If you live in a non grammar school area...

I live in a non-selective area and the schools are all good (apart from one, but even that isprobably satisfactory compared with 'bad' schools in London).

Selection is generally based on catchment area and there is a v. good CoE Beacon status school in town most people try to get their children into - they are highly socially selective (lots & lots of questions about what kind of community involvement the parents have etc.). There is some competition for that particular school, but it's no great shakes if your child doesn't get in. TBH, the comp we're in catchment for does almost just as well without the compulsory religion, so we won't even bother applying for the CoE school.

All the schools stream from Y7 onwards and get good results.

I live in a town with no grammars or private schools. The schools here are pretty dire, with the only options being to commute your children to a private school about an hour away, send them to boarding school or to move out of the town. Our local results are...

1. Middle class area of town 56%
2. Okay areas of town - 49% and 41%.
3. Cheaper housing areas of town - 18% and 25%
4. Mix of housing from 2 and 3 - 28% and 33%

Given that unless the parents move out of town (which does happen), most people do send their kids to their local catchments, we do live in an area of selection by mortgage. Its not good.

Or, for us, rent in the catchment of a Winchester comprehensive...

Surely a solution would be the big school (ie having the cash to provide a wide range of opportunities) with 'x' % of pupils of 'A' grade material, 'x' grade B, 'y' (or whatever) of Cs etc.

Chuck 'em in together then stream, stream, stream! Provide 1st class science laboratories, sports stadia, performing arts complexes, metal and woodwork-shops. And even a working farm! AND (importantly) a 'pupil referral unit' where all disruptive kids would have to go and could easily be sent. Prize giving would award a prize for 'best-in-school' AND 'most improved' across ALL subjects.

This can be acheived. My husband's rural state high school in Australia got kids into university to do chemistry and kids whose animal husbandry skills won County Show prizes.

FWIW all the secondary moderns in Salisbury make mention in their OFSTEDs how the school can only do so much because the most able kids are creamed off into the state grammars. Many of the grammar kids were privately prep-schooled to ensure their place- there's a reason why Salisbury has no boys private secondary school and the girls' one is RC or another that is frighteningly expensive, yet the town is bursting with prep schools!

Like UQD I was at a (girls'!) grammar (in 73). It was an excellent, academic school. The secondary moderns were, by and large rubbish, teaching watered down academia. This is why the SM/GS 11+ thing failed: No one would grasp the bullet and offer the less academic kids real alternatives, and there was no swapping between schools, once you were in the grammar, you were in for life, ditto the SMs (there were girls in my class who sat CSE maths and got level 3s. They, IMO, shouldn't have been at the grammar at all.).

I want my boys to go to a grammar. They won't because they're not clever enough to compete against prepped kids, but actually it isn't the academia I specifiaclly want at all, it's the focused learning ethos, the high value placed on education, the knowledge that if you mess around too much, you're out. It's the celebration of effort and success. You have to pay a high house price to buy that in a comprehensive!

I have mixed feelings about grammars, I do think that selction by ability is fairer than selection by mortgage which is what happens now, although the only schools that don;t seem to do this in our LEA are the catholic ones as they take kids from all over the LEA and over the border but that is another thread.

If poor bright kids did have an equal chance with bright rich kids I may even be in favour of them but that is not the case as we all know.

It is hard though as in our town with the excpetion of the catholic schools there is a selection according to income all be it not an openly declared one. All the kids from nice areas go the the higher achieving state schools and then the school I teach at takes the kids no one wants or the ones whose parents could not be bothered making an informed choice with the odd leftie do gooder like myself who wants to support there local school.

The very good state school has certainly pushed house prices up but our primaries are also very good so I think it is a combination of the two.

we have no grammars here although I am being put under a lot of pressure from my whole family, my dd family and my dp top move to Lancaster so dd can get into a grammar as I have refused to send her private.

My options are for 5 a-c's are (first figure 5 a-c second figure incudes maths and english)

c of e secondary 89% or 69%

1. private 88% 85%

2.fee paying grammar school 88% or 88%

3.joint closest state school 76% 0r 45%

4.charming but faded minor public school 69% or 88%

5.catholic school in next LEA 60% or 55%

6.catholic school 58% or 47%

7.Rather good humantiies college 46% or 28%

8. joint closest state school 46% or 28%

9.Church of England school on the definite up 45% or 30%

10.rather rough but fab facilties sports college 41% or 34%

11.state school I teach at, 32% or 19%

12. state school 44% or 29%

Out of the privates the fee paying grammar IMO is the best I have visited them all but being a leftie private is out for me.

Dd is at a catholic primary so the C of E schools are unlikely to take us and if she were to go to a church school it would be unlikely to be a Cof E one as that would not make sense. I also have moral issues with a church school (number 9) that is proud to be getting rid of kids from council estates to attract more m/c families.

