Priority admissions to grammar for free school meals

[polycomfort]

I'm pretty much not a person to start hand-wringing over low income families getting breaks. Happy for people less fortunate to get the odd leg up. Fine.

But I'm really angry to have just read that the local grammar school has just started giving priority admission to children claiming free school meals. I understand they get an extra £900 per child so I get that there is probably a financial benefit for the schools themselves. But I've been practicing with my daughter every evening (can't afford a tutor) using books I've bought cheap on Amazon and was thinking she might be just about good to go after lots of effort from both of us and now I'm just thinking what's the point? There are 20 applications per space as it is, and now just because I'm not poor she has even less of a chance. We don't have a high income but I work full time and so she doesn't get free school meals. For my efforts I may end up having to send my really rather bright daughter to the crappy (and it is crap) local comp even though she may be brighter than a child whose parent doesn't bust a gut to work every day of the week.

I don't think it's okay for grammar schools to be crammed full of wealthy kids who could go to private school, but couldn't they do a household income cut off rather than using a free school meal as the criteria? Then all the kids who can't afford to go to private school could be assessed for grammar school. I don't see why kids from the middle income should be penalised.

"What about children who aren't top set material Hak? As has been pointed out many times, being motivated and wanting to learn isn't something that can only apply to top set children."

Well, they wouldn't be in the grammar school, would they?

"IMHO the assistance the pupil premium children need should (as a result of the additional funds paid to their primary schools) be provided at that primary school in enabling them to sit the 11+ on a level footing with their peers at the age of 10"

- so you think an extra 900 odd quid a year is going to make up for years of disadvantage? Children who attract pupil premium are often significantly behind even before they start school........Some people have no idea!

. I assume you also agree that m/c children and children from wealthy backgrounds and educationally supportive backgrounds are more 'entitled' to this sort of education than poor children - they must be given that they pass the 11+ in so much larger numbers.

Being neither wealthy not middle class myself there is no way that I could assume that those children are more worthy of a grammar place than poorer children. I have already said that a poor child who has had no tuition or familiarisation getting the same results as a child who has had those things is brighter IMO. 80% of the children in my child's class took entrance exams, must were heavily tutored, only my son (not tutored) and one other who was also not tutored passed for the most selective schools. Some that had been tutored for years failed all the entrance exams. I think small amounts of familiarisation helps children but I don't think tutoring or prep can make an average child be the brightest of the bunch.

so you think an extra 900 odd quid a year is going to make up for years of disadvantage?

Probably not where the disadvantage is extreme, but not every child who qualifies for the PP is disadvantaged. There are too many exceptions to this particular rule for it to be fair. The PP is farcical IMO, schools should be well resourced enough that they can target extra help where it's needed instead of being forced to target it on children who might well not need it.

andrewofgg
If private schools could be and were abolished the fee-paying classes would colonise good schools (by buying houses near them) and get the advantage of having their children educated with others like them while spending the money on an asset which will probably appreciate instead of on fees. Not sure I see a real gain there for anybody else.
legal cases can be overcome if you change laws.... I sort of get your point, if the system remained as it is now. But you could quite easily legislate to ensure a lottery system in a wide geographic area (isn't that what they did in Brighton) so that all secondary schools within a certain defined distance take a mix of different areas. Thus living next to a school would give you no advantage.

In reply to the post about "that's what top set at a comprehensive is for".

A neighbour's son is in all the top sets at the local large comprehensive.

This does absolutely nothing to prevent a certain element of the lower set children making life miserable for him outside of the classroom, corridors, playground, bus-stop, bus journey. Being at that school brings him into daily contact with kids he has very little in common with and for various physical reasons he is a target for bullies.

School have "dealt with" with incident after incident and the undercurrent is now "snitch - we'll get you back every time you report us". The school achieves poor results and his parents would love for him to have got a place elsewhere but were unsuccessful at appeal. The school can't seem to avoid the general downward drag effect of the main catchment area on behaviour of some pupils.

Well, they wouldn't be in the grammar school, would they?

No, they wouldn't. But their parents have plenty of valid reason to want their children to avoid being in classes with children who aren't motivated to learn and who have low standards of behaviour.

I know a couple of children who struggle with maths and English so they have been put in the lower sets at secondary school. They problem they have isn't a lack of natural ability, it's the fact that they are having to be educated alongside children who, because of their parenting, don't value education and don't behave well in lessons.

The parents of those children are the ones whose choices affect other people, not the ones who think a selective education might benefit their child. You are looking to 'blame' the wrong group of parents IMO.

I am at a loss to know why it is assumed that my non academic son shouldn't have ambitions, aspirations, isn't motivated and doesn't focus in lessons. Even more at a loss to know why assumptions are made about his parents because he is not academic.

