Page 2 | Why on earth would anyone reject SPGS??

newsibling123 · 2022-02-25T08:43:00+00:00

I've been reading through many threads with mums wondering between SPGS and G&L. While G&L is a great school, why on Earth would there be a conflict in choosing SPGS, they applied in the first place, its not like they got cold called by the school and their DD offered a place! If we applied to SPGS, we'd put G&L as back up, but if we had two offers there's no question we'd choose SPGS. The only way I can imagine conflict is if G&L offered a scholarship, or DD really didn't want to go SPGS, even then we would try and show her what a brilliant opportunity it was. I know one chooses the best school for the DC, etc etc, but I can't imagine any scenario, all things being equal, how G&L would be 'better'. If DD was heavily tutored and parent was worried she'd struggle at SPGS now they have offer in hand, then G&L doesn't come to mind as an alternative to that! One of the less intense GDST schools or somewhere with broader selection, less high academic like Portland or More House maybe? Don't mean to offend anyone here, choosing school is tough, but I just don't get this at all...It's like getting a place at Oxford and choosing Durham

bjmin · 03/10/2022 18:56

Doubtmyself · 03/10/2022 18:52

He would reject the offer? She has no say in the matter then...So much for happiness ,

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Don't forget the property empire! LOL

thing47 · 03/10/2022 18:55

TeenDivided · 03/10/2022 18:20

No because you still have to reach a certain academic standard and the worst school in the country probably won't get you to that standard.
there's a whole thread running somewhere right now (maybe Higher Education) regarding standards and getting into oxford/cambridge.

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Yes I think that's right @TeenDivided. DD2 went to a low-performing secondary modern, I'm not sure they've ever sent a pupil to Oxbridge, certainly DD2's A level results wouldn't have put her anywhere near being able to apply, even with a contextual offer. The teachers, by and large, would not have been equipped to get pupils to the standard required. However wind forward a few years and she now has a first-class Masters from a university ranked higher than Cambridge for her particular field of STEM study.

So intellectually speaking it would appear that she isn't as far off that standard as her A level results would indicate.

Doubtmyself · 03/10/2022 18:52

XelaM · 03/10/2022 18:15

My brother turned down a six-figure offer to work for Google (he's in IT) because he didn't like the interview process. Sometimes people value their happiness over prestige. I would also always prefer co-ed over single sex. And it's huge pressure to compete with the SPGS girls which not everyone wants for their kids. I had a colleague whose daughter was the sole heir to her grandfather's (his FIL's) property empire. He couldn't care less about how academic her school was - he just wanted her to be happy and have a nice school experience given that she will never really struggle in life. He would reject an offer from SPGS.

He would reject the offer? She has no say in the matter then...So much for happiness ,

TeenDivided · 03/10/2022 18:32

Ultimately even AAB from St Cuthberts school for troublesome children probably shows far more potential than A A A from Winchester / Wycombe Abbey.

TeenDivided · 03/10/2022 18:30

It shouldn't work, because they can see where you did our GCSEs.
I suspect there is a lot of misinformation about this just as there is for schools admission.
'Neighbours very bright lad at Eton didn't get in they are biased against independent schools' whereas he was nothing special, didn't do well in the extra entrance tests, or was very formulaic at interview.
The thread I referred to is in AIBU right now.

XelaM · 03/10/2022 18:27

bjmin · 03/10/2022 18:24

What about staying independent for GCSEs, then switching over? I had no idea Oxbridge was just about the relative performance, I always thought they wanted the smartest students. Interesting, thanks for this.

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Many kids actually do this! They try to game the system by switching in 6th form and getting lower conditional offers for Oxbridge. You'd be surprised that some of the most desirable leafy grammar schools also get preferential lower conditional offers. I think each uni has a list of schools they give lower offers to.

XelaM · 03/10/2022 18:24

bjmin · 03/10/2022 18:18

I would reject a lot of things if we had a property empire. Sadly, we don't.

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Me too 😭😭😭

bjmin · 03/10/2022 18:24

TeenDivided · 03/10/2022 18:20

No because you still have to reach a certain academic standard and the worst school in the country probably won't get you to that standard.
there's a whole thread running somewhere right now (maybe Higher Education) regarding standards and getting into oxford/cambridge.

