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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To think this is a ridiculous reason for requesting a voluntary payment

109 replies

NeedsAsockamnesty · 06/05/2016 09:38

A school local to me has been in te local paper because it is requesting a voluntary contribution towards GCSE exams the suggested donation is £40 something pounds per exam or the average cost of a child's exams.

It's a grammar school.
The head is quoted in the paper as saying "we receive next to no pupil premium or additional learning support funds like other schools do"

Then going on to explain that because they don't have this they are on a tighter budget than other schools.

The only 'additional learning support funds' I can think of are SEN/ECHP funds and my understanding of PP funding is that if you have the kids who qualify then you get it (same as the ECHP funding).

It seams very silly that a educated headmaster would not realise that if he does not get the funding this means he does not have the kids who qualify in his school and then winge about it.

If he did have it would he use it to fund the GCSEs and then the kids who need it would not have it used for them?

OP posts:

peacheshoney · 07/05/2016 19:14

so at our GS, the kids sit a VR and a NVR paper.
What qualifies anyone to be a tutor in that? Nothing! You just need to buy a £10 set of practice papers from WHSmith. That's all I did with my 4 DC so they had the chance to build up a bit of speed.There is no way any parent however poor can't do that!

noblegiraffe · 07/05/2016 19:24

Free school meals are provided because some parents can't afford a proper lunch for their kids. What on earth makes you think they can afford a ten pound pack of papers from smiths?

Jaimx86 · 07/05/2016 19:26

Peaches, with some parents it's not a case of being able to afford but a case of giving a fuck. It's awful seeing the kids whose parents just don't care.

BertrandRussell · 07/05/2016 19:29

And it's not just affording them. It's knowing that they exist. Knowing that's what you need. Having time and space to do them. Overcoming the worry about uniform costs, worrying about the unknown - it's sooo much more than just buying the papers. I have a good anecdote about this if people have a moment.........

BertrandRussell · 07/05/2016 19:30

"Peaches, with some parents it's not a case of being able to afford but a case of giving a fuck. It's awful seeing the kids whose parents just don't care."

And of course, some parents don't care.

bigbluebus · 07/05/2016 19:42

What p*es me off is the lazy journalism that leads to these stories being published at all. A bit of googling would tell them who qualifies for this 'extra funding' (SEN or PP) and what it is intended to be spent on, ie extra support/tuition/school trip fees/uniform etc- exam fees wouldn't even come into it as they should be paid by the state school as standard.

If he was struggling to make the school budget stretch he should have just said "we're a bit short of cash and would be grateful for any fundraising/comtributions towards school funds". It's up to parents what they do then. Asking for money to pay exam fees might make some parents think they have to pay them for their DCs to be entered in to all the exams they are due to sit.

Mumoftwoyoungkids · 07/05/2016 21:12

My mum used to do private tuition and occasionally did tutoring for 11+. (We lived in a non grammar area but you could apply for the grammar school 30 miles away if you were willing to lug your kids that far.) What could she do that a parent of a deprived child may not be able to do?

She was a graduate and both highly literate and numerate and so could actually do the tests herself.
She was a qualified teacher and so knew exactly how the kids had been taught maths and English and could use that method (not maths from 25 years ago) to explain.
She knew what the pass mark was likely to be and so could shape her teaching by that
She had seen loads of kids do the exams before and so knew which bits were most often problematic.

That's just off the top of my head.

I just can't see how you can possibly believe that the grammar school system is a fair and just one. I don't have an axe to grind here. I live in a non grammar school area. And if they suddenly decided to change where we live to a grammar school system I would probably be delighted as my kids would be massively advantaged by it. (My full name is Mumoftwoyoungkids MA (Cantab).)

But just because a system would be brilliant for me and my kids doesn't mean it is a good system.

TormundGiantsbabe · 07/05/2016 21:18

There is no way any parent however poor can't do that!

Buying £10 practice papers is not very high on your list of priorities when you are so poor you often have to choose between heat and light, rent or food.

EweAreHere · 07/05/2016 21:24

YANBU.

They don't have many pupils who qualify for extra funding because they choose not to admit them. The school should reap what it sows.

I wouldn't contribute.

peacheshoney · 07/05/2016 21:36

they don't need teaching VR and NVT, that is the whole point! Most do need practice to get up to speed though. The 11+ is not a surprise! I do not believe that anybody cannot find £10 over a period of months.And 11+ papers would be top of my list of priorities!

BertrandRussell · 07/05/2016 22:10

Peaches- just checking. You have read the thread, haven't you?

PuntasticUsername · 07/05/2016 22:29

The 11+ is not a surprise! I do not believe that anybody cannot find £10 over a period of months.And 11+ papers would be top of my list of priorities!

