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/

My father went to grammar school, absolutely working class in a small rural town that has minimal prospects.

He then went to uni, and did a Masters and PhD. This would never have happened without the grammar school.

I'm in favour of creating more choice, opportunity and variety in education

Fixing issues at primary school level probably would address many at high school level.

What I'm seeing with yr3 who have been one of the hardest hit years due to covid (first two years of school where they lost so much time just sitting still) is the knock on effects of that.

The teachers are trying to teach kids who are massively behind, some of whom have had delayed SEN diagnosis, there are shed loads more behavioural issues and then you have the brighter kids who are performing above expectations in someway who just aren't getting support they need either. It's just a total car crash. And thats a school which has good resources and staff.

We are already getting kids who are falling behind, giving shit to those who are bright. At age 7.It's not ok on any level. For either set of children.

I can well see this dynamic is going to be even worse in schools which aren't in such good areas and aren't as well regarded.

Of course that has an impact all the way through.

Why do parents want their kids to go to grammars in the first place? On of the major factors is about behaviour. It's about how less bright kids are being failed earlier on and they aren't getting support that they perhaps are never going to get at home. Support they desperately needed age 5 and 6. Is it any wonder parents either with aspirations or children who are naturally bright, want to put them in an environment where education is seen as positive thing and the kids there generally want to learn?

The elephant in the room here is this dynamic.

Some might argue that bringing back more grammar schools will foster more competition, in groups who probably wouldn't have had the option of the 11+ before. And that in itself might foster a more determined attitude to education in some. I think it may be true to an extent but I'm unconvinced by it.

Round our way, the comp is outstanding. The six form excellent. Arguably there is no need to go for the grammar school. A few parents do choose it because of the academic emphasis and culture. But many many don't, because the comp is good and the behaviour is good there. It's not a barrier to the future.

And social issues and behaviour is very much a socio-economic one, about parental attitudes and good and prompt access and to appropriate educational support when it's needed. If you have a failure of one or more of these, that's where you get the problems that impact children across the board.

In this sense, more grammar schools don't fix that problem. They would however make more of the most pushy and vocal middle class parents who have more money and social status happier. So from that point of view it silences complaints about a system that is failing across the board in the most effective way politically. But its not a solution to a problem. Its a solution to rising concern about schools being overwhelmed and underfunded where they need it most at the least cost to government.

The overall problem here is there has been a decision about the solution without actually considering what the real underlying problems are. I am not sure whether this deliberately cynical or simply due to ideological blinkers. I tend to lean to the latter but its convenient to the cynical.

Yep ,but people dont care about the needs of disabled children, they don't get the headlines ,
I'm lucky my child is at an LEA special school that meets his needs ,but j see do many children failed by SEN provision or rather lack of it.

But more children go to uni now, it's not the same as after the war when there were limited opportunities.

What utter nonsense OP. I've worked in grammar schools and social mobility is key. We have had children from the most deprived backgrounds, terrible home situations and it's great to see them thrive and grow in confidence.

They would not have had the same opportunities at a non selective school.

Safeguarding and pastoral care is excellent.

I say this despite both my FIL and my Dad having 'got out' due to grammar schools. They were both very very working class and would have never had the social mobility they had without grammar schools.

However, this is a different time and the opportunities and future are different. The problems out there are completely different.

We should be moving forward, not looking back at nostalgia and times where social issues were completely different.

But who's to say that he couldn't have gone on to university/done a master's/done a PhD without the grammar school?

He obviously had the ability, so why wouldn't a really good comprehensive school have enabled him to thrive and succeed have got him just as far?

The grammar school helped him to fulfil his potential because that was the system in place at that time. It doesn't mean that grammar schools were the only option that could have facilitated that success, nor that they were the best option. It was just the best option that was available at that time.

My dad also benefitted from the grammar school system. He has always been passionately opposed to them because he saw what happened to the kids who were left to go to the secondary modern.

We should be working to provide the very best possible education for all children, not only the ones who are able to get through the very unfair selection tests.

