To wonder what Teresa May's plans for secondary moderns are

[Neverthelessshepersisted]

That's it really.
I am a bit disappointed with her tbh.

Jacks sorry that was badly worded in my last post, dad was army, I have been to school

In Scotland (where the system is comprehensive so the schools aren't differentiated by type)

In England in a comprehensive county where I attended an excellent comprehensive school. Bro and sis were still primary age.

3rd school was in England in a grammar/secondary modern area where I went to the sec mod, bro & sis went to the grammar.

Apart from maths and English and science ( by virtue of triple science) my children's secondary school do not set for GCSE subjects.
It's a small comp and therefore doesn't have the numbers required to run differing sets in option subjects.

Consequently teaching is aimed at passing rather than excelling.
I think if your experience is a large comp where setting is more viable you might not see the shortcomings in the system.

There are disadvantages in the comp system. Like any system. But pretending that there aren't serves no one.

Actually I was coming to that Neverthelessshepersisted
My three nephews undoubtedly fall into 'the 80%'. All three plan to go straight into the building industry after school (like their dad). A traditional grammar education would be completely wrong for them - what they need is an education that is relevant to their needs and interests, i.e. based around technical and practical skills (which the UK badly needs).
I know that there were great plans at one time for 'Technical Schools' which ran alongside the old-style grammars - these would have been perfect and would have saved at least three young men a lot of boredom and frustration!

UTCs have opened and closed almost as quickly all over the country because no one wants to send their kids to them.

Edith, you're going to love this.

Bullying at Comprehensives, eh? Public schools are so much better at it!

www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/7682353/Uppingham-public-school-students-revolt-over-expulsion-of-bullying-pupils.html

Again Edith I take you point about your nephews. But could their needs not be met within the comprehensive system?
Do they really need a secondary modern?
After all most lower-entry-requirement jobs nowadays are in call centres not factories. In manufacturing we need high level skills.
There are not going to be a significant number of "brawn" jobs in future.

There are not going to be a significant number of "brawn" jobs in future.
what about the trades? We are crying out for more good tradesmen!!

To go back to the root. Exactly why cannot secondary moderns be made good or outstanding?
They can be! Our local one is OFSTED outstanding. Many parents might not CHOOSE to send their DC there, but that is nothing to do with the quality of the offering, but there own snobbery and delusions. Many of the children will fall below the GS cutoff but still be above average academically

Yes but in the trades most jobs are challenging e.g. Electrician, building contractor.

Very few labouring jobs (we could veer into an immigration discussion here).

Anyway, why on earth would a school with a grammar syllabus be unable to meet these needs up to GCSE.

I'm a lawyer. My next door neighbour is a builder and runs a major business just like my tech. Clients. The difference is that unlike them he employs a few labourers as well as highly skilled highly paid folk like electricians.

The idea of a hod-carrying majority is pure fantasy in 2017.

Again for me this idea of the "GScutoff " is fantasy. People don't come divided into two groups like this.

Most building work is donkey work and people learn on the job before setting up on their own business.Even electricians are often not qualified but have an arrangement with someone who is, to sign off their work. Domestic wiring is very easy to understand

Angel,

I'm sure neither of us believe that the Prime Minister believes we will have a functioning economy if we operate 80% of school places as preparation for labouring jobs.

Unless of corse it's all about getting ready for those fruit-picking and waitressing jobs post Brexit (please God let TM not be thinking that).

Secondary modern obviously do not prepare kids for only labouring jobs! But neither are they preparing them for Oxbridge,
Obviously there is going to be an overlap between the bottom GS set and the top secondary modern sets.
But the top set at a GS NEED peers of a similar ability to excel and subject teachers with the experience of teaching children of the ability..Similarly the costs of providing facilities are considerable and they hence need to be concentrated in schools where there is a demand
nevertheless However technologically advanced the country becomes, we still need an army or shop assistants, cleaners, carers, caterering assistents However unpalatable that truth is to you, there is no getting away from that !

God another typo!
'Similarly the costs of providing vocational facilities are considerable and they hence need to be concentrated in schools where there is a demand

Right, so 80% hairdressers...

I doubt the PM agrees with you.

Head of hive its documented that pupils are struggling at comps and esp in mixed ability setting.

Angel, comprehensive have also been heavily criticised by ofsted for low expectations, failing top sets and all the others actually. I know there are some brilliant ones out there but they are not the be all and end all some people make out. I also-ran wish we could do something to instil more pride in doing jobs like that. We need variety.

"Documented......"?

Pride in what was just described as "donkey work?"

Hmmm.......

It's odd that countries such as Finland, Japan and Canada do not "need" to separate children in this way and actually have education systems that are more successful than ours. They use much less setting than we do, let alone separate schools.

If there is a problem with comprehensives then that suggests the problem lies with society instead of the schools. We should be asking ourselves how we have gone so wrong that we think our children cannot co-exist in one building.

Yes documented, is that the wrong word perhaps? A government report has said disappointing that schools have shown apathy in face of failings eg lack of aspirations, and failing top and bottom sets. It's been a documented in a government report.

And by ofsted.

Angel I think you may have hit on something in post above re good secondary modern. I have two dd and one is showing strong signs of being excellent all rounder. Sadly we are not in grammar area and there are rubbish comps here. If I could get her into one i could. I think she needs that environment, and she has done her turn at sitting next too and being a good example to the un engaged in her class. However who knows what dd 2 will be like!! She may inherit mums non existence maths skills! In which case I would be perfectly happy sending her to the secondary modern if it is was good. But..... I think some parents on the here would find that embarrassing. It's them and how they feel about them!! THAT'S the real issue here.

I think it affects children's confidence to be all in the same set. Just like as in sport, playing and competing against people of your own level can be challenging, but not overwhelmingly crushing.

Can I make the point that that Ofsted report is seriously flawed in its use of the statistics? It bases its comparisons on the performance of Level 5 children in non-selective and selective schools. Roughly 30% of children achieve this in Year 6. However grammar schools in selective counties take the top 20% of the cohort and superselectives are generally held to take about the top 5-10%. Given this of course selective schools will show better results, or would you expect comps to achieve the same results with the top 30% as grammars do with the top 15%?

Quite how no-one in Ofsted spotted this obvious flaw is very strange. One might almost think the writers of the report wanted an excuse to denigrate comprehensives.