State school 6th forms oversubscribed

[LordGiveMeStrength]

AIBU to be concerned about the impact the new VAT on private schools will have on state school 6th forms?

Our local 6th form open days have been jam packed with so many year 11s moving from private schools.

Issues I see:

1. kids who have been at the local state secondary school since year 7 have been told their space in the 6th form is not guaranteed and if they don’t get as high GCSE results as other potential pupils they will not have a spot. The nearest private schools have amazing GCSE results so very likely to displace existing students to other state school options a far distance from their homes.
2. infrastructure - the local school is already heaving so accommodating a huge influx is not possible, buildings are already crumbling and it will take a long time before investment actually happens to improve the facilities.
3. false economy- currently kids in private schools don’t cost the government to be educated. Government’s plans are that money raised from VAT will pay for additional teachers (but I don’t see that happening immediately). If lots of private schools kids move to the state system not only will government not collect that VAT, but they will all be liable for educating pupils who previously were in the private sector. I believe the current cost from central government to educate in 6th form is £5k with additional payments for more academic subjects (eg further maths A level pupils will equal an additional £900 per pupil per year in the state schools). Apologies if these sums aren’t correct.

https://inews.co.uk/inews-lifestyle/private-school-parents-vat-state-sixth-forms-3473062?srsltid=AfmBOopXOi5842QMq-qO1NqHGR9g9-4BOi6Gc0v_dlhBbFBTMmU5Prsi

Our applicants fill in an additional form telling us — BUT, the vast majority of our school references do actually tell us (eg. in Maths X student is in the top 2 of an A-level class/cohort of y); School Z is a mixed-entry comprehensive with xx pupils in the sixth form; our average A-level class is 15 etc. If your references aren’t doing that then I hate to tell you, your competitors are.

Plus the UCAS school reference page has a figure entry for the total numbers in each the upper and lower sixth cohorts in the school. In addition to the school data we get from the national DfE databases, which shows comparative pupil number figures and achievement levels across that LEA and nationally, number of FE and HE offers for that school per year for the last five years plus achieved places; number of Oxbridge offers and achieved places, FSM percentages at each level, POLAR pupil neighbourhood and school scores, among many other things.

We also keep and maintain pretty extensive background knowledge of all schools throughout the country because it factors into our offer decisions for each subject, school type and individual school. It’s all very data-driven these days.

Average A-level class size tells you fuck all about the classes those students are actually in.

Seems a no brainer to me. Otherwise why would grammar schools be so popular with parents of high achievers.

True

So we add a lot of additional data, plus our applicants fill in part of the form about the quality of their A-level teaching, any disruptions, etc. But we do this every year for large numbers of applicants, so we get to know how schools across the country work very well.

BUT the point here is that posters seem to think that A-levels can just be taught in massive classes the same way Year 7 or GCSE classes are. That isn’t the norm and it isn’t feasible without employing more teachers. In STEM each student needs additional practical time and resources; they all need work intensively marked and more individual teaching time than in lower school classes.

Do people genuinely have so little idea of teaching that they think an A-level English or Biology teacher can just double the number of pupils in the class with no effect on workload and school resources?

The situation at your DC's school sounds difficult @OhCrumbsWhereNow but it must be quite unusual. There can't be many schools with "a queue of kids with all grade 9s wanting a place" and such a big drop in PAN between year 11 and 12. I mean last year there were only 1270 pupils in the whole of England who achieved all 9s at GCSE and there are about 2800 schools/colleges with 6th forms. I know attainment is not spread evenly across the country and results are highest in London but even so it seems improbable that there will be many schools swamped with such high achievers.
I'm sure it must be very stressful for parents and pupils who are in that position and I'm sympathetic to them but it must be a pretty localised problem and the relevant LEA needs to look at their provision. It doesn't sound like increased numbers of private school pupils is really the problem. When a school is already unable to offer 6th form places to such a small proportion of year 11 I can see that even a few extra applicants makes a bad situation worse, but surely the root cause of the problem is that there's an inadequately sized 6th form at a large, high achieving school? That's nothing to do with VAT on private education.

I feel sorry for all those kids sweating out their personal statements, doing work experience, volunteering etc when apparently what might swing it is their class having 20 kids instead of 16.

Do people genuinely have so little idea of teaching that they think an A-level English or Biology teacher can just double the number of pupils in the class

Baffled as to why you think class sizes are going to double.

I thought the problem here was that kids weren't going to get into those classes.

Oh yeah, definitely, that’s exactly what would swing it. We make our decisions just purely on this. 🙄

Well exactly. You were trying to make out that it's massively important and unis have this data and scrutinise it incredibly closely. And that I should be 'worried' that my 'competitors' were providing this data.

Okay @noblegiraffe : me explaining that we know what schools’ A-level class sizes actually are, was in response to the posters saying you can just add more pupils to A-level classes, and their kids were taught in A-level class sizes of 30.

