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).

Thank you, teachers- I missed out that vital bit! Probably because I've said it so often and nobody ever has a sensible response..........

You are the one with all the facts and the links to studies seeker so you tell me.

Are you saying that there are no comp areas with a comparable population make up that has worst results than your GS area?

the sutton trust report on the effects of selective educational systems concludes that:

"the majority of studies (and all of those we judge to be
methodologically strongest) report that pupils who attend grammar
schools do better than equally able pupils in comprehensives."

while a department of education report on the selective 11+ system in Northern Ireland quantifies further the advantage conferred:

"The analysis suggests that the difference in GCSE performance (as measured by total GCSE points score) is largely explained by a ?grammar school? effect. That is, other things being equal, the most important factor for a pupil in achieving a high GCSE score is achieving a place in a grammar school. To put it another way, if we compare two pupils, one of whom is in a grammar school and one of whom is in a secondary school, and who are similar in every other respect, including Transfer (i.e. 11+) Grade, then the grammar pupil will achieve a significantly higher GCSE performance. The analysis suggests that being in a grammar school adds almost 16 GCSE points, equivalent to three GCSEs at grade C, to a pupil?s achievement at 16 years."

So seeker's claim that "bright children in a grammar do an almost unmeasurable bit better than they would in a comprehensive" is simply not true - All the evidence shows they do a whole lot better.

I don't know anything about the Northern Ireland system, so I'm afraid I can't comment on that bit of your post. But you are selectively quoting the Sutton Trust report. The conclusion it comes to is that the studies are not robust, but the most that can be said is that pupils at UK grammar schools do something between 0 to .75 of a grade better than equivalent pupils in comprehensive schools. And that it is by no means certain that this is because of being in a grammar school- there are many other factors which could cause the difference.

teacher - seeker's town is an economically deprived area (her words). seeker is the person with all the facts and so I'm waiting for her to enlighten me. Are there other equally economically deprived comprehensive areas that have worst results than your GS area?

The Sutton Report blows apart your assertion so you then focus on how other factors could have caused the better results attributed to the GSs.

But when you have a comp area that does better than a GS then it's definitely because a GS system is not intrinsically better???

Did you miss teacher's post about authorities with comparable demographics? This " that the point is that grammar counties and other counties with comprehensives WITH THE SAME DEMOGRAPHICS have very similar results, indicating that there is no advantage of a grammar school system when other factors are reasonably equal"

"The Sutton Report blows apart your assertion so you then focus on how other factors could have caused the better results attributed to the GSs."

0 to .75 of a grade is hardly "blowing apart my assertion" - I have always said that the is a slight benefit to kids at grammar schools.

And that focus is not mine, it's the report's. I posted the relevant section a while ago- I'll do it again.

"A range of statistical analyses carried out in the study suggest that pupils in grammar schools do better than pupils with the same characteristics in other non-selective schools, with the difference somewhere between zero and three-quarters of a GCSE grade per subject.
Although these analyses indicate that grammar school pupils appear to make greater progress from Key Stage 2 (age 11) to Key Stage 4 (age 16) than other pupils, the study also finds that these same pupils were already making more progress during primary school from Key Stage 1 (age 7) to Key Stage 2 (age 11). This suggests that there may be important but unmeasured differences between grammar and non-grammar school pupils that are driving the differences in attainment, and not necessarily a ?grammar school effect?.
The study also investigated how factors such as the different choices of statistical model, different assumptions underpinning them and various inadequacies of the available data might affect the outcomes of the analysis. Given the arbitrariness and uncertainty introduced by these factors, it was not possible confidently to estimate the difference in attainment more accurately than ?between zero and three-quarters? of a grade per subject."

I am asking you if you are aware of a comprehensive area that has the same demographics as yours BUT has worst results?

Teacher's comment is a non sequitur because I am asking a question as opposed to making an assertion that one area has better/worst results than another.

Generally speaking, all LEAs have similar GCSE results.

What do you mean by area?

Kent ( I use Kent because I know about it) is a fully selective county- and it is about in the middle of the list for 5 A*-Cs.

Because it's not all about exam results.

seeker - I provided a working link to the full report and quoted the part of the executive summary which refutes your assertion in plain, unambiguous language. The authors' own assessment of the relative robustness of the available studies was indicated by their phrase "those we judge to be methodologically strongest". In what way is this quoting selectively - should I have cut and pasted the whole 270 page report?

On the subject of quoting selectively, you appear to be doing a bit yourself, as the report actually says
"the difference (is) somewhere between zero and three-quarters of a GCSE grade per subject."
That this difference is per subject is a rather important distinction since three quarters of a grade per subject is enough to turn straight A's into mostly B's, and quite sufficient to make the difference between a conditional offer of a university place and no offer at all.
On what grounds did you say such an effect is "unmeasurable", and does the fact that you have now back-pedalled and amended it to "slight" mean you now acknowledge the effect is real and measurable?

Is it the case that "quoting selectively" means quoting something you don't like, and does "not robust" mean "not supporting the conclusion I would like"

Seriously, has nobody told you that cherry-picking, twisting, or dismissing the best available evidence to support a pre-conceived notion of how you'd like things to be is intellectually dishonest?

I posted a chunk of the report covering this, and also the bit where it says that while this slight grade increase exists, ( which I have never denied) it is not clear why. Note it says 0-.75 per exam- the 0 is as relevant as the .75. And all points in between.

MTS-it's very difficult to discuss this topic if you keep bringing it back to my personal situation and your interpretation of it. Please could you stop doing it? It's boring, and makes you look a little.....odd. And, more importantly, doesn't add anything to the discussion.

I suspect that those are precisely the reasons some posters may be happier to keep returning to the personal: it's a great way to shut down discussion and hide your own failures in understanding behind a lot of vitriol.

seeker since your own often repeated platform appears to be identical to the stated aim of the Sutton Trust, I wonder if you could explain why it's strongly supportive of selective education whereas you're not? Is there something you know that they don't?

The Sutton Trust is a useful place to get facts and figures from- I don't think it's right about everything. Its support of a return to the assisted places scheme is, in my opinion, misguided. My understanding about it's position on grammar schools is that it supports the idea of super selectives for the very able- and I've been persuaded by people on here that there is a good case for that.

Yes but I think your version of superselective is very narrow, for genius only type children, whereas the current superselectives aren't nearly as narrow and nor should they be or they'd become very odd places socially, which would be incredibly bad. A spread of superselectives around the country taking the top 5 - 10% seems about right. It's a nonsense having them spread randomly, as they are now - very unfair.

The Sutton trust talks about an average of 2ish per primary school- not sure what % that is.

Well assuming the average primary has 30 pupils it would be 6%. Our village primary (where DD4 is in Y6) has 6 pupils but obviously there are schools with four forms, so 120 pupils. I would expect the average to be about 30 pupils per school but I may well be wrong.

I could live with 6%!