Show quote history

What about staying independent for GCSEs, then switching over? I had no idea Oxbridge was just about the relative performance, I always thought they wanted the smartest students. Interesting, thanks for this.

TeenDivided · 03/10/2022 18:20

bjmin · 03/10/2022 17:25

Is that right, Oxford benchmarks candidates on how they compare to their peers at the same school? So, Oxford admits students who are top of their class regardless of their actually academic abilities? I guess the best strategy is to find the weakest academic schools in the UK and go there, then your chances of getting into Oxford would be extremely high. It might make sense. TA

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No because you still have to reach a certain academic standard and the worst school in the country probably won't get you to that standard.
there's a whole thread running somewhere right now (maybe Higher Education) regarding standards and getting into oxford/cambridge.

bjmin · 03/10/2022 18:18

XelaM · 03/10/2022 18:15

My brother turned down a six-figure offer to work for Google (he's in IT) because he didn't like the interview process. Sometimes people value their happiness over prestige. I would also always prefer co-ed over single sex. And it's huge pressure to compete with the SPGS girls which not everyone wants for their kids. I had a colleague whose daughter was the sole heir to her grandfather's (his FIL's) property empire. He couldn't care less about how academic her school was - he just wanted her to be happy and have a nice school experience given that she will never really struggle in life. He would reject an offer from SPGS.

I would reject a lot of things if we had a property empire. Sadly, we don't.

XelaM · 03/10/2022 18:15

My brother turned down a six-figure offer to work for Google (he's in IT) because he didn't like the interview process. Sometimes people value their happiness over prestige. I would also always prefer co-ed over single sex. And it's huge pressure to compete with the SPGS girls which not everyone wants for their kids. I had a colleague whose daughter was the sole heir to her grandfather's (his FIL's) property empire. He couldn't care less about how academic her school was - he just wanted her to be happy and have a nice school experience given that she will never really struggle in life. He would reject an offer from SPGS.

bjmin · 03/10/2022 18:00

MissHavershamReturns · 03/10/2022 17:56

I think this is true @bjmin

Admissions tutors consider where candidates are educated when weighing their application. An A* from a comprehensive in special measures will usually mean much more than one from a superb independent.

That's interesting. Would it make sense to go to a superb independent for a few years and then switch over to the worst academic school you can find?

MissHavershamReturns · 03/10/2022 17:56

I think this is true @bjmin

Admissions tutors consider where candidates are educated when weighing their application. An A* from a comprehensive in special measures will usually mean much more than one from a superb independent.

bjmin · 03/10/2022 17:25

Flammkuchen · 25/02/2022 09:04

There is academic research that it is better to be a big fish in a small pond, than a small fish in a big pond.

For Oxbridge entrance, I would expect the same individual to have a better chance being one of the top of the year at G&L, versus middle of the year at SPGS. Oxford benchmark candidates on how they compare to their peers at the same school. It would be hard to shine at SPGS.

Is that right, Oxford benchmarks candidates on how they compare to their peers at the same school? So, Oxford admits students who are top of their class regardless of their actually academic abilities? I guess the best strategy is to find the weakest academic schools in the UK and go there, then your chances of getting into Oxford would be extremely high. It might make sense. TA

Chiswickmama · 06/03/2022 20:39

I have a daughter in the MIV at SPGS (and one to follow). I asked her about this weighing of food issue. She said the school does report in the canteen how much food is sent back everyday (by weight) to avoid food wastage, for the many obvs reasons. So maybe things have gotten misconstrued…hth

Phos · 06/03/2022 20:17

@Frederica852

No idea about the schools you're talking about but I got offered an Oxbridge place and chose to go to Durham. Best decision I ever made!

Similar story here, I turned down Cambridge to go to Manchester!

pkim123 · 06/03/2022 19:51

This happened this weekend, which made me think of this thread. Someone told me that their DD a couple of years ago got into a school, but turned it down for another school. However, the lower school that the DD went to discloses both offers and acceptances. Can you guess what it showed? In that particular year, the number of offers was the same as acceptances. In other words, the mother was lying, her DD never received an offer.

So in conclusion, keep in mind when somebody tells you that they turned down an offer from ANY school that in fact they may not be telling you the truth.

