To wonder why priority isn’t given to state school children when allocating grammar school places ?

[Hermanhessescat]

I don’t live in a grammar school area but there is back door selection by affluence (one of best secondaries is in a nice leafy suburb) or by religious belief (equally high achieving secondaries are c of e or Muslim). I have no personal experience of them apart from the fact that my DF attended one in the 40s, enabling him to leave his deprived hometown and go to a fairly prestigious uni.
Many posters in the past have talked about sending their dc to private preps then trying for a state grammar at 11 which surely puts said children at a huge advantage due to smaller classes, better facilities and active preparation for the 11 plus.
How come the grammars don’t therefore give precedence to state school educated children who pass then allocate remaining places to those who weren't ? Or have a slightly lower cut off point for those children who attended schools in particularly deprived areas ? I appreciate that’s probably a fairly simplistic idea and prepare to be flamed

Children will always get more advantages if their parents can pay for it. And it's that simple.

"Doing it just by how people score in the test is just about as fair as you can get"

Not if is a test that is entirely coachable. And which in many cases favours candidates from "bookish" homes.

You absolutely can give priority to state school applicants. The well off middle classes would howl though. Frankly, if you cared about social equality, you wouldn’t give a toss about removing an advantage from pupils who are already so favoured by the fact their parents can afford private school fees.

It’s like the Norway model of mandating percentages of women on boards. You need a positive action to remedy the disadvantage, and I don’t have a problem with removing some of the advantage from privately educated children in order to help those who can’t afford such benefits. Sure, it might not look like equality to those in private schools, but you can bet it looks fairer from the bottom of the heap.

The thing is, quite a lot about the 11+ gives middle class children an advantage

Regular state education is equally biased towards children from more affluent backgrounds. Small catchment areas and lack of choice means people with money can afford the jumped up house prices. If they don't want to move, they have the choice of private school. If anything, I'd say grammar schools are more inclusive than schools in naice middle class areas.

I have taught in both private and state schools and know a lot about the 11+ . I firmly believe that most grammars are essentially now free private schools as the majority of kids are either from independent schools or are heavily tutored either by tutors or parents.

The North London Girls Consortium (this is a group of some of the top London girls schools) have changed the 11+ to an online test which you cannot be tutored for; they said quite rightly that children were being put under intolerable amounts of work and stress. The system was and still is ridiculous with many children prepped for these comprehension and creative writing exams for years. Whoever has money or parents capable of extra teaching themselves do well and that’s not the point of these schools.

Never mind all the highly intelligent dyslexic kids who have very high standardised scores but simply cannot compete in such a time sensitive writing nd reading heave traditional exam. ’ll get off my soapbox now!

Writing and reading heavy obviously!

Most prep schools in Bucks don't prepare them for 11+ as they want them to stay on for year 7&8. Our school didn't and tutoring was either done by parents or tutors.

I just did books from Amazon with my child and he passed with a decent mark.

Happy to talk about other unfair admission procedures. This thread, however, is about grammar schools.

Oh fantastic, yet another private school bashing thread. If your kid doesn’t do well enough to pass the exam they don’t get in, simple as? I don’t think positive discrimination is doing anything positive at all. People shouldn’t be given an easier ride just because they went to less high performing state schools, if your kid is bright they’ll do well whatever. For the parents with kids aiming to do the 11+ and get into a grammar who aren’t getting practice of v and nv reasoning, why can’t you help them at home as another homework/reading task? There are cgp esque workbooks to help. Sick of the private school bashing on here. Instead of attacking the kids and parents who go to them, attack the system that causes such massive disparity across state schools that facilitate the existence of grammars and private?

Not all grammars are in areas with private schools. There are 67 in Northern Ireland.

In my dd’s girls Grammar school, in her class of 30 there are 3 girls from prep school.

A local academy school which has it’s own entrance exam, not 11 + has a summer school in the weeks leading up to the exam. It’s free and anyone can attend, however it refuses prep school students unless they are in the top 10% exam results. The school also has boarding facilities, swimming pool, equestrian etc.

They also allow in students in catchment area primaries in, each school is allocated a couple of places. Prep school are not allocated places.

However if anyone drops grades they are shipped out to one of their other schools.

Nobody is bashing private schools. Just saying that private school pupils shouldn't be able to take the 11+ for state grammar schools. Nothing stopping parents who want their child to go to a grammar school sending them to state primary.

