Financial Times Top 1000 Schools

[Xenia]

398 of the top 1000 are independent
Of the top 100 schools 80 are private and 19 grammar. Only one is a comp but it is a partially selective comprehensive.

(England only)
My older children's schools are 5th, 24th and 35th, not too bad.
www.ft.com/schoolmap-2011
The % ho get A or A* is proper subjects is a good measure and the fact they give the position in 2009 and 2008 too so you can see if a school has just had a bizarre year.

Must go now. Not doing my students any favours my being on here when I've marking to finish!

Paula, the list is massive, there are 1000 schools on it! Try a google search on 'FT top 1000 schools' and then click on the link that is a pdf.

fivecandles - "I teach a lot of students who have no idea what sort of competition they're up against." I wholeheartedly agree that many teenagers have no idea how hard their parents' generation works, let alone that their own generation is going to have to work a hell of a lot harder and smarter.

pickled thank you have looked at 2010 one but it wont let me access 2011

As a person who has intensely researched 5 schools that my daughter is looking at for A level - I am more than a little at these tables

I FAIL to understand why their statistics look so far removed from other tables

PaulaYates - their statistics are different because they use different criteria! The FT list is supposed to be the sensible list, that doesn't take government attempts to massage the league tables into account but rather the examination results that will get pupils places at top universities.

in ds year 12 got in to oxbridge

that is just over 10 %

wonder if it is on the tables?

Actually Fivecandles, that research you quote about state-school pupils doing better at university than their privately-educated counterparts isn't quite what it seems I don't think. And I speak as an ex-comp girl who has been quoting it since it was published! The problem is that it isn't comparing like with like ie it doesn't take into account that the state school pupil with 3 B's by and large won't be studying the most rigorous degrees at the most rigorous universities, simply because those grades would not get the a place. So yes, they may get their 2:1, but is a 2:1 in Creative Arts from Chichester University worth the same as a 2:1 from Oxford in English?
As I understand it, when you really do compare like with like eg undergraduates at Oxford, the privately-educated do better. Not because they're brighter, but because they've been better equipped to cope with the rigours of the course.
I don't like it, but as far as I know it's the truth.

interesting that DD's old school came in at around 250ish despite having the some of the highest IB scores in the country last year.

DS's independent school was about the 400's in the table yet turns out amazing kids, academically, musically and in the sporting field.

Selection of a school is so much more that where they sit in the tables, even if the FT is considered the "best" ranking table. I know that the independent schools I sent (and send) my DC to offer something more than A* A levels.

I'm not at all surprised that a local grammar school to us scores very high in the table - but talking to children who went and go there (DC's contemporaries) they hate the pressure and can't wait to leave.

JazT - i know a child recently started at cambridge who says it is the privately educated who seem less well equipped- less spoon feeding at university

the state school kids are used to 'doing it for themselves'

Yes, that would seem to be logical wouldn't it-that if you've achieved great results without the small classes, extra interview practice etc etc you'd be better able to cope with the independent study demanded. But I don't think the evidence bears it out. I'll try to find the article/research I was reading recently that showed this. Hope I'm wrong!...

PaulaYates

That's the complete opposite of everything I've ever been told by Oxbridge tutors and lecturers. The state school students often take a year to get up to speed while they learn the basics of essay writing and critical thinking, while those educated at independent schools hit the ground running, relatively speaking.

You can say what you like about the independent sector, but I don't think you can really dispute that it equips students for the rigours of further education.

My daughter fopund the state school pupils not as able or willing to argue points or do so so coherently. Some hardly spoke but that's just her experience on her course at university. They didn't seem to have the same debating skills.

Anyway as long as parents can pick the school they want and women pick careers which enable them to pay school fees if they want to pay fees there's no problem. You pay your money or not and take your chances on whatever system you've chosen.

'And Xenia, unlike you, not everybody judges success by how much money you earn.'

I find this weird; the money earned comes just about bottom in my career choice and job satisfaction top. Some jobs that are thought of as 'high flying' careers would make me want to jump off a cliff and I don't care how much money they earn, I don't want to do them!

Hmmmm wonder how the 25 or so from my DCs' state grammar are managing to hold their own then at Oxford??? No complaints so far..... far from it in fact.

There are clever children from the state and private sector.I really don't think by the time they have jumped through all the hoops to get to Oxbridge there is a great deal of difference between them all, other than some have attained their top grades more 'easily' than others.

Believe it or not, some pupils from the private sector don't actually get into Oxbridge in the first place, regardless of the amount of money their parents have spent on their education.

'They didn't seem to have the same debating skills.'

I already said earlier that my DS's comprehensive came top in a debating competition-above the fee paying selective school-they can be taught.

happy just saying what i have been told by a first year student so -yes i can dispute it

which university was your daughter at Xenia?

Yes, many pop stars are from private schools. It's partly parental effort and school effort. My children are all musical, very and that's partly genetic and partly effort at schools. Primary schools in the state sector just don't seem to put in the effort. There are teachers giving up just about every break this week for my boys and others to practise something. It's amazing and they're very lucky.

Look at sport - a ridiculous number of Olympians are privately educated yet only represent 6% of children.

(PaulaY, I think it's here rankings.ft.com/secondary-schools/secondary-schools-2011 if that's the same list. It has the same number 5 as the one talked above above)

It's also partly effort in terms of how you get jobs as a graduate, but also knowing there is huge competition and plenty of prviate pupils even with good results can't get jobs this year. You need tactical plans going back several years to get places. £13500 pa for school 5th in country for example. It is not a King's ransom although if you're on a minimum wage job and married a low earner it might seem so.

Xenia, my son and daughter found the private school pupils at the same (NON OXBRIDGE!!!!!) universities equally irritating, I can assure you.

University Xenia? The one where the state school pupils hardly speak?

Paula asked which university your DCs were at, not the school.

It's Nottingham and Bristol.

I can't access the 2011 list, but having looked at the 2010 one I see that 3 local comprehensives fall within the 1000-which is pretty good as they don't select.

I try not to let them be identified and it was just one group so it's hardly a representative sample but it's not unlikely. I do find more umming and ah ing and "you know" and like among certain classes and confidence is supposedly one of the things private school pupils have. What we need is studies of how they do 10 or 20 years one.

We could even do a mumsnet one - private school or state school left 10 years + and what you now earn and see if there is a correlation.

What about those of us who don't equate success with salary?!