably as large a socio economic/cultural mix as you'd find at a naice comp in an affluent suburb?

mumtryingherbest they don't qualify for most league tables (including some indie ones) because you cannot fully compare Igcses with GCSEs. The local press and the schools own website issue the results each year.
In any case the schools high master issued a statement (I checked and it was actually over 10 years ago) stating that he didn't want the school to feature on league tables as he saw league tables as a cancer on education. His stance was that whether a school was achieving in the top rankings or much lower down the rankings, league tables created competition to appear as being successful which only leads to teachers teaching to test to gain high grades rather than ensuring children are actually properly educated and given a broad knowledge of each subject.
He wasn't the only high master / headteacher at the time to make such a statement. There was quite a few very successful independent schools and some state schools who released similar statements. I'm not sure how many decided not to continue submitting data for league tables though.

OP- if you have a high achieving child then check what happens to the high achievers at any school you're looking at. If they don't do well, then it's time to panic. But check first.

I'd give my teeth for average to be honest.

Dd goes to a below average comp. 36% of kids get 5 or more gcses. Behaviour is shit, bullying is a problem.

Dd is a bright kid, passed her eleven plus. She's on target for As and Bs but I can't help think she'd be on target for A*s if we'd lived nearer to the grammar.

Iamnotloobrushphobic - doesn't qualify for most league tables.

The school did state (more than 5 years ago) that they no longer wanted to feature on league tables as they don't agree with league tables.

Yet I have posted a link to an indie. league table.

Interestingly your school is up with the very top performing indie schools. Hardly representative of independent education sector on the whole is it given that the majority of independent schools don't gain results as good as this.