Update - missed Grammar School application

[sososocross]

So many people have kindly sent pm and a couple of update threads have been started so I wanted to update.

Firstly I really want to thank you all for your help and kindness. I was in a state and without you all I would have lost the plot. You women rule 🏅

Update: They are not letting him do the test and I have told DS. I made the choice to tell him in a vague way and simply stated that something had gone wrong and his application had not been received. I will not lie to him if he asks for more details at a later date, but I couldn't take away his chosen school and his image of his dad in one cruel swoop.

He cried and asked me to sort it out, and I told him I had tried and couldn't. I told him my alternate plans and he relaxed. I also told him I would be coming home early 2x per week from here on, and we would work together on homework, extra study or whatever he chose. If he wants to register for the 12 or 13 plus I will do all I can to assist him. Then we watched guardians of the galaxy and had big cuddle up on the sofa.

So that's where we are.

I am sorry to those I irritated by deleting the thread, I was very worried about the daily mail and any come back. I hope you understand I was having a crisis and listed inappropriate details which could identify my son on the thread.

Please don't mention school details on this thread as I'd rather it all remain anonymous for his sake.

Thanks again for all the kindness, it meant the world to me.

Oh soso I am delighted for you and your ds. What wonderful news.

Brilliant post Sososo.

This so why I don't support the grammar system.

You live with whatever the status quo is and make your best choice based on that though - so I'm very glad your son has his chance indeed

Sososo pleased for you all sosososo

I've not commented before, but I've been reading and just want to add I'm so pleased for your son.

I'm sososo glad

So you're slagging off the grammar school system but are applying to be part of it? Is that right?

Gianna99 - no. I'm critiquing the GS regarding inclusivity whilst giving my son the full choice of schools we have locally, looking at his needs.

I've had a pm from a user who owns a tuition company local to the GS who does teach looked after children for the 11plus, gcse and a level as part of a charity foundation she runs alongside her business which I think is wonderful. Mn has again surpassed my expectations of the world

"critiquing the GS regarding inclusivity whilst giving my son the full choice of schools we have locally, looking at his needs". Is just a more sophisticated way of saying slagging off the system while applying to be part of it. 😆😆

Thegirl- that's not true though, if you live in a grammar area then you are "in the system" whether you like it or not, whether you apply or not.

don't worry OP.
I slag off the grammar system, but 2 of mine go to grammar and I hope the third will follow.

You work with what there is, while campainging for change.

Indeed steppe and fleur

I believe it was F Scott Fitzgerald who said 'the test of first rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function'

Hypocrisy is part of the human condition but I think this is different. As parents we are responsible for our children and my personal politics and beliefs, whilst part of who I am, do not define my children. Ideally schools would provide expert sport and music tuition to all children but I don't hear those who pay privately called out. Likewise for private medical treatment such as dentistry or speech therapy which surely most right thinking people would agree should be available to all, regardless of their means. Is it worse to go to a GS or a sports or music academy? Which is morally best? So much virtue signally but so little campaigning and fighting for the rights of children who do not have access to the benefits a living and involved family provide.

Thatgirl - I am extremely fortunate to live in a high functioning sully comprehensive area. But I have no idea what I'd have done if we had lived in a Grammar school one - except whatever I could to get the best for my DC.

The right result and very good luck to your son. It hurt no one to extend the deadline and allow him to sit with his peers. 1/9 was just an arbitrary cut off. Our area (not far from you) is 20/9 for the 11+ exam on the same date 30th. I suspect the LA legal dept will have reviewed your letters and those from others In similar boat.

Wonderful news and good luck to your son, hope all goes well going forward soso!

You work with what there is, while campainging for change.

You have two at a grammar and hoping one to go. And yet you "campaign for change".

Genuine question. What do you do to "campaign"?

nice and good luck

Fantastic news! I'm rooting for your DS.

It's absolutely NOT hypocritical to send your DC to a grammar and to 'disapprove' of grammars. I would have sent my kids to either a grammar student or even a private school if it had been the best place for them.

I went to a GS. No idea how I made it in. It gave me a very academic education and I'm not sure I would have fared so well had I gone to the local comp at the time. There were looked after children there, there were children from single parent families and there were children there who would have been considered 'from the wrong side of the tracks' in those days (80s) as well as children from a more privileged background - so I'm not sure, at least from my limited experience that it's quite as rarified as it might seem. I'm grateful for the education I received. I'm glad children with less privilege are being supported to maximise their opportunities.

ginger certainly where I lived, having a very good grammar school meant that people moved there to get into it. Then the overall area kind of rose and the less-lucky people slowly ended up elsewhere. So it became harder again for their children to access the grammar schools because they were so oversubscribed even within their cachement areas that anyone from outside had near to no chance

Karma I think Ginger is extolling the virtues of her grammar school, with its wide cross-section of society, not criticising the local secondary for the same thing.

karma, things and terminology have changed. But that's certainly how things were seen then, at least in some areas.

Mind you people pick on actual words, but in some ways nothing has changed in terms of people's outlooks. People don't want their kids hanging out with other kids because the values and accepted behaviour are very different. It's just the phrasing has changed.

But I do think that the narrowing of access to grammar schools is a hell of a shame.

Sosososo glad to hear this amazing! So happy for you and your DS, and even your husband ..

I hope your DH can get the help he needs so that he can be both happier in himself and a better husband and father (I hope you don't mind me saying that)

ginger it's completely different now. State schools aren't allowed to teach for the 11+, so grammar schools are full of privately educated kids and middle class kids whose parents either spent a fortune having them tutored or spent many many hours tutoring them themselves. I know this because I'm one of them. I hate the GS system, but we have it here and you have to do the best for your DCs at the end of the day.