I don't agree with grammar schools in theory but seeing my dd flourish in a 6th form where learning and being well behaved isn't looked down on by peers has made me rethink grammar schools. There are plenty of 14 plus specialist schools with focus on btecs and apprenticeships, it would be nice to have academic achieving schools to be an option as well.

Sorry Iamtheusername (may have got that wrong) - I knew your motivation and was backing you but sort of merged my response to you and to those who were accusing you of setting the number too low. I have been in very similar circumstances to you before and was raised in a household that would never have seen 31k even when both my parents were working.

I'm a lone parent and quite an experienced teacher and earn less than that average so the idea that anyone is disadvantaged on over 60k is a reach for me. I think your figure was quite reasonable.

There would have been a lot of other factors too - such as small numbers of university applicants (relatively), grants and no fees, etc and earlier perhaps a primary school education where the primary school teacher's professional and expertise guided his experience rather than some hairbrained scheme by Gove that the priority was knowing frontal adverbials or whatever you call them and drilling kids in the correct terms for grammar rather than fostering a love of literature, a curiosity about the world and books and encouragement do develop their interests and skills. She might even have had the energy to give him some extra time for free because she could see he had potential if she wasn't too busy being a social worker and diagnosis referral system and dealing with kids who couldn't cope at all with being in a classroom all day let alone accessing the curriculum.

Again hugely outdated anecdote that ignores the gazillion other changes that have gone on in education and society in the interim.

We don't even live in a grammar area.

I know 3 kids in ds years, 1 above and 1 below who are all wanting to go into medicine. The first 4 got accepted and the one applying now got the better gcse results of them all so 🤞.

Dr just need to be good at the sciences. And study hard. They don't need to be grammar schools. Our comps all set anyway.

Plus I'm shocked that people seem to think grammar school = no bad behaviour or disruption.

Brilliant post

My son passed 11+ but we chose not to send him as we felt the local grammars were boring and old fashioned.
He went to the much bigger, mixed ability comp and has just got 10 really good GCSE results and offered a scholarship at a private school for 6th form (which he decided to turn down!)
He has had the best 5 years at the comp with loads of amazing opportunities in his local community. Arts, charity work, diversity, drama and social stuff.
I hate the divisive nature of grammar - in our area they are full of kids who have an attitude of “ I’m better than you”.
More is certainly not what I would vote for!

Also, even then prosseco, both your father and mine got into grammar school and showed great potential. Your father's household was able to afford him staying in school past 15, my father's wasn't.

It didn't actually address the wider boundaries.

Also the kids who ended up in the Secondary Moderns then at least had jobs they could walk into, as did my Dad when forced to leave grammar school at 15. We haven't got this two tier employment machine to match the education system of that era.

Or are the grammar school kids going to be earning and paying enough tax that the rest of them can all live on universal income or some such?

We also weren't a multi cultural society like we are now. I presume all refugees and recent migrants would have to go to the secondary moderns to avoid disrupting the uninterrupted learning of our naicely behaved, no problems, grammar school kids with their language needs and if it turned out after they were fluent within 6 months in the country that they were a maths genius, tough luck?

And what of staffing these places? Knowing that if you have multiple children the chances are very slim that they'll all get into the grammar are you happy to have a tier system of quality of teachers too like someone (actually a teacher god help us all) was advocating for upthread whereby the really clever teachers would work at grammar schools but the thick ones who were patient with the other thickos could stick to their level in the sm schools because they would be more patient with those kids and unable to cope with clever kids needs anyway?

(It's too far back to find and quote them but I can't be the only one who read that and wept at her delusions - 'cushty' behaviour schools in my experience have the absolute weakest teachers because once they somehow get a job in an 'easy' school they will not budge unless you throw them out with a crowbar because they simply wouldn't cope in an environment where the teacher is the deciding factor rather than hot housing parents and tutors etc).

How would parents actually feel about say one of their children having this grammar school experience with the allegedly best teachers, no behaviour problems, opportunities etc whilst their other equally bright but had an off day in year 6 or didn't develop the ability to concentrate long enough for the test till they were 12 kid had a totally different educational experience? How would those siblings connect and relate to each other for the rest of their lives? Do we envisage any potential issues?

Those that are for grammars.

Have you ever stopped and wondered exactly why they were abolished in the first place and replaced with Comps?

