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.

Do you enjoy being obtuse just for the sake of it Hak?

Different schools suited my two very different children. The two schools were options available to us, we chose to use them. That's it.

"Do you enjoy being obtuse just for the sake of it Hak?"

Why on earth do you need to be rude? You say that "one size doesn't fit all" say that the two schools "do things differently" in a discussion you freely entered into but refuse to elaborate.

I agree with all of your post Superexcited.

This

How do we have an allocation system which favours intelligence over financial background.

is the real question for those of us that support grammar schools being available. But it's a really difficult one, and it goes back to the old nature/nurture thing.

A child's ability to thrive at school and achieve their academic potential isn't just about intelligence. By the time children even start primary school they can already be at vastly different starting points, not because of the level of intelligence they were born with, but because of they way they have been brought up. Without good parental support, the gap between well supported children and children without education support at home just continues to grow. Even with things like the pupil premium, especially considering it's not just about a child's financial background.

As a country, we probably could find the money to close the gap, but it would need to be a massive priority and it would need to start with early years education.

As much as it would be great to increase economic diversity in grammar schools, the real change needs to come from parents, not the selection system. It seems pointless to me to identify poor but highly intelligent children to take grammar school places when despite their intelligence they are still going to be behind their equally intelligent peers because they aren't supported at home, because at high achieving grammar schools, they definitely need lots of parental support. We don't want to put bright but unsupported children into grammar schools just to watch them flounder, that doesn't help anyone.

The real problem here is not selection.

Why on earth do you need to be rude? You say that "one size doesn't fit all" say that the two schools "do things differently" in a discussion you freely entered into but refuse to elaborate.

I'm not being rude, and I'm free to elaborate as much or as little as I'm comfortable with when it comes to putting personal details on a public forum. I've made the point that the schools I use are different, equally good, but differently suited to different children, and it think that's enough for anybody that understands that not all schools are identical clones of each other.

Would you like to elaborate on your circumstances? Maybe you could tell us whether your family has made use of a grammar school, or if you have personal experience of your children being at a comprehensive school that you think is a perfect fit for every child except those with complex SN.

"Would you like to elaborate on your circumstances? Maybe you could tell us whether your family has made use of a grammar school, or if you have personal experience of your children being at a comprehensive school that you think is a perfect fit for every child except those with coMp lex special needs"

Happy to expand on my personal circumstances- have done so in the past!

It's not that I think comprehensive schools are perfect. What I don't understand is the belief that they are "one size fits all" as if they do not have sets, or different ethos- as if all comprehensive schools are indistinguishable mixed ability factory farms. And I also believe very strongly that, even if it's true that a grammar school is the perfect environment for a small minority of children, providing that perfect environment means that the vast majority of the other children in the area go to a secondary modern which no one would actively choose, so it is better for the minority to have a learning environment that is not absolutely perfect for them to enable everyone to have an environment which is at the very least good.i do not see why it is a good idea to have an education system which is targeted at the right hand side of the bell curve, and which in consequence provides something inadequate for the majority.

And of course I know that not all comprehnsive schools are good. But most are. And our resources would be much better used improving the less good ones than airlifting out the "top" 23%.

I can't see why a child would need to hide their cleverness in a good comprehensive. It is no different- if there is no grammar school then the top sets are grammar school equivalent and cleverness is celebrated. Anyone would think there was no bullying in grammar schools!
The grammar school that I moved away from was very poor on pastoral care.

Because, mehitabel, that's what happens in comprehensive schools. Clever children are bullied unless they "dumb down" in every state school in the country except the 164 163 grammar schools. Didn't you know?

Well I had to,dp had to,our siblings had to.

That is but one reason why we've chosen our school,there are a whole host of others.

And I also believe very strongly that, even if it's true that a grammar school is the perfect environment for a small minority of children, providing that perfect environment means that the vast majority of the other children in the area go to a secondary modern

It doesnt have to be that way though, grammar schools exist alongside comprehensives in some areas. Grammar schools don't have to take the 'top' 23%. Ours don't and it works well for children in this area. Plenty of very clever children don't even do the 11+, so there is nothing that our grammars are doing to negatively affect other schools. So why the need to attack all grammars?

I don't see how grammar schools even in fully selective areas result in something inadequate for the majority. If a school is inadequate for all it's students, then something inside that school needs to change. Getting rid of the grammar school down the road isn't going to do anything to improve an already inadequate school elsewhere.

Silly me, Hakluyt!

When politicians talks about bringing back I grammar schools they do not mean the superselectives that can coexist beside almost comprehensives. They are talking about the sort of grammar school that used to exist across the country, which were designed to take the top 20/25%.

The educational, social and psychological impact of deciding children in that way is just unfair and unacceptable. And it always was. History is written, as they say, by the winners. Nobody who has failed the 11+, whose child has, or who has any empathy could possibly want the system retained or expanded.

"That is but one reason why we've chosen our school,there are a whole host of others."

If it's a selective school, you didn't choose it, it chose you!