State school number 4 which is in my village is very hard to get in but It would not be my choice as I think they do not do well enough with the kids they have, I think their teaching is unimaginative and kids underachieve. But if dd wanted to go there that would be fine.

If we lived closer I would consider the humanities college as I think it is very good and being a teacher I do have some inside knowledge.

In all honesty dd will probably go to one of the catholic schools where competition is fierce to get in but we are church regulars so dd would get in.

I would worry about her being at the other state schools but I know dd would do well whatever school she went to and I would try my hardest to support her and the school.

As for how do teachers choose where to teach, part of it isn't a choice in a town like mine there are not many jobs but I wanted to teach in a school that was a challenge, to teach kids from my own very poor background and I think that I am too good a teacher to go for the easy option so although I could have got jobs in "easier" schools I chose not to.

We have no grammars either. I am terrified DS will have to go to the nearest comp, my niece went there and was bullied for 3 years with no resolution...school just kept wanting to "talk about the bully's feelings". Their last ofsted report that has been published was 2002 and it was not great academically then either. There is a good state boys school slightly further away, hoping when time comes ds will get there...we could not afford to move into another area or clser to this school. So no choice here, and like pp's have said house prices near the other school through the roof. But ds is only in reception now and i know there is an lea review ongoing, so things may change or imprive drastically (i hope).

HappyHenry - no grammar schools here, aren't I lucky, my nearest on went through special measures 5 years ago and is still at the bottom of county league tables.....I'm so thrilled that dd will be going there.........

How nice for you to live in an area where all the schools are good, HappyHenry.

I wonder how much the houses cost there.

if you live in a non grammar school area ... you should celebrate.

All children will stand a decent chance and nobody gets made a reject at 11.

Most local comprehensives are actually doing a great job, don't be afraid of them. My kids go to the local comp and are doing great, no regrets.

The one he goes to is, yes, but in the pack, the LEA stated the situ for both grammars and uppers.

thankyou for that. is that a grammar mumblechum?

Otter, the LEA tells you when they send that pack asking for you to state your places. Eg in my ds's grammar school the year before he joined, it said there were 120 places and about 900 applications, then said that places were given out in the first tranche to children living (I think)1.3 miles away, then 1.7 miles away etc. Therefore, even if a child passed the 11 plus, if he lived more than say 1.7 miles away he didn't get in.

Your LEA should provide you wiht the info.

Is there still a need for the private schools in areas where there are a lot of grammars (Kent and Bucks especially) on the basis of not having to keep precious darlings away from the oiks at the comp

That could change the pass rates as independent results are not usually counted in the tables

I live in Brighton where the council is trying to introduce the lottery system (I think that some parents are challenging the legality of it atm). The theory is that there are catchment areas for all the secondary schools (apart from the RC one i presume) and within the catchment it doesn't matter how far you live from the school, you are all put into a lottery for a place. Of course there are some schools that are considered better than others. The boundaries have been redrawn so that some deprived areas fall into the catchment areas for the 2 good schools, and some "good" areas which fell into that catchment area have been moved to a less good area - of course those middle class parents are up in arms.

I think the theory is that the people from the less middle class areas will be able to get into the 2 good secondary schools (which up until now are have been fairly middle class). I suppose in practice, those people will just sell their houses at inflated prices and be pushed to another area as the middle classes move in.

If you take IGCSE it doesn't count on the official tables as a GCSE pass - so at DS' school, which changed to IGCSE Maths, the percentage getting 5 GCSE's A*-C including English and Maths has gone down from 100% to 0%.

people bandy these phrses abiout how many apply for the places and i feel much of it is here say
i have no way of knowing how many applied to me dcs schools so how do you all?

Explanation one: Independents' results can be skewed by the fact that they don't always do GCSEs - some do the IGCSE which doesn't count on league tables. I think.

Explanation two: they are full of rich but thick/lazy kids.

I'm always rather surpised to see that independent schools can have such uninspiring results. I thought that was the point of private. It stretched the clever ones and chivvied the not so clever into good grades. So what's with 59% A - Cs?

Our local secondary school has just gone into special measures. Its academic results are slightly above average but OFSTED's view is that because we live in an affluent area the results should be a lot higher.

We only have one state secondary so there is no competition but a lot of people go to the private school.

Well, I would absolutely agree with some of that. I loathed teaching about atomic structure to my bottom sets. Well, actually, they quite enjoyed doing electronic configuration because it was all number patterns to them, and they could say "two electrons in the first shell and seven in the next shell" and sound really clever without actually having a scooby about what an electron, or even an atom, might actually be. Why do we insist that these children learn this stuff rather than the things they find interesting and/or useful? Anyway, I'm absolutely all for vocational qualifications. And for me, it's not about redefining selection, but about redefining post-14 education.

Two crap school, in fact 3 really.
Thenan excellent school that is catholicc.

go back to school/college to get to university, I mean.