To wish the extra funding for grammar schools was £500 million rather than £50 million.

[letstalk2000]

www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/government-gives-16-grammar-schools-in-england-a-share-of-£50m-funding-pot-to-expand/ar-BBQqmk6

Instead of just 16 grammar schools sharing the pot of £50 million . It should be the full 164 of grammar schools hence the £500 million requirement.

Grammar schools as the flagships of the state education sector should have all the resources they require . In order to ensure a world class education is available to those that can make use of one.

I am not stupid and realise to make statements like this on here puts me on par with Nigel Farage or Katie Hopkins in the hearts and minds of the cohort which inhabits this parish !
However, I have a belief that if you have limited resources available you should make sure what you have got does not get wasted; i.e. put it in to areas such as selective education.

After all there are only about 220 good secondary schools in England with 164 of them being grammar schools. The other 56 being de facto grammar schools despite posing as comprehensives. This proves you cant be successful if you are all things to all people !

Also since the common disagreement with grammar schools is about the cohort or social class ,perhaps an extra 20 children per year from poorer families could be admitted if extra funding was given

Yes the reduction to SEN budgets are appalling as seen on School on BBC 1 .

My Autistic son was failed by his comprehensive school by a lack of knowledge rather than funding though....

We give £14 billon a year away on foreign aid, if we reduced that to £4 billon we could split the £10 billion saving between education and welfare !
This is real money not the type posted on the side of buses....
However,

So you want 500 million to be invested on educating less than 5% of the population? Yes, that sounds completely fair and sensible

I’m going to agree with all the posters that I’d like that money to be redirected to all the comprehensives like DS’s where they are struggling with 3 to 4 sen kids in each class but can only fund 1 or 2 TAs max.

For many years policy has been to encourage SEN children into mainstream and insisting their needs can be met there, then cutting cutting and cutting again their budgets to the bare bones to the point that some schools are now incapable of actually supporting those children and trying to get parents to agree to half days etc to deal with them

In some counties there are no grammar schools.

So those counties get nothing of the 50million or the hyperthetical £500million

I wish it was £0. Don't agree with grammar schools at all, despite having been a "high achiever myself as a kid, and having a high achieving dd now.

We should be investing properly in a better education for all children, not just the chosen few.

We give £14 billon a year away on foreign aid, if we reduced that to £4 billon we could split the £10 billion saving between education and welfare

Given that the British Empire has fucked over loads of countries in its lifetime, foreign aid is the least it can do.

Also the Tories could chose to increase public spending.

Instead nearly 10 years later we have an even bigger debt than we had previously and yet public spending has done down.

Where has the money gone 🤔
But instead of asking that question, you OP, fall into the classic trap of blaming the “others”, in this case foreigners and their pesky aid.

Grammar schools are only flagship schools because they cream off the brightest children, who therefore gain the best results.

The money should go to support comprehensive schools and SEN.

Believe. Nobody alive had anything to do with the British Empire fucking about countries.

The USA gives about $30 billion dollars a year in aid since we have 6 times less population and an economy 6 or 7 times smaller I guess £4 billion is about right..

letstalk... we ex-grammar school pupils have an insight that others don't.

My '73-'79 GS education was great. For me. But I know it came at the expense of those DC who didn't get in, being cast off with the mantle of 'Failure', at 10-11 to absolutely shite, in so many cases, secondary moderns.

Just no.

Come back to me once the government are championing 'appropriate' education for all. And, funny old thing, in many areas, this could all be provided under the same roofs- Oxbridge facing Physics, artisanal carpentry. Comprehensive education.

IMO, the cash needs to flow towards SEN, vocational (do you still eye roll at the term BTEC? Your average a German wouldn't), most kids, not the few. In particular, it has to be noted that grammar schools are no longer fit for purpose. They were a (useful) wheeze concocted by the upper classes who needed an educated 'officer class' to manage The Empire as there weren't enough 'toffs' to do it. It has morphed from then to now where the GS is now the first port of call for the wealthy-enough-for-private who wanna have-a-go at a free 'private' style education, one that excludes the hoi polloi. Their kids go to preps, tutoring, etc from Y3 onwards to increase their chances of gaming the 'ungameable' 11+. It has become corrupted by money. It no longer caters for the clever but possibly poor. Its core purpose has been lost.

The perceived 'need' for separate, academically exclusive education is a savage indictment of our state education system.

So, tho I have risen to the bait offered by the OP/ journalist who posted, my take home message is- fund all education fairly. It makes sense financially (many more people reaching their potential in productive employment); it makes sense socially.

There are some children with no suitable school and others who have to live away from home or spend hours travelling every day. I don't think extra money should be spent on those who already have a very large advantage.

No Grammar schools shouldn't receive extra funds - then again I was educated in inner London where there aren't any so I'm bias. (At least pesky foreigners ensured I got a good education. )

Oh and @letstalk2000 if you are 38 or above you where alive when the Britain still had colonies.

Also, some areas don't have grammar schools at all so they're automatically at a disadvantage.

They're should be more funding for struggling schools first anyway.

Back under you rock OP

£500 million to a select few?

I'd like my teenage daughter to be given the opportunity to access the education she's legally entitled to.

If every child had the chance to go to a grammar school then you might have a point. But they dont.

What exactly do you think grammar schools need more money for?

But I agree with slashing the foreign aid budget!

'Vanuatu ' 1980....

@Walkingdeadfangirl - if the foreign aid budget is cut do you think the money would go to another government department or just be used to slash taxes for the rich? Remember we have just finished austerity.

We only have 1 secondary school with intraventricular distance never mind a Grammar school.
I'd like to see the money per pupil evened out and not by cutting those with enough but by raising those with not enough.

Totally agree, OP. Smart, poor kids can't learn in a classroom full of knackers and that should be all that matters.

Love to know how you get the idea that 50% of Mumsnetters have grammar school educations

Clearly grammar schools are non inclusive and should not be funded above comps.

YABVVVU I grew up on a council estate, went to a comprehensive and then to a Russell Group university. Knickers to grammars: we moved house to avoid subjecting DS to a secondary modern area.

totally agree with hazeyjane

money should be spend on sen kids as thousands havent got a place to go

we were forced to home educate(many, many other in the same boat) as my boys were in no mans land

not severe enough for special school,(hour away by car anyway and the only one around here for miles,valleys of south wales)and not suitable for mainstream,so we had no where to go

Well I didn't go to a grammar school, a private school or any other form of selective school. They wouldn't get a penny out of me. Way back in the 80s when I was at primary school the special school my relative went to school was fantastically well resources compared to mine down the road. It's scandalous that's no longer the case.

Sorry. No. I am a teacher and my own child is bright and would possibly ‘benefit’ from a grammar school in the future but I would far rather see SEN being properly funded. If you properly fund support for SEN children then all pupils will benefit.

My Autistic son was failed by his comprehensive school by a lack of knowledge rather than funding though...

Hmmm... and I wonder what would happen to that knowledge if the funding was increased?