Bring back secondary moderns?

In our area as grammar is for a very small number it doesn't adversely affect the other schools. There is only one girls school and one boys plus you have to be on the edge of the borough to be within distance for grammars in neighbouring regions. Here it is just another choice and not devastating if the child fails as we have other good and outstanding schools. I think the system has changed a lot from the 'grammar or bust' era, there isn't always a simple line or either/or choice. Here you have faith schools, sports academies, technical colleges, comprehensives, grammar, colleges. It is all part of the mix and choice.

Another good article:

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/sep/07/thatcher-grammars-poison-theresa-may-tories

The middle class parents of the kids who fail won't be happy - they will be furious.

Many schools do 3 year GCSEs now so 14+ entry couldn't happen.

Some areas have the middle school system. Would a grammar only cater for GCSEs onwards in those areas?

There are going to be kids who are going to end up sitting SATs, 11+,12+,13+ and 14+ out of parental desperation for a place which begs the question perhaps a middle school system might be better?

The kids will be thrilled to be there because they will have understood there is no "failing" the 11plus. They will be assured they are at the right sort of school for them. They can be big fish in a smaller pond. And should they feel failures they know they can still get in at 14plus if tutored hard enough. It will be lovely .

I wonder how thrilled the 2/3 of middle class parents whose kids will get to go to secondary modern will be. I'm sure they'll be happy that their very bright, scoring 5s in SATs kids weren't among the chosen few and will accept that fate. Or maybe they'll start free schools for those above the country average, but below grammar.

I do not support new grammar schools. Changing in Bucks would be an expensive nightmare and our schools are funded at rock bottom levels as it is. We cannot get any worse financially, so wholesale change just won't happen. Bucks is considerably less complicated than Kent regarding the exams etc. The truth is, when most children are in the secondaries, they like them. Few try to change. They do, mostly, get a good education.

Earlier, I named the very good ones, which are the majority. However, all the sec mod schools in Aylesbury have been RI recently and so was The Cottesloe and Buckingham has been in and out of RI like a yoyo, as have a couple of others. Sir William Ramsay has just been judged RI.

Also, why can't secondary moderns be good schools? Did I say they shouldn't be trusted with top set children? Although some have dubious progress for their high achieving children, If you look at the A level results at some of the schools, you will see they have them and do very well with them.

The big problem here is "closing the gap" and many of the secondaries need to work very hard at this because this is the big area of failure and I have no doubt comprehensives do better. It is a constant problem getting high quality teachers and SLT into some secondary mod schools but it is the system we have so it needs to be better where it currently lets children down.

I want the secondary schools to be as good as the grammars. Too many of them have struggled with poor leadership

Thank you, BizzyFizzy. I hope it cleared up a few myths.

I think the link was misunderstanding Review and Appeal. The Review of borderline cases is undertaken without parents being involved. It looks at children who have usually achieved 120, but looks at 120/119 if there are lots of spaces because the number of (expensive) appeals are reduced. If the grammars are very full, the Review will not put through many children. After Review, the score is published and the child is not offered or offered a Grammar school place, parents can appeal. The Head of the primary school may well support this course of action but in Bucks the initial decision to appeal is never taken by the Head but lots of Heads support children at the Review stage. I think anecdotal evidence about appeal panels is a bit doubtful. However, it is likely some children will have been coached extensively to get 118 but another child has had no help at all but achieved 117. You might say the 117 child would be better placed in the grammar school when the appeal panel heard all the evidence. Frequently forums are populated by disappointed people who think the panel ŵas against them. I would like to see the evidence that lots of near misses are turned away in favour of lower scores.

I would be very wary of putting new grammar schools into some areas. Actually I would not do it. It would be clear that it would destroy the comprehensives' top streams. It is quite likely that some of these schools would be left with too few high achieving children but it would depend how high (or low) the grammar pass mark was set. The other problem is that in some areas, high achieving (the old Sats level 5) is not enough to get into the grammar school so there would be a false dawn for many families as there is in Bucks. It would not necessarily be a rural problem either. Some urban areas of high deprivation would have the same issues. Wherever there is a grammar school that does not fill up from the immediate area, it takes in children from a very wide area adversely affecting more and more schools. You only have to look at the effects of the Bucks grammars on some Milton Keynes schools to see this.

"Prosperous area like Kent"

Have you been to Sheppey lately? Medway Towns? The coastal towns?

Bojo, if these secondary moderns are so awesome, then why the bloody hell shouldn't they be trusted with top set kids? Why all the fannying about with entrance exams and shuttling kids off aged 11,12,13?

"unlike at comprehensive schools where students go offsite for hairdressing and motor mechanics"
Just to note that DD's comprehensive offers hairdressing & other vocational subjects on site - and in fact the Engineering department offers various courses & I know is popular with students across the ability range.

I think the range of pupils at a high school in a prosperous area like Bucks/Kent is going to be quite different to the selection in a poorer rural area, so it's not really directly comparable. If you creamed off the 20% of highest achievers from dd's comp, you would be left with pretty much no-one sitting higher tier maths papers, just for example.

bojorojo Thu 15-Sep-16 16:30:52 As for the bitter disappointment of failing the 11 plus, the Review process often offers to candidates who score one mark below the pass mark. Frequently children get in who are 3, 4 and even 5 marks off the pass mark on appeal . Some people do not appeal because they are happy with their allocated secondary modern.

As you are in Bucks this might be of interest:

"It's interesting to note that it is becoming harder to win a Review case on higher scores, but easier to win a case on a lower score."

www.elevenplusexams.co.uk/forum/11plus/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=46245

Great post, Bojo. My teaching practice school was on your list :)

As for the bitter disappointment of failing the 11 plus, the Review process often offers to candidates who score one mark below the pass mark. Frequently children get in who are 3, 4 and even 5 marks off the pass mark on appeal.