If they worked so well why did most areas abolish the system?
Why do we have thread after thread here from people (mainly SW) asking tutor advice, costs, recommendations, worrying about what happens if their child doesn't pass the 11+. Why are they so worried about their school options if they don't get in?

I acknowledge we get similar thread about schools where they are all comps.

But this is the issue isn't it?

Rather than replacing a system with another all the time (the academy system wasn't exactly a roaring success anymore than the change to ehcp) - the issue solely requires someone to acknowledge and action the proper funding of a state education system that could meet the needs of ALL pupils.

Why pay millions and millions to build more schools which cuts numbers in comps and reduces funding and the repair of the building further when you could plough those millions into existing buildings and existing schools to do what grammars can do with the grammar stream - and have money to support pupils with send and also Joe a average who may have a special talent somewhere.

But di you have the same percentage of deprived pupils as your neighbouring non-grammars?

If you don’t have at least the same percentage - preferably more - then you cannot argue that you are supporting deprived children. Doing well by the 2% you have is no good if your neighbouring school has to be 35% deprived children because you are not taking your fair share.

I have never seen a grammar school with the same % deprived children as the ‘other’ schools that serve the same catchments, by the way. It is often 5-10x less.

The reasons so many posters are giving fir why there should be grammars - disruption by, or focus on, children with high needs / SEN - would surely be better solved by more special schools, both for learning difficulties and for behavioural ones, plus investment in social services / early help?

That would far more directly help all children.than creating a system that ‘parachutes out’ a small number of able pupils, leaving the majority if children (middle and lower ability pupils, as well as those with specific needs) still floundering in a school now also seen as ‘second class’.

Grammar schools would help 10-20% if children - and even then, given the flawed 11+, not even the right 10-20% - while disadvantaging 80-90%. Fully funding SEN education would potentially help 100% of children …,.

I agree with this.

It's not down to grammar school that send problems are not fixed in primary school.

My dd had Sen issues before COVID.
The school is also well off and outstanding.

The culture of the school has been to hamper efforts to address Sen and support parents.

This is the rot.

Since discovering ( on my own) my dd sen and taking to others at the school past and present I uncovered a history of this culture and failed DC.

There is also a coterie that refuses to recognise dyslexia.

There is no point talking about social mobility when the current system has pushed the efforts back onto parents to sort out.

Bring it back in house as per Sutton trust guidance and level it up.

Personally, I think it's a myth that selective schools benefit the brighter pupils in any case. I believe that my very bright, very academic dd has benefitted enormously from going to school alongside children who are very similar to her as well as children who are very different from her. I would not have chosen to send her to a selective school because I don't think that would have been the best education that she could have received.

What utter nonsense OP. I've worked in grammar schools and social mobility is key. We have had children from the most deprived backgrounds, terrible home situations and it's great to see them thrive and grow in confidence.

But the key is that they've had the opportunity to be supported to pass their exams. We need that support for all children. And directing money to new grammar schools rather than using it to bring up comp schools creates a two tier system in state education. With tax payer money. If people are so keen to get their kids away then send them to private school. Not use tax payer money to create a private school environment at tax payer expense, and to the detriment of all other children who haven't had the same advantages.

Exactly can't

I suppose, perhaps understandably, people are thinking oh but I could get my child out of that mess. There's no guarantee of that though whereas there is an absolute guarantee that improving investment and resourcing of comprehensive education, social services, camhs, alternative provision for sen or behaviour issues that make mainstream too difficult etc would improve things for everyone.

It's not always a myth. Noisy classes are always going to be a disruption to those who are trying to learn. This particularly impacts children in the bottom sets. Tax payer money needs to be focussed into identifying and resolving those needs for those children. If teachers are able to teach without having to focus on classroom management then all children benefit.

Plus we know what happens when we don't integrate well in society - there are benefits there too with comprehensive education.

I would personally probably do away with faith schools too.

If we are going to have grammar schools then entry should be done fairly. If 25% of pupils are educated in one then it should be 25% from every primary school being offered a place. That would decrease the effect of tutoring and promote social mobility ( if it is believed grammars promote it).