You asked me how I know, so I explained. If you write school references, as you say, then you should know all of this already — and if you write school references, then you must be an A-level teacher, or head of year/head of school. So, please tell me, what are the sizes of the A-level classes you teach; and how many pupils would you be willing to add to them before decreasing your timetabling elsewhere?

Why are you not suggesting increasing staffing as an option? More bums on seats = more funding = ability to increase staffing.

Your university admissions process seems to be very different to others. How do you know they are going to tell the truth regarding quality of teaching? They could either say it's bad if they feel it's going to help them or they could say it's good because they know the school see the applications before they send it off. Also, where exactly do you get the data on every class size?

I didn't say large A-level class sizes are the norm in every school but they certainly are in the grammar schools where I live for some subjects. They get very good grades too. The range of abilities is not as broad and probably easier to teach a larger class size. Teachers won't have to focus on pupils who are struggling because none will be struggling. My point is if they are asking for high GCSE grades for sixth form entry they can teach larger class sizes.

We don’t provide that data either. And have absolutely no problem getting people into university. I can’t imagine the departments care about that.

😆 The increase in “bums on seats” doesn’t remotely make enough money to employ many, if any, additional teachers. Each student brings in c. £4.3k per capita per year per school (at school 16–19 per capita funding amounts). Each student does 3/4 A-levels, so the amount per subject is at the most a third of that £4K.
And that doesn’t even take into account the amount that goes towards non-teaching costs per student (substantial - resources, admin, pastoral support, books, library, sports facilities, catering etc.)

Is that enough to employ many extra teachers, each with a total return costing (this includes employers’ costs, eg pensions and NI) of £40-60k+? No. Instead you need to decrease the teacher’s timetabling and increase class sizes in the lower school to compensate.

We have a maximum class size of 20 students (very rarely might go one over in something like maths).

There were 30 in some maths and science classes at my DC grammar school. I wasn't very happy about it but presumably the school got more money for more bums on seats.

Missing the point 😆 Whatever you do with the references, I still see the average class sizes for A-levels, so I can tell you, A-levels are not routinely taught in the class sizes that lower school classes are.

Do you actually see the page that UCAS generates for the school references? Each school reference form has a box for year 12 and year 13 enrolled numbers for that school. In addition we also get those numbers, plus average class sizes, HE and Oxbridge offers and achieved places for the last 5 years, from the DfE and UCAS databases. Why do you think we don’t get this info?

Interesting that you're an expert on school funding and also on University admissions. Not sure many state schools spend a substantial amount on food or books or much in the way of sports facilities to sixth form students nowadays.

Er….yes. I have worked in the sector for 25 years across DfE schools policy, university admissions, widening participation programmes and am a trustee of several education charities, so I know how schools funding works. And yes, funding per student always includes a substantial proportion for non-teaching costs: how do you think those get funded otherwise? That’s one of the reasons why schools’ per capita 16-19 funding is a lower amount than FE/6th form colleges - because part of those costs are cross-subsidised by the 11-16 funding in schools.

If you want to look at the exact funding formulas (they are reasonably complex), you can start with the document I linked to above.

If you only see average class sizes it won't tell you much about class sizes in specific subjects There will be wide variation. e.g. there could be two doing music a levels but 30 for maths. So not sure how useful it would be.

Yes, we get that info. Plus it isn’t exactly rocket science to work out that A-level music probably has fewer candidates than maths 😆

And yes, funding per student always includes a substantial proportion for non-teaching costs: how do you think those get funded otherwise?

In the sixth form many of the things you mentioned e.g. books, catering aren't funded by anyone other than the students or their parents nowadays.

Bizarre this suggestion that a sixth form would need to pay more for sports facilities, textbooks or food because of additional students.

Also they can't decide if class sizes will double which will bring in a substantial amount of extra money to the sixth form, or whether it will be a pitiful amount which won't raise enough money for anything at all.

Also, putting on an extra class at A-level wouldn't require hiring a whole extra teacher.

Ah. Who do you think funds the libraries/school textbooks/school teaching resources/subscriptions to A-level boards’ teaching and exam databases/institutional online resource subscriptions/exam board fees/invigilation costs?

Or the school kitchens/buildings and grounds maintenance/non-academic staff/computer systems/cleaning/caretakers/energy to heat and light the buildings/furnishings/water for the loos/loo paper? Do you think sixth form students don’t use the buildings/need heating/lighting/use the school facilities/need loo paper?

In educational accounting usually at least 1/3 of the total income must be allocated across general non-teaching core business costs. That’s an accounting rule: you don’t get to ignore it. But I’m stopping contributing here, because this thread clearly does not have people who are knowledgeable in how schools (or in fact any institutions) are financially funded and run and it’s a waste of my time explaining these things to people who don’t have a clue how schools or universities work.

A-level students buy their own textbooks and pay for food in the canteen so I'm not sure why you brought those up as examples.