Err no we had 3 grammars and 2 comps to choose from during the weeks before application deadline.

We chose the one we went for.

If it's a selective school, you didn't choose it, it chose you!

A selective school can only choose from the people who have chosen to apply and passed and met the over subscription criteria. There is an element of choice from the parents.

Been thinking about this one.

What % of children could be educated in a grammar-type school - so rather than thinking about having a 'life raft' for between 0.2 and 23% of children (depending in whether it is an area with residual grammars or a fully segregated system), how many children might be able to benefit if grammar schools could accommodate all who had the 'academic capability' to manage the curriculum there?

79% of Year 6 children attain Level 4s across the board - and in Kent at least, children who obtain Level 4s go on to grammar schools. Even in a county with superselectives only, I have personal knowledge of highly-coached children with L4s, or in one case not even a full set of L4s, passing the VR test for the grammar. As there doesn't seem to be a huge percentage of children 'managed out' of those ghrammars after 11, then children with L4s (at minimum, there may well be other children e.g. those with ESL who are very good at Maths despite less than L4 in English who could also thrive) are capable of managing a grammar school education.

So that leaves a maximum of 21% who, on this very rough estimate, might not be able to manage a GS education ... or maybe even fewer, once the inherent unreliability of any test at the margins, and late developers, are taken into account.

I am, marginally, in favour of extreme superselectives - in the same way as I believe that there are children with cognitive or other impairments who are best educated out of mainstream in special schools, I believe that there are a tiny % of children - certainly less than 1%, maybe as few as 0.01% - who are of such high ability that they cannot be educated in a mainstream secondary because their high ability is so extreme. Those children who need university level Maths at 12, for example, are not easy to educate in mainstream, and a statementing process such as those used to identify those needing special school placements could be used to identify them and place them in 'High ability special schools' at whatever age they are identified.

But if 79+% of children are at or above the minimum academic level at which grammar schools are currently successfully accessed, there seems to me to be very little argument for hiving off only some of this % on the basis of an arbitrary and unreliable (in the sense that it will not, on separate days, identify the same children as 'passing' or 'failing') test at 11..

In my neighbouring LEA (which has grammar schools) L4 would not be enough to pass. Children need to be a minimum of level 5 at the start of year 6 if they live in the catchment and high level 5/level 6 if they live out of the catchment. I suppose these schools are selective for those in catchment but superselective for those out of catchment.
Is it easy for people performing at L4 to manage L5/L6 on exam day?

Super, it depends on the test - the grammar school test is not the same as SATs, and in many areas relies on VR and NVR, which re a) not linked to national curriculum subjects and b) easy to coach.

So children who go on to get L4s pass ... and thse who go on to get L6s fail. The point I am making is that those who go on to get L4s manage the grammar school education just fine, and there seems to be no a priori reason why other children with L4s - perhaps not so highly coached for the 11+, but no better at academic subjects - could not manage that education just as well.

The point about the 11+ as it is at present is that it doesn't - and doesn't need to - accurately identify the very brightest. It just needs to provide a method for choosing a small number of 'bright enough' children from a very large pool of very similar ability.

Which was why I was asking myself 'how big is that pool of 'bright enough' children?'

Of course schools in your neighbouring LEA will give a 'guideline' fr the level at which they would like a child to be working to have a realistic chance of passing the 11+ - parrtly because they do not have the capability to handle every child taking it, and want to reduce the number applying to a manageable number. But if you were to analyse the ACTUAL SATs results of all the passers and failers, I am sure that not everyone would conform to those guidelines - because it is a separate type of test, and also because of the complexities of coaching and private schools.

I don't think levels in schools are that accurate and aren't that a good predictor tbh( teachers vary in quality for a start). Also the 11+ contains a lot not even covered in primary schools.

1200 children sat for the single sex school (170 available places) and 1600 children sat for a co-ed school (not sure about exact number of places). Obviously I don't know how many of those children were working at L4/L5/L6 but I do think there are some parents who believe their children have more academic ability than they actually do so the numbers applying are always huge. There are a lot of disappointed children on results day. I do agree that children can over perform / underperform on the day but even if the test is multiple choice a bit more than guesswork is needed to answer enough questions correctly to get a high enough score. Maybe a few level 4 children getting through is a good thing.

Not all children take SATs either (most prep schools don't do them) so it is hard to see what level most children are working at. Are CAT tests any better?

I think also those with level 4s in something will need some high ability in other areas otherwise they wouldn't get the marks needed. One of schools adds up all the marks so a weaker mark in one subject would need a stronger one in another.

I'd be suprised that hoards of level 4s would pass.One of my dc is weaker at maths but I'd be expecting a 5 by the time she does Sats,least of all because knowing and processing the 11+ curriculum would be at least a 5.

Certainly with CEM you'll need to be bloody good at several areas to pass,it's hard!

Level 4 s are the average and grammar schools are not for the average, or even the slightly above average. I agree with teacherwith2kids and don't mind a super selective but wouldn't expect more than 2% to fit the criteria.

Very few level 4s in grammar schools...........