Astounded to think that people can think that their educational choices has no impact on others.

I will start again.
Can someone tell me why my non academic DS can't be educated in the same building as his academic brother? Bearing in mind that he got Bs and Cs at GCSE in all subjects. He got level 4s in the year 6 SATs . He would not have passed the 11+ even with tutoring. He has an excellent work ethic, had excellent reports and was well liked by teachers and peers. He was good at Games. He left at 16 yrs and got an apprenticeship and is highly regarded at work.
Please don't palm me off with 'he needed vocational subjects' . He didn't at school - he needed a good solid education.
Why did he need to be in a different building with different uniform and different teachers?

Oh, yes. The old undeserving people benefitting from pupil premium worry.

Any evidence?

In Kent, the 11+ scores are scaled according to your child's age - if your child is born in the summer, they will effectively be given several points on each paper. My dc are autumn born. I could argue that they are effectively discriminated against. Or I could accept that this is simply an effort to level the playing field, given that statistically summer-born children will be academically behind autumn-born children.

In the same way, giving priority to children on FSM levels a very sloped playing field. There is a vast amount of evidence that children on FSM are statistically less likely to achieve academically.

Mehitabel, clealry, your non academic ds didn't need to be in a different school.

But sometimes, academic children will do better than they otherwise could have done if they go to selective schools. So the focus in a debate like this shouldn't be about where your non academic son goes, because grammar was never going to be for him. This is about the children who will benefit from being at grammar school.

Selective schools clearly work for the children that go there, that shows in their results.

No one is saying that non academic dc automatically won't have aspiration and ambitions, many of them do and obviously they deserve to be educated in the best possible environment for them just like the academic ones deserve the same.

Astounded to think that people can think that their educational choices has no impact on others.

But it doesn't have an impact on others if you make the right academic choices. At least not in the negative way that seems to be assumed, and no ones going to complain about the positive impact that comes from other people's choices.

People's educational choices only have an impact on others that is worth worrying about when the choices they make are negative.

Super - so the vast over representation of children from private prep schools at grammar schools is indicative of nothing?

Any evidence?

Only what I see for myself in a school where all but two of the children that get PP come from educated and supportive families and happen to be average or above academically, whereas the ones that really need the extra support like the travellers or the ones who have disinterested parents, or the ones that are just not very academically able get no extra funding.

"Selective schools clearly work for the children that go there, that shows in their results."

So forget about the other 77%? Why should education policy be based on what's best for the right hand side of the bell curve?

Frankly, I would rather my child did marginally less well in her GCSES if it meant that other children got a fairer crack of the whip. And it would mean a marginal difference. From memory, kids at selective schools do half a grade better than children of similar ability at a comprehensive, and there is no consensus about why that is.

hettie Yes, you could have a lottery over a wide area. And increase school-running and school-bus use - although who would pay for that?

And you make it more difficult for children to mix outside school hours.

Would you allow sibling priority which makes school-runs less of a hassle?

And the right to have private schools is entrenched in European human rights law - unless you want to abandon that, you have no way to get round that.

But in any event there is nothing wrong with parents who value education wanting their children educated with the children of other parents who share that value. Your children only get one chance and you don't want it put in peril.

Blimey there are some horrible attitudes on this thread

I really hope some of you never have children who are just average. They're going to feel such a sense of failure

Yes tiggy, but the grammar schools you are referring to are still doing their job well and enabling their students to reach their highest academic potential as well as enabling them to grow into capable, contributing members if society.

Isn't that all anyone wants from a school? We can't expect much more than that surely?

And yes, those schools do have fewer challenges in terms of behaviour and parental disinterest, but that's what all schools should have. And when schools don't have that, it's generally because of the parenting of their intake. Grammar schools shouldn't be criticised for existing just because there are too many disinterested parents around at other schools.

"Only what I see for myself in a school where all but two of the children that get PP come from educated and supportive families and happen to be average or above academically, whereas the ones that really need the extra support like the travellers or the ones who have disinterested parents, or the ones that are just not very academically able get no extra funding."

What do the Head and the Chair of Governors say about this blatant malpractice?

Frankly, I would rather my child did marginally less well in her GCSES if it meant that other children got a fairer crack of the whip.

That's up to you. Personally, I feel the child I have at a GS has enough of his own disadvantage to contend with that he shouldn't need to be concerned about other children's crack at the whip.

I'm glad that each of us with our differing opinions on the education we want for our children has options that suit us.

What blatant malpractice?

What happened about the pupil premium malpractice at your primary school?

The malpractice that permitted children not entitled to pupil premium to access it, and those that were not to?

Because you were obviously on the school staff to know such details, and presumably you "blew the whistle"?