How do we ensure all UK children regardless of back ground/ability receive high quality education?

[happygardening]

Contrary to what some may think I'm not anti state ed and as someone who works with disadvantaged children it really matters to me that they receive a high quality broad education and they fulfil their potential. But sadly in many cases they are not (there are I know exceptions) frequently their parents cannot assist them for a variety of reasons.
Is there an answer to this problem or are they condemned by their circumstances which are not of their own making to remain at the bottom of the heap?
No judgey DM comments please.

Yellow It used to take me more than an hour to get to school in the morning, by bus. And about an hour to get home in the afternoon. If I left school at 3 (generally speaking, I didn't , in which case it took longer). But that was because of the stupid way all the buses were routed - if I walked through oaks wood and Lloyd Park and along the railway line I could get home in about 25 mins. If I really legged it (and who wouldn't leg it - oaks wood in particular was scary).

So is anyone going to address the practicalities of rolling out super selectives to the country at large?

TBH seeker is there any point?

You don't agree with them in principle...so...you'll pick apart each and every point. Bit boring dont you think? And pointless?

Out of interest yellow I was wondering if I could get involved in a widening access scheme for SSs in London area? I was thinking it could work alongside my Oxbridge access stuff. Speaking to one of my colleagues on the later, she thought it was a great idea.

word Im waiting to see if anyone is ever going to address the practicalities of abolishing the existing grammar schools.

Word As far as I can see, there is is movement to limit access to Tiffins (or is it Tiffin Girls?)

I'm not opposed to super selectives on principle. I have been convinced that they might be a way forward. As i have said repeatedly. But I don't see how they can work practically. I was interested in how they might.

seeker you are in favour of super selectives? Since when?

Not necessarily in favour. But I have been saying for ages that I am prepared to be convinced that they are a way forward. Not my preferred option, but I can see why they might work if the practicalities can be overcome.

I suspect people don't actually read anything I post any more, they just I overlay their prejudices and and move on!

It is interesting, by the way, that a thread supposedly about the best education for all has become , once again, a thread about preferential education for a minority. And I am berated for daring to say that that's no way to build a railroad........

My brother says there will never be equality until it is routine for a woman to say to her partner "Have I got any clean knickers for tomorrow?"

Ops, wrong thread!

Might be the wrong thread, seeker but since we're talking about equality in education...

I went to a catchment mixed secondary at 11. There were two single-sex schools (both ex-grammars and run by the old grammar heads along similar lines) in the town that ran 13-18 and so there was a voluntary transfer after the second year (Y8). So I've been to both mixed and girls'.

But, at 13 after two years of streamed/set classes at the 11-16, it was obvious to pretty much all pupils who were the academics and could cope with the usual tranche of academic subjects, and who would prefer to stay at the schools with the large wood/metalwork/tech drawing/home ec/needlework facilities but still do the main subjects too and have option of CSEs or O levels (dates self!).
So it became a matter of parental/child choice to go to the more academic comp but it was in essence self-selection. And it worked. Those who were late developers at the 11-16 could transfer into the 6th form at the 13-18s which was independent of O level or CSE attainment or go to the 6th form college.

And then the council decided to scrap it because the two 13-18s were still being run like single sex grammars and that was elitist and would never do, would it? sigh The boys school is now a sports specialist academy, where before it sent half a dozen to Oxbridge a year. Girls became the education dept HQ.

So I'd say that mixed high schools from 13-18 might well work. Make them primarily academic (don't have most of the vocational stuff, keep art and music and food tech and PE) and let people choose to stay at a more vocational school or move. Kids know. They'll pick the one they're suited for most of the time, and they can move later, freely, if they want. But with no invidious 11+.

Moonbells- I suppose that sort of system would work in the days before people micromanaged their children's education. And before there were appeals, and all that sort of thing. Oh, and before there was so much emphasis on strict numbers in classes? It does sound eminently sensible- shame it couldn't happen now.......

Oh, and crucially, in a time where there were jobs available for people without academic qualifications.

Even if we agreed that it would be a) workable and b) better for the top 10% to be educated apart, I'm not clear how it's better for the 90%.

True, it's a different world out there now. But sometimes you can learn from the past in a positive way if you are minded that way.

We have to work now with what we have. Things have swung too far in the opposite direction in so many things. I suspect we'll have to see what the academies look like in 5 or 10 years. But for so many children, that will be far too late.

Russians my long (uphill) walk took me (illegitimately, but it was quicker) across the golf course which was neatly situated between two psychiatric hospitals where patients were quite often known to roam in their bids to escape (terrible days, terrible institutions I know). I think perhaps I wasn't favourite child :) (also my parents gave me a small brown suitcase for getting the free place; I've wondered if that was a cover all present so that I could pack my bags if I'd failed).

word clearly those two initiatives fit very neatly together. I've long held the view that the Oxford Access Scheme would be an excellent blueprint for widening access to superselectives, and obviously not just in London. There are legal and financial obstacles though, all of which could be sorted with political will, which is missing. The Sutton Trust has been behind this stuff for a very long while but it's beginning to gain more momentum with the setting up of a new grammar schools association (the GSHA) and with the widespread attempt to call time on tutors. The reality is that nothing which will help really significant numbers of kids who could benefit without an embrace from government.

What you probably could do word is to get enough signatures on a petition to trigger a HoC debate, since a great many MPs are in favour.

the reality is that nothing can happen, etc

It is interesting that we are once again talking about the provision for the top 10%, and access to Oxbridge. Is that what we mean when we talk about ensuring the best education for all? Are we assuming that what is available to the other 90% is fine- but it's the top 10% that need something doing for them?

Yes, seeker, we are because the current system is designed for the middle ground. It is the outliers for whom provision is patchy.

They're a significant proportion of kids seeker and your own educational ideal serves them ill, in practice. It's the reality which is important, not whimsy.

"Of course they are. But are we saying that everything is fine for the 90%? That all that need to be done to perfect the education system in the UK is to change the provision available to the top 10%?

Because I don't see it like that- and I don't think the majority of people who post on these threads would either.

The "bottom " 10% for example. Would their parents say the provision serves them well?

In many schools I feel the 'middle' are badly failed. Extra support tends to go at either end of the spectrum leaving a neglected middle.

Once labelled middling you are doomed to mediocrity at school as who cares?

I absolutely agree there Sapphire, and I am afraid I do blame the G&T brigade for that. It creates a kind of underclass within a school, made up of the biggest proportion of students.

The ones that do well get the special trips and visits because they need to be stretched, leaving the others feeling that they have done something wrong or aren't good enough.