But sometimes the initial decision to appeal is taken just by the HT with no independent/ parental input and the likelihood of going to appeal varies widely between HT some schools never go to HT appeal because the SMT don't like grammar schools. Parents can appeal but then the decision is not known until the summer before they start. A more transparent process would be good - e.g. all cases reviewed if 1/2/3/4 marks off.

I live in a grammar school county. Children do indeed move to the grammar schools at 12 and 13 and for 6th form. Very few apply though. The majority of our secondary moderns are good schools. A few are not. One is outstanding. Loads and loads of the children going through these schools into their 6th forms then go to university.

The money follows the child. This is standard procedure and taken account of in the census of pupils each year. There are no budget problems caused by transfer to grammar school, however, because, in effect, hardly any children move. Far more move due to parental relocation.

The least favoured grammar schools (there is a pecking order) can usually squeeze a few more in. They also take from far and wide and do not stick to catchment area. If entry is at 12 or 13 plus, the grammar school sets the exam not the LA. No-one transfers at Y10 or Y11. Grammar schools are not allowed to keep places open for late transfer. They accept everyone who passes the exam for entry in Y7 and do so, as far as I am aware, but it may not be the first choice grammar school. However, not all cohorts taking the exam are the same and some years they do not fill up. They do not lower the pass mark, to keep standards up, but then can take children who "blossom" a bit later.

In the case of schools not having a 6th form, of which there are few here, they can also transfer to the secondary modern 6th forms who nearly always have places.

People who post on these threads have never been near a secondary modern. They have no idea that A levels are available or that children get 55% and upwards of GCSE's at A*-C including Maths and English. If any of you have time, take a look at Waddesdon, John Colet, The Misbourne, The Amersham School, Chalfonts and Great Marlow School and you will see schools you will not recognise as secondary moderns. Some have in excess of 30% high abilty children so why would they not offer A levels and academic GCSE's? It would be failing the children if they did not.

As for the bitter disappointment of failing the 11 plus, the Review process often offers to candidates who score one mark below the pass mark. Frequently children get in who are 3, 4 and even 5 marks off the pass mark on appeal . Some people do not appeal because they are happy with their allocated secondary modern.

The big problem is closing the gap in our secondary schools. This is being addressed by Pupil Premium funding. Hopefully, there will be improvement. I have met very, very few parents who have transferred out of the secondary moderns to the grammars. Usually people who are rather "stuck up" but not affluent and do not see themselves, or their children, at the same school as ordinary children. They cannot afford private, so they agitate to get their children into the grammar schools. I have seen children (two near me) pushed to breaking to achieve 12 and 13 transfers. (Bed wetting, bad behaviour etc). Most people do not do this to their children and are quite happy with the schools they are allocated.

For all Theresa May's protests, it's impossible to see how a return to selection cannot also result in a return to a two-tier system, if they come up with another name for secondary moderns. And that's in no-one's interest, in my view. wp.me/pPheW-9G

Schools are funded on a per-pupil basis, so moving pupils around between schools creates budget problems, quite apart from the practical difficulties of getting pupils from one school to another. (Pupils may also experience problems from having to have studied similar/the same curriculum- no good moving to a school because it does more languages, for instance, if the other pupils doing them have done 2 or 3 years more of that language). In areas where schools are full, the budget pressures will be less of an issue, but outside urban centres schools are often under-capacity because it doesn't make sense (and there isn't the money) to bus children around the countryside for miles. For the same reason, arguments about choice are hugely problematic from a practical perspective outside towns and cities.

If there are Uni places for 45% of school leavers, then the top 1/3 of students at the hypothetical sec-moderns would be university bound. And need to be prepared for university in the same way as the top 20%.

I did my teaching practice at a Bucks Secondary Modern. I knew nothing about the system at all (having been educated in the independent sector in Scotland).

It seemed fine to me. We taught the GCSE curriculum. Children had access to a full academic curriculum, with a few vocational subjects onsite (unlike at comprehensive schools where students go offsite for hairdressing and motor mechanics).

There was no sixth form at this school, so students went to the grammar school for A-levels.

I also add that some schools have smaller sixth forms as they are not good or are less popular. Yes some leave for courses that are not run by school sixth forms. Some schools have a larger sixth form than their Y11 cohort as they are doing an amazing job and are in demand - the same would apply for other years.

I have seen children in selective schools who have been over coached. Some voluntarily leave as it is clear it is not the place for them. And shock horror they do well elsewhere without feeling inadequate next to their academic peers and they still achieve. Why can't there be movement between schools why should children be shoe horned into a school that might appear a good fit at first but turns out not to be further down the line. Why do parents fear moving house or taking up job opportunities elsewhere once in a good school, it should be more fluid than that. Yes stability is good for a child but just as bad is staying put out of lack of choice or options.

Sixth forms are smaller because they're not compulsory - years 10 and 11 are!

So again, where are all these year 10 and 11 places going to come from? Will grammar schools only select the top 15% at 11, even though they have space for more, so that they have space for another 5% to join at year 10?

I suppose you could always move the low performing children out of the grammar to make way for the 14+ intake?

I only wish that those on here who have been obsessed with grammar schools for the 13 years that I have been here were as concerned with decent housing for children and medical care.

I am happy with that, I have a dd at secondary modern, a ds at superselective and dd at private.
It works for them all.

Just like in sixth forms, schools adjust according to supply and demand. Some sixth forms are smaller than their y11 cohort, some are larger. I imagine it would be similar at 14+.

Where are all these vacancies for 14+ entry going to come from?