You live in a bit of a different world, don't you, dear?

peacheshoney · 07/05/2016 23:54

How so ? Because o don't believe people really cannot put by £1 a week for ten Weeks for something that could transform their kids life.no I don't believe it!

LittleHouseOnTheShelf · 08/05/2016 08:09

Our nearest grammar school has paint peeling off the walls and generally looks run down and uncared for. The local comprehensive has it's own swimming pool, excellent sports facilities and new science labs. The grammar school asked the governors if they could use their sports facilities at the comprehensive but were turned down.
The grammar school head that the OP mentioned is probably not the sharpest knife in the draw.

Tiredemma · 08/05/2016 08:20

Agree with you OP.

I noted this in my local newspaper yesterday. What differing attitudes of the HT's

www.suttoncoldfieldobserver.co.uk/Admissions-policy-popular-Sutton-Coldfield-school/story-29199370-detail/story.html

BertrandRussell · 08/05/2016 08:28

"The grammar school asked the governors if they could use their sports facilities at the comprehensive but were turned down."

Do you know why?

BertrandRussell · 08/05/2016 08:30

"
How so ? Because o don't believe people really cannot put by £1 a week for ten Weeks for something that could transform their kids life.no I don't believe it!"

No. Because you think the only thing standing between people from disadvantaged backgrounds and grammar schools is the purchase of a pack of past papers.

LittleHouseOnTheShelf · 08/05/2016 08:35

Bertrand I'm not sure exactly, though I know they are used a lot so maybe that was why - I rarely see them unused when I go by. The pool is some kind of PFI with the local company who run the leisure centre so it could be to do with that.

BertrandRussell · 08/05/2016 08:42

Oh, I see. The way you phrased it sounded a bit "poor old rejected grammar school"! I'm sure that's not what you meant.

StealthPolarBear · 08/05/2016 08:47

Sorry if this has been said (will go and rtft) but he's basically admitting he'd choose to use targeted funding to pay for a standard expense for all pupils? ! Dodgy

LittleHouseOnTheShelf · 08/05/2016 08:52

No, that's not what I meant.

AugustaFinkNottle · 08/05/2016 08:57

If I were a parent at that school, I'd be wanting to know how the funding for the school, which should include the resources for pupils taking GCSEs, had been spent, if there is insufficient for those pupils

If you've ever looked at state school funding you would realise that it has been stripped to the bone and beyond. Therefore I suspect that this school could account for every penny of its funding in a way you would find perfectly justified, and there would still be a shortfall. In the school where I'm a governor we're having to look at taking class teaching assistants away. Many schools are asking for a regular financial commitment from parents.

This head was an idiot to tie pupil premium into exam fees, but in essence he's asking for a one-off payment to help stretch the budget. The interesting thing is that if he had simply said "funds are being cut back and the government/council is not paying what it costs to educate children" the local paper probably wouldn't have bothered to print the story at all.

NicknameUsed · 08/05/2016 09:02

"I do understand the head's pissed-offness though. I teach in an exceptionally high-attaining comp (not grammar) and teach in an ancient, leaky, asbestos-ridden pit. The schools that have crap results get the funding. Also within my school my department gets the best results and has the crappest facilities. We get the results, so where is the incentive to give us more money?"

This ^^

Can I clarify a few points.

Pupil premium can only be spent on students who are on free school meals, and not on the school or students in general. So you can discount the pupil premium entirely.

The main factor is the funding formula. In our LA the schools with the best results get less funding per pupil than the ones with poor results. The knock on effect is that the better schools are now struggling to keep good teachers and subject leaders because their worth isn't reflected in their salary.

Also, there are a lot of new build schools in our LA and they are now being crippled by high mortgage repayments.

The education cuts mean that most of the secondary schools in our LA cannot balance their budget, and I know they aren't being profligate with their funds. Certainly the school where I used to be a governor at has had so many staff restructures and redundancies that if they get rid of any more teachers it will have a negative effect on their results.

StealthPolarBear · 08/05/2016 09:05

"Brighter parents generally have better jobs.brighter parents generally gave brighterchildren.thisis why there are so few desperately poor children at grammarschool.itis nothing to do with unfairness"
I'm sure it's true that one of the predictors of a child's Intelligence is the parents' but it's not at all the full picture
there's an excellent graph from some research which I'm going ro look for. The study tracked children from birth. Children who showed high levels of Intelligence earlier on but were from deprived backgrounds were overtaken by children from more affluent backgrounds but had had lower Intelligence scores in the early years. They were overtaken at the age of six. Showing that environmental factors play a huge part.

Original poster

NeedsAsockamnesty · 08/05/2016 10:29

The paper went with it because it's a slow week (you can pretty much tell from the other guff in it)
A nameless parent approached them with the issue.

The HT comments have had nothing at all picked up about them.

OP posts:

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