Nothing stopping parents who want their child to go to a grammar school sending them to state primary

Cool. So we sort the selection process first then?

Why shouldn’t they Bertrand?

The children who are excessively tutored often struggle at grammar and at university. I sat my eleven plus from state primary, didn't even really know what it was and with no prep, I was accepted, I also had to have an interview where the deputy head asked me some reasonable things such as describe to me how your position in the netball team works within the game and also 'your parents are divorced how do you find that affects you', I was ten. I didn't go in the end we moved to a non grammar area, not really relevant. But essentially whatever a selective entry system is, will advantage some and not others, confident children will have a better chance, those whose parents spend time with them reading or taking them to places they will actually learn something rather than plonking them in front of the tv, parents who have confidence in their own and their children's abilities. Children who speak more than one language fluently can often be advantaged and ultimately the children accepted have to be able to keep up with the piece and standard of work. So you make concessions for state school pupils, give them lower entry requirements, then what? They will struggle to keep up with their classmates.

I can't see how it would be workable.

If in private school on CAF application date in year 6? Parents will just transfer them to state for yr 6.

Is it if the child has ever attended a private school. Will catch children who had a term private waiting for a state place, those from overseas, those who used just private reception as it costs same as nursery once funded hours and childcare vouchers used etc.

Is a private school not preparing for 11+ any more advantage than a state school child having 2 hours a week private tutoring all year 4 and 5.

What about parents who have opted for private school due to child's disability eg specialist deaf school or for religious reasons eg didn't get DC into catholic state primary as there isn't one in the village so pay for private catholic school.

But Bertrand there will always be inequalities due to the income of the parents - are you going to ban tutoring? For 11+ and GCSE and A-level?

I’m personally not private school bashing. My children are at one and I have worked in private schools. The point is that grammar school entrants are very often tutored for years to get in, making the admissions discriminatory to children who are from disadvantaged backgrounds. A year 7 reasoning exam is pretty tricky as is knowing how to write the perfect story or 10 mark comprehension answer. These schools are supposed to be accessible to all but many grammar school exams do not reflect this inclusive ethos.

What about children whose parents lose their jobs and so can no longer pay school fees? Or families in which one wage earner dies or becomes unwell and so they can no longer pay school fees?

What about parents who are both very highly educated and send their children to state primary? Do their children have an unfair advantage? Should they be penalized?

littlesqidge but surely a child's chance of a good education should not be influenced by whether they have a parent willing/able to tutor them?

All schools should be good schools. Yes a bright kids will do ok anywhere, but they will probably not reach their full potential in a failing school. My own DD got 3A and 8As in a school in special measures. Sounds good but she had supply teachers for half her subjects and the As she missed out on as a result were the difference between a good uni and taking a stab at Oxbridge (she got good enough A levels for it to have been a possibility). Doing ok is not ok.

My twins have both just started at grammar schools. They went to state school and while they were always in the top sets there we also tutored them for the 11 plus as everyone was doing it. I'm very lucky my children are in good schools...but why can't all parents feel this way? Our comprehensive is in dire straits and was rebadged as an academy and while its improving its still got a way to go. Personally I think they should scrap the grammar schools and instead make ALL comprehensives brilliant schools and everyone should just go to their local school. The 11 plus is awful and just teaches small children what a big level of stress feels like. They are not even teenagers yet for F sake.

The intake of a grammar school should be exactly representative of its effective tacghment area.

It should have exactly the local area average of SEN children, PP children, and children from each socio-economic band (as should all comprehensives, btw - there should be different-sized effective catchments for each band).

Yes, they can select the 'highest scoring' from each band, by whatever test is chosen BUT the effective pass mark for each band or subgroup would be different - like the effective catchment for each band at comprehensives.

The grammars wouldn't like it much, but if they are genuinely good schools, then by having 'the brightest of each subgroup' they should be able to make extraordinary progress.

The grammar school that is local to my hometown, has differing pass rates for those in catchment versus out of catchment. I also doubt many of their places are filled with private school pupils either given that there aren't really any private primaries in the area.

This is no difference to asking why employers generally select private educated candidates for jobs over state educated ones. It’s because when a selection process exists the best candidates are chosen. Grammar schools discriminating against privately educated pupils will do nothing to fix the bad education that their state school counterparts received. The problem isn’t grammar schools. The problem is that state primaries aren’t up to scratch. The government, educators and, parents who use state schools have a lot to answer for-why have they collectively failed the children?