Liz Truss to lift ban on new grammar schools

[noblegiraffe]

I cannot believe that we are here AGAIN after it went so poorly for Theresa May when she wanting to do this.

Liz Truss said in her leadership campaign that she wanted to lift the ban on new grammar schools. Since becoming PM, she has stuffed DfE positions with ardent supporters of new grammar schools (including the odious Jonathan Gullis as new schools minister).

The Telegraph is now reporting a planned amendment to the Schools Bill which would allow the creation of new grammar schools. Leading this is Sir Graham Brady, chair of the 1922 committee, who has been trying to bring back grammar schools for years.

Some notes on grammars: They are bad for social mobility. Despite many efforts to create a selection test that doesn't select against disadvantaged kids, this remains the case, and grammar school intakes are heavily skewed in favour of the better-off (obviously this is why some people like them).

The Tories closed more grammar schools than Labour, (Thatcher closed more than anyone else). They were not popular with parents who eventually realised that the vast majority of children don't get into them. Parents who might be in favour of grammars are not actually in favour of sending their child to secondary moderns, yet this is where most of them will go.

The German system (which is always referenced when it comes to grammar schools) was condemned by the UN for perpetuating social inequity.

Vocational education is a real issue in England and that's where any energy on schooling should be focused.

And obviously school funding and teacher recruitment and retention should be the main priorities in education for the new government.

www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2022/09/17/liz-truss-could-lift-ban-new-grammar-schools-months/

Sorry you've had such a rubbish time, glad your dc is doing well now and that she has you to fight her corner!

Your argument is fundamentally flawed as children are split into "sets" based on ability in all schools, grammar or not.

Do you understand that it is easier to move a child between sets in a school than it is to change their school?

Sorry? What's that got to do with anything?

In Birmingham they have levelled it off for Grammar entry. Catchment areas have been introduced and traditionally the Grammar schools are not in the ‘best’ areas but parents from more affluent areas were shipping their kids in. And also for children in catchment there is a reduced points level before it opens up to kids outside that.

Just small tips really...no great need for funding etc. rhats the shocker for me.

But those small tips would come from a well-funded SEN department in a school whose job it is to know these things.

SEN departments have been utterly devastated by the lack of school funding over the last decade+. Teaching assistants were the first in line for redundancies.

I work in a grammar school area. I live in a non grammar area.
The kids who go to grammar schools are tutored from about yr5. It's not a fairytale world, where some disadvantaged kid sits an exam and magically gets to escape poverty. You need to be able to afford the time and money to coach your kids through the test.

My dc are fairly bright, but there's no way I'd have been able to afford to tutor them to try for a grammar, even if they could get to one.

I'm also not so convinced that top grades really counts for that much. It's what you do with them after- which is why my non teacher graduate and non graduate friends, who got lower grades than me in the distant past, earn way more than me. And why the cleverest man I know, who is posh and went to a grammar, works as a lorry driver.

Also wondering where the money is coming from to build and staff new schools, when existing ones are struggling.

Ridiculous idea to say household income over 60000 shouldn't go to grammar. That's two below average ft salaries, you would need a lot lot more for private school.

A grammar school is how my father pulled himself out of dire poverty. So much so he could afford to send me to a top private school in the SE. Despite having a well paying job, if my DC don't get scholarships (looking good chance of this so far), I can't afford to send my multiple DC private , so will fight tooth and nail to get them into a good grammar.

You’re suggesting that there’s no difference between a grammar school system and a comp with sets.

And there are just as many that are.

I had to send my middle daughter to a private school as the only alternative to the truly shit education and outright violence she experienced at the awful bog-standard comprehensive she attended.

Ime they know the basics.

Sen is also know about sendcop and the EHCP law. They know the LA is talking rubbish.

But they also know that they can spend hours doing an application that will be rejected. The school don't appeal - the parents do.

So they repeat to the parents what the La illegal blanket polices are because that's what they can work to. I don't agree they should but they also have professional boundaries to adhere to.

And the issue to also higher than the LA. If government funded schools better (I bet their shiny new grammars get decent funding!) then la wouldn't have to make their own rules and school staff would t have to repeat these as incorrect fact.

Same for my mum. Some poorer families might have been able to manage it but my mum was the oldest sibling of a large family who regularly had no food in the house.

@noblegiraffe grammars are a popular policy. You're incredibly invested in the education system with a strong political stance, if your many many posts are anything to go by, which is ideologically opposed to grammars. That's fine, it's your call and your views, but not one shared across the board.

Love to know where all these extra teachers are coming from. Bit of a recruitment crisis at the moment.

I don’t think many would oppose this if it came alongside huge improvements and investment in comps. Sadly that won’t happen.

Do more grammars actually mean more secondary moderns these days?

Wouldn't those who don't get into grammar go to the comps and other existing schools?

That's the thing too is it not?

They are "tutored to pass".

So they aren't being presented as schools for a selective number of academically able pupils across the board from all areas and socio economic backgrounds.

They are for parents who have money but who save that by avoiding private education. I've seen so many threads on here where MNers say "we are trying for x and h school and if not which of these indies do you recommend".

Meanwhile schools in general are struggling g with ever decreasing real time funding and increased behavioural issues with increased poverty and struggles of MH in young people.

I'd be quite sad if teachers like @noblegiraffe weren't invested in the education system. I have a lot of respect for their professional expertise and wish that it was listened to more often.

What I think some posters are missing is that if we funded schools, SEND, alternative provision, CAMHS and also children’s services properly then schools would be able to function properly and everyone would be able to learn. Children’s services so that schools aren’t doing the job of social services who are so overstretched. Options for those with SEND and/or not fine in school whether that is units attached to schools, separate schools or properly funded schools. We need to be campaigning for that. The reality is campaign for grammar schools and you campaign also for secondary moderns who by their nature are likely to have well above average SEND and higher pupil premium.You have to be happy for your DC to go there as well as the grammar - it will only take one off day in year 6 for that to be your only option.

Of course not.

If the brighter children are creamed off to go to the grammar schools, the comprehensive schools will no longer be truly comprehensive. They might still call themselves comprehensive, but in reality, they will be the same as the old secondary moderns.

I'd be quite sad if teachers like @noblegiraffe weren't invested in the education system. I have a lot of respect for their professional expertise and wish that it was listened to more often.

They are just as invested, if not more, in their political prejudices.

Are Secondary Moderns a popular policy choice ? Or just Grammars ? You can't have Grammars and Comps by definition.
Not sure they are popular, except with middle class parents who think they can save the private school fees.

There is a potential couple of grammar schools DS could go to. There is also a very good comp locally. We have also toyed with a private school too. He won't go to a bad school. I have reservations about all of the options for different reasons.

What concerns me more at the moment is how even in his very good primary, they completely abandon the brighter kinds because classroom management and pitching to the SEN and average kids is prioritised.

Every kid has the right to the best education for them. However all I see is a system where pretty much the majority of kids get failed in someway. The entire system needs a bloody good shake up. The needs to be more investment in schools. There needs to be an change in attitude towards education from a lot of parents. There needs to be zero tolerance on bullying smart kids which seems par for the course and actively encouraged by some parents.

We do not take education seriously in the uk. Other countries have an attitude which values it far more and it bloody shows.

if you create more grammars you inadvertently create more secondary moderns because you lose the top 20% or whatever percentage of higher ability pupils. The surrounding schools will have higher SEND rates and also PP so become by nature the equivalent of secondary moderns.

There wouldn't be any comps if grammars opened up everywhere. There would be secondary modern schools, though obviously, they would need to come up with another name in order to pretend that this wasn't the case.