11+ being scrapped

[musu]

At one school in Essex here

Interesting development which follows on from Bucks CC overhauling their 11+ and trying to make it tutor proof (although everyone I know in Bucks is still employing tutors).

Nit - I think you are right to point out that you can't really compare a posh school and a state school in that way. I also think you are right that to take out 20 kids from one school would have a negative impact.

Ilikethebreeze I don't normally find being sworn at 'nice'. But each to his own I suppose.

I didn't swear at you. I swore.i was frustrated and angry. And fed up of you portraying me as a hater of clever children. I apologise if you felt I swore at you.

Russians. I agree that they education system in Kent does seem not to work at all well.[Dont know for sure, never had any personal experience].
But for the country as a whole. Yes I think I would have to say that, on the whole, and any system is never going to be perfect imo, that yes, the current education system is working well.
I would actually go as far as to say, that in decades or centuries to come, it has been pretty brilliant.
Hence perhaps, why I dont venture on to education threads.

I suppose I do take a wider view of other countries, and Britain in other centuries.

I have never once said you are a hater of clever children. I've never said you are a hater of anyone. You constantly misrepresent what those of us who support selective education up to a point say, and I'm fed up of it. I guarantee that you are no more frustrated and angry than I am. And no more fed up either.

Ilikethebreeze If you feel the system is working well for your kids, and for the needs of your business (I assume you recruit, yes?) then that's very nice for you. My experience as a parent and as a recruiter is somewhat different.

I think word's point is that a private school missing its top 10% still has much much more to offer than a SM.

Nit - I wasn't passing comment on whether it was 'alright'. Seeker was talking about the GS being unfair to the majority. I was merely pointing out that it was actually unfair to a minority. Nothing more, nothing less.

A lot of children are leaving school with barely a clutch of GCSEs but hey, let's spend our days discussing what can be done to ensure how more WC kids can get GCSE A*

But nit posh school or not, surely the same principle plays?

What is it about these 20 DC that will make a difference to the other DC's lives?

I think you're assuming that they're somehow superior. But I just don't buy that.

The selective system has an impact on more than the few children in the top sets of the sm/bottom sets of the grammar school.

". "You constantly misrepresent what those of us who support selective education up to a point say,"

Really? Why not challenge me on the then, instead of telling me that I think, believe and say things that I don't?

No of course the same principle doesn't apply! Posh or not (and that's a big thing to leave to one side, but for the sake of argument), it's a school people choose to go to - maybe because they think it has a nice ethos, maybe because they love the facilities, whatever. It is a school with a self-selected intake, not the school you go to if you fail to get in anywhere else. That is very, very obviously going to make a difference, and is in no way the same as an ordinary state comprehensive which is deemed not to be able to achieve top grades for its brightest pupils, and has consequently had them removed.

The brightest pupils haven't been removed from the school you're talking about - some of them have chosen not to go. It's a school full of people who want to be there, whose parents are investing in, and have chosen for, them to be there. The same principle can't apply, because it isn't in any way based on or governed by the same principle!

Seeker, I live in a county that has no GS and good/outstanding comps. Having worked in one and heard lots about the others - they are not good enough for my DC (similar % of top grades as word's example). There are excellent teachers there but a huge body of disaffected youth that 'school' just seems to bring out the worst in. GS are not responsible for this. What makes you think that things in Kent would be any better if they abolished the GS there?

Pickled I read it that word was saying if that particular private school can be good and do well despite not being academically selective, why should a secondary modern not be just the same. Your point would make more sense, though, and perhaps I read it wrongly.

What I'm saying is that a school that has had its top ten % creamed off need not suffer!

It need not feel or be inferior.

Why should it? That 10% aren't magic children. What benefits do they bring?

Russians, what do you mean by "recruit".
I dont even know what it means in your post, let alone be one as far as I know!

Right, so you say 'clever children don't belong here. The cleverest must go elsewhere, and the rest of you, business as usual.' And that's not going to make a difference?

The words 'top 10%' might give some indication as to the message you're sending there!

Seeker I have not told you that you think believe and say things that you don't. I have pointed out that your (oft) stated position on how the system should be designed (or changed) necessarily means that you believe it should be designed (or changed) without taking into account the needs of the outliers at either end of the spectrum. You may not want to accept that, but that doesn't make it any the less true. I have also stated that I believe you to be biased and given my basis for that belief. If you refute that then that's your right. Your actions and words continue to demonstrate the bias I have accused you of though.

And Russians. In my post of 10.44am. I wasnt talking of my children specifically, I thought my post was obvious that I was talking about the country as a whole.

Oh FHS. Highest percentile then!!!!

It doesn't matter to most people, that they're not within that group! They don't care!

It only matters to the MN 'I have a PHD from Oxford' brigade, who can't cope with the thought that their angel might not be in the top 10%.

Oh, don't be silly, Russian!

Nit - I have some sympathy with your position but - do you not think that giving 10% of the kids special extension work gives exactly the same message? In a more divisive way (because the kids are still there, in the school, a living embodiment of 'difference' in some cases) But of course, some schools don't do that......and that's the problem. It's not intractable but it's not easy and it can't be resolved by post hoc fiddling round the edges. But it's too important to go on the too difficult pile, I think, anyway.

It's a bit more sensible, and bit less emotionally determined than 'my angel might not be in the top 10%'. Both my angels would probably stand a reasonable chance, though certainly not a done deal: I'm not sure I'd want them to have consorted only with that 10% for 5 years, but I equally wouldn't want them left behind in the school where no-one's expected to do well.

Seeker, disagreeing with you, and seeing through your blather !=being silly. HTH.

And again - please stop with the insults.