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

" got the highest 11+ score in the county and yet I was 1 of only 2 kids in my (state school) class who passed. I didn't need any pity points, thanks. It's infantilising."

Blimey. Well, I suppose this is proof positive that the 11+ certainly wasn't an indicator of innate intelligence-whatever it is or is not now....

I posted because I am doing exactly what the OP seems not to like, i.e. sending DS to a private prep to maximise his chances of securing a place at one of the excellent local state grammars. I would hope at least for a level playing field simply because it's rather arbitrary to put all state school pupils in the same bucket (ditto all privately educated kids).

I think that Morbidly's point is that the advantage she has attempted to confer upon her child (private school) is attainable by those who would benefit from a state school point boost, so it's a penalty to those who to scrimp/save to pay.

And even if you could find a way to adjust for the perceived advantage of any school vs. any other school, it's just one factor in many that influence a child's educational attainment. National Trust members? Plus 1%. Mum/dad read to you? Plus 5%. Sky TV? Minus 2%. Members of a library? Plus 2 %. Noisy neighbours/loads of siblings? Plus 5%. Dropped on head at birth? Plus 10%. etc

I agree, but state vs private is a big one that overlaps rather nicely with everything that you listed, and is easily filtered.

The state primary i went to in an affluent suburb was full of the kids of doctors and lawyers. Absolute nonsense to suggest we should be given priority in the 11+.

I understand the point about private school pupils on average, but I don’t think it’s really relevant when you’re talking about individual children and the top 10% (or however many pass 11+). Of those state school pupils that get shunted up to get a grammar school place above private school pupils who did better in the 11+ , at least some - and possibly the majority of you believe this thread that it’s only tutored middle class kids at grammar schools - will have been at brilliant state school and received tutoring and not suffered the disadvantages the OP is suggesting need to be redressed.

The fact that the average between state and private lower down the marks in the 11+ is neither here nor there when it comes to that as the middle class state kids would largely get the benefit of this policy.

I don’t agree with it on principle but it doesn’t work anyway.

With a comprehensive system it is easy to move up and down between the streams

No it really isn't. Moving down streams is easy enough, but moving up streams is particularly difficult as the upper streams are usually moving much faster so if someone moves up, they've a lot of catching up to do, which immediately puts them behind and under stress. In my son's school, their "bottom" groups started with very low numbers (under 10), the middle groups were averaging 25 pupils, but the top group was 32. The teacher explained it to us that most movement is downwards so they start with the groups weighted at the top end and by the end, all groups would have similar numbers, i.e. the movement was downwards not upwards.

Also, in some subjects, there are so few pupils choosing it as an option, there's only 1 class per year, i.e. in, say German for GCSE. If there's only one class, then that's going to have a very broad spread of ability and no scope at all for moving up/down - those at end end of the ability spectrum will suffer with lack of tailored attention to their ability level.

Most/many comprehensives have sets, not streams, with frequent movement between them

I know from speaking to friends with children at comprehensives they are only set for english and maths. It was the same at my comprehensive school in late 80s.
So the pace of the lesson in french, history, geography etc has to cater for alll abilities. I suppose in some massive comprehensives they can set for more subjects but it's not the norm in schools around here.

I live in an area with some of the best grammars in the country. The numbers of free school meals kids are vanishingly rare. So small that the OFSTED reports don’t include detail of how they’ve done as it would be identifying to the students.

It was suggested that free school meal kids could get a leg up with the scores. There was fucking outrage

I know from speaking to friends with children at comprehensives they are only set for english and maths. It was the same at my comprehensive school in late 80s.

That's how it is at my son's school. Maths and English are set, but even then, it a top set, a bottom set, and all the groups in between are random so each "middle" has has a wide range of ability, just not the top few and bottom few.

When I was at my comp in the 70's it was a bit of a mixture, but even in Maths & English, there weren't 6 sets of differing abilities, there was a top/middle/bottom for forms a-c and another top, middle & bottom for forms d-f, so there was a very broad mix of abilities in each. I was in the top set for Maths and got a D, so that gives you a flavour of the breadth of ability in a group when some in my class got A* (I didn't underperform either, I was a "D" in the third year so didn't go downwards in the O level years).

Fully accept that electricmonkey but plenty of parents can’t afford to rent privately at all let alone in good catchment areas, tiny flats or not.

We got our kids into a good state primary. To do this, we have chosen to live in a TINY two-bed flat without even enough space for a dining table. Our children share a bedroom. We eat in shifts. Whoever is working from home has to work in our bedroom among the piles of washing

There is currently one flat available in catchment for the school we applied to. It’s 4 figures a month....are you going to penalise children whose parents can afford that? It’s way over double my mortgage payments.

How much is your rent/mortgage per month?

Out of interest, why do people think going to a comprehensive school rather than a grammar school is being penalised? Honestly?

"There is simply no workable way to take all of the moving parts into account for the purposes of an entrance exam."
No. Which is why selection at 10 is iniquitious.

Out of interest, why do people think going to a comprehensive school rather than a grammar school is being penalised? Honestly?

But you’re naking generalisations again. I don’t believe going to a grammar is better that a comp.

DD saw three (all outstanding) state schools and chose the one she liked best because it has a specialism in subjects she’s interested in and wants to pursue.

The removal of choice is the penalisation.