Londonderry34 · 06/03/2022 17:12

Really? What is wrong with Durham? It's brilliant and perhaps it has courses and options - sport - not available at Oxford or Cambridge. Where did you go OP? Here's the thing. St Paul's suits a certain kind of girl (yes sent one there) but there are plenty of great schools which provide a brilliant education too. Wipe your brow OP check out Tiffin, Orleans Park...........

pkim123 · 03/03/2022 10:19

@Emilyontmoor

Well OP has had a little taste of the madness that descends on parents as the entrance exams loom. If OP thinks these anecdotes are extreme she is in for quite a ride. There was a girl we knew who had been earmarked for SPGS almost from birth by both sets of grandparents (never mind the parents) who paid for the tutoring for two years before, even though she was in a prep school that did have a track record of girls going on to SPGS. Then she didn’t get in. I just can’t imagine setting such a high and narrow bar for your child to succeed and such a huge abyss of failure. There was another girl at a school narrowly beneath SPGS in the league tables who had had more than one sister go to SPGS who used to identify her to other people as “the one who didn’t go to St Pauls”. When one of a friends daughters did get in to St Pauls that mother commented “Congratulations. Mind you it’s hard, my girls are just average there.”

I could go on but many girls’ self esteem suffered from that competitive vicarious ambition based on an over preoccupation with league tables.

And I absolutely do think that if you took a girl from SPGS and put her into Putney High or KGS or Surbiton they would enable her to achieve the same results. Indeed might actually enable her to do better. I know so many girls who went to those schools who have gone on to Oxbridge and elite universities and to do medicine etc. They are still some of the top schools in the country in terms of results, the gap parents put between those schools and the ones at the top of the table, and even more so between LEH / G&L and SPGS are largely illusions, easily explained by being more selective in the first place.

Best decisions we ever made was to let one DD decide to reject SPGS in favour of a school that was certainly instrumental in giving her the motivation and confidence necessary to succeed in a traditionally male dominated discipline / field, then to let the other DD leave that same school (who didn’t want her to go) for a less academic coed where she thrived in the less pressured more encouraging environment and almost certainly did better academically.

There is some good advice on here from people who have been through the process and seen how it turns out long term.

You raise an excellent point. The pressure and anxiety is nearly all to do with the families pressuring DC's for admissions to certain schools. The schools themselves have nothing to do with that. So it would seem that if a family is balanced and nurturing, then the DC can comfortably apply to any school without any pressure or anxiety.

Emilyontmoor · 02/03/2022 21:21

weigh and Miss If you have daughters who have gone through both the admissions process and are out of the end of school and they have peers who attended all these schools, and a few more elsewhere, in every sector, including St Pauls', then surely you have some feedback to offer? Especially to an OP who clearly does not have experience of the process and asked, I hope, a genuine question and got genuine answers from people who had been there, done that. Surely that is the point of these threads, to gain the benefit of other people's experience. Frankly from my experience you actually couldn't make up some of the behaviour I have encountered.

Not sure why you would want to close that down Anyway as you were, I will go back to fangirling Sarah Fletcher who truly should be Education Secretary. We can only dream.....

Onceuponatimethen · 02/03/2022 21:03

@weighthefood the whole thread is about the people who don’t have anything to do with the schools. WHY do people reject - by definition it’s about the non attenders

weighthefood · 02/03/2022 20:50

In any thread about such schools, it’s always people who don’t have anything to do with the schools that weigh in. Invariably they will be talking about the good old “friend’s daughter” . Yes, that reliable source! The “friend’s daughter” is always used to push some thinly-veiled agenda or prejudice relating to the schools and /or the perceived “type” of people who use them.

Anyway, absolutely none if this matters and who cares?

Emilyontmoor · 02/03/2022 19:39

I suspect it will provoke some cognitive dissonance….

Emilyontmoor · 02/03/2022 19:37

I wonder how OP feels about Sarah Fletchers ideas about moving away from exams and by implication league tables as a measure of pupil’s achievement? www.tes.com/magazine/archive/why-we-must-scrap-gcses-4-ways-form-better-system?amp

ConfusedaboutSchool · 02/03/2022 19:00

I think this thread is actually a wind up.

So, OP you think SPGS's league table position is entirely down to the teaching / environment and that if you put those girls in another top school, they wouldn't do as well (despite those schools having girl that do as well as girls in SPGS)?

I'm not saying all schools across the country have equal quality of teaching but among the top indie schools the relatively small percentages that separate their results makes it very clear its the cohort's innate ability.