To think DD can get top grades in an 'average' comp. secondary?

[HotCaterpillar]

Dd has done well at primary, near top of class academically and is well behaved and conscientious.

I've moved area and she's due to start secondary in an averagely performing comp. in September. Aibu to think she can get top grades in that environment if she continues to apply herself to studying?

She was offered a place in a selective private school but I declined due to the fees, I could probably just about afford them but it felt very expensive when there is a free option. She's done well in state primary. I'm a single parent working FT, we have a good home life.

Norma, I’m sure you’re right. That school might mean your DD had a ‘contextual flag’ when applying to uni, which results in a slightly lower offer or more liklihood of an offer. They are given when kids attend schools with a limited record of sending kids to Uni, are in deprived postcodes, or if neither parent has attended HE. I think sometimes you need more than 1 flag for a contextual offer.

It’s great she’s done so well. And of course there will be thousands like her across the country. I guess the thing that worries people is the fact there are also loads like her, who in average Comps DON’T go onto perform at the level they might have and instead finish with a string of 5s and 6s. Nothing wrong with 5s and 6s, but if 8/9 was achievable, then it is a problem. And in certain schools, that underperformance is more likely…it’s what people fear. Schools probably aren’t seriously worried as those kids have still got decent passes, but those kids have been sold short. And sadly, for every child like your DD, there are also kids who could have got 7-9 and could have pursued an academic route suited to them, that instead find some doors starting to close to them, either at 16, or possibly a bit later. I suppose people pay fees because they think the orivate school will keep as many doors open as possible. It’s a bit of an insurance policy. But no-one ever knows for sure how their particular kid would have performed in an alternative school, simply the macro figures for overall general performance, which their kid might have fitted in with…or bucked the trend.

Aren’t top Unis having to fill more of their quota from comps these days?

This isn't correct. What the top universities are doing is creating widening participation where they are putting things in place to try and reduce the inequity and ensure that people don't get unfair benefits from their position of advantage. So for example Oxford will look at GCSEs (traditionally. They haven't so much in the last few years due to covid) and consider someone who got 7s from a school where they were the only person to achieve that very differently from someone who gets 7s from Eton for example. I think they are looking for students from the top 10% of their cohort, whatever their cohort is.
Other universities do it differently (for example making their grade requirements lower by one or two grades) but it's not true to say there is a quota. There is just an attempt (and I think a genuine one) to level the playing field such that, if Student X had had the advantages of wealthy parents (usually meaning a quieter home environment, not necessarily having to get a job to support the family income, being able to spend more time studying, potentially a more selective school with better results) and clearly would have done as well as Student Y who did have those advantages, then X and Y would be treated the same.
A friend of ours has a friend who lives in an area where - if he goes to uni - he would be the first person in his entire village to do so (has just done GCSEs). He is now going to have to get 3 buses and travel for 75 minutes each way to get to the nearest 6th form which offers the A level subjects he wants to do. He wants to do a very competitive subject at uni. If he gets there, he will have overcome a thousand times more than my children's peers, despite the fact that they too will have worked hard to get there and deserve their success.

Ok quota was the wrong word! It’s more complicated that that.

But that’s what I meant - more levelling of the playing field, lowering grade requirements for certain schools. Basically unis need to think about the balance of where their students are coming from and that may work more favourably for state school pupils.

@Delatron
Sorry I wasn't meaning to teach you to suck eggs - I've just had too many conversations with people who tell me that their poor privately-educated children are disadvantaged when it comes to uni admissions. Drives me mad!

i think in a family members Oxford college where she works they had 35% private school which sounds ok but only 7% of the population actually go to private school!

Oh and my family member tears her hair out at those public school students who have been supported to the hilt and their school has talked the talk and got them in but when they actually get there they fall to pieces. So I wonder if these schools pushing average kids that hard is actually a positive thing for them anyway…

I think the % at private increases when you consider 6th form only, not the rest of primary and secondary. So 35% is not as disproportionate as it might sound compare to 7%.

@Chilldonaldchill Oh it’s fine - your explanation was much better - I worded it clumsily- and yes that must be very annoying. Didn’t think of it that way!

Very little analysis on this thread as to what constitutes an ‘average comp’.

An ‘average comp’ that has a representative number of students at the high performing and needing support ends of the spectrum but has ‘average GCSE results’ is probably delivering a very good education to students of all abilities. The average GCSE point scores being made up of those who score all 8s and 9 s, as well as those who did fantastically well to get 4s.

An average education, average teachers, can deliver a high GCSE score in a grammar because of the cohort.

I think that one of the reasons London state schools do so well against the national average is that the demography is very mixed. High density estates with huge problems border conservation areas and private residential roads. There is a critical mass of students being supported to be high achievers which provides a peer group from intelligent kids from more chaotic backgrounds.

Also on this thread pp talk of the difference between grammar schools and comprehensives in their area. If you live in a grammar area, the ‘comprehensives’ are not comprehensive because 25% of the highest achievers are in segregated grammar schools. Hence fewer options for a choice of MFL, separate sciences etc. Genuine comps cater for all, and have these subjects.

I think the % at private increases when you consider 6th form only, not the rest of primary and secondary.

No, it's when you consider students studying A-Levels in 6th form, as opposed to vocational qualifications. Then it's about 14%. (I think it's A-Levels; not sure whether it includes other academic qualifications like IB.) But 35% is still 2½ times 14%, so an Oxford college with 35% privately-educated entrants is still hugely skewing its selection towards those students.

Oxbridge interviewers are on the record as saying that they can look to favour students with less advantages to a point….but beyond a certain point it can be counter-productive. They talk about students who show raw talent, but their knowledge base and sometimes skills are simply too far behind that if some of the advantaged students, to be something that be catch-upable, if you know what I mean. They say they can plug certain gaps and raw talent will allow for some of that…but there’s a limit. Sometimes they regretfully have to turn down a disadvantages student who clearly has a lot of talent, but the gap is just too much for the degree course to make up. They want to level the playing field….but they can’t be the whole solution and often by 18, the gap for some is just too big.

Regarding contextual offers, some people seem to think that attending any state school, gives you these special lower offers. They don’t seem to realise that this can only exist where students attend a school with historically low HE entry or in very deprived areas. Of course lots of state schools are in affluent areas and the bulk of kids couldn’t be considered disadvantaged.

Its absolutely right to try to level the playing field more. The trouble is that certain students just have had such an advantage that they really are so much better placed to succeed on their degrees than many others. Universities and especially highly academic ones rightly want the brightest and most capable students. They are there primarily to deliver academic excellence, not to deliver a social service or a redistribution of income or reduce inequality. They can do those things to a certain level, but it’s not their primary purpose. And if it becomes such, then they will find that the whole nature of what they can deliver and produce changes. The changes society needs must happen sooner. Even today the BBC reports that 50% of kids failing to pass GCSE Eng and Maths with a 4 were flagged as being behind at age 5. Well that’s not a surprise really is it. But advantage and disadvantage have truly taken root well before kids go to school, and university admissions is far down the line for addressing it. But clearly dealing with poverty and disadvantage are massive and hugely complex issues that no government or person has really found the answer to. But we must keep trying.