For anyone who still thinks that access to selective state education is a level playing field.....

[curlew]

I have just read the latest OfSTED for my dd's grammar school.

There are no children in Year 7 who are eligible for FSM. None. Not one.

Fair point about Kent's NEETs being skewed, but I still think it would be interesting to know. And to look at and compare statistics from other areas with varying levels of selection, including private.

Private schools are far more detrimental to the ideal of a fully comprehensive system anyway, and I don't think that should be ignored just because the state doesn't pay for it.

Good points duchesse.

Funnily enough, we thought about moving from the city to Lincolnshire because it's so very cheap and we could have had an insanely large house there... But the 11+ was a bit of a put off

But surely you could have opted out of the 11+ for your children and just opted for the comprehensive school?

well, ds gets FSM. he has passed his 11+ and is pretty certain of a place at Grammar School.

We are in a superselective area, and we self prepared for 11+, as we couldn't afford a tutor. Then for July and September (exam early Oct) my Mum paid for him to go to a tutor, this was mainly because my mum was in hospital and I was massively supporting them, and I couldn't do both. The tutor did, pretty much, what I was doing.

BUT, I am a highly educated person, our family is very vocal. We read, talk, discuss and debate endlessly. My dcs spoken vocab is very wide and they read loads, so have also a wide reading vocab. Those are mostly things they get from the family environment, not from tutoring. Education is also very important for our family, and we support it, prioritise it.

I don't think that most kids receiving FSM have those family/background advantages. It is not just about tutoring or buying past papers, it is about the whole family support package. While many families want to support their kids, their don't always have the skills to do so.

Sadly, I think the gap is already evident at reception (vocabulary, familiarity with books and story structure, familiarity with counting/number games) and just widens as the years go on.

"But surely you could have opted out of the 11+ for your children and just opted for the comprehensive school?"

In fully selective areas there is no comprehensive school.

Totally agree with all that steppemum.

That's what's so stupid about a lot of this. Those differences between family backgrounds are still going to affect kids, and affect their educational outcomes in whatever kind of school they're in. But grammars seem to upset people because their existence forces us to be open and frank about those effects. Whereas selection by postcode keeps the poor schools out of sight and allows people to pretend that we're all one big happy family.

Congrats on your DS.

This is a question i have asked before: Is there a percentage 5 A* to C including English and, Maths where a non selective school in a selective area
becomes a Comprehensive School. Does that school even if it gets between 70- 80% remain a Secondary Modern School.

Well, if you take Gloucestershire as an example of a county with residual grammars, all of the comps there are technically secondary moderns, because a proportion of the children who would have gone to them have gone to the grammars.

HOWEVER, the difference between the two types of school is much more marked in Gloucester and Stroud (4 grammars apiece) than it is in Cheltenham (1 grammar), or in far flung rural corners of the county where no grammar is realistically accessible.

The definition of comp is perhaps not about final statistics, but on 'proportion of catchment intake who go to grammars'. On that measure, Gloucestershire does contain some true comps, where the proportion creamed off is vanishingly tiny.

Soul2000 -

AFAIK, the non selective schools in selective areas are already referred to by the government as comprehensives. "Secondary modern" no longer exists as an official category. The fully selective authorities have various names for them - in Kent they're called "high schools" - but I don't think that is reflected in official government nomenclature.

only 2 grammars in Stroud, teacher - one girls and one boys.

the grammar in chetenham takes from the whole county and further afield and as it is so popular and so super super selective, that I am not sure that it makes that much difference to the pool left does it?

But in principle I agree with you, in Kent, where the whole (almost all) of the top x% go to Grammar, then all the comps have that top x% missing, which is not the case where there are superselectives. In fact many parents of bright kids choose not to do 11+ if it means traveling, and they have a good comp on the doorstep.

I think the interesting statistic would be rather than compare one area (fully selective) with another area (fully comp) it wold be interesting to break the statistics down, are those at the top of the comp in selective area under achieving compared to their peers in the fully comp school. Or are they doing better, having had the top kids removed, so they get a bit of attention for once?

Our decision to use Grammar was actually not really to do with it being selective, it was more to do with the atmosphere in the school, the expectation, the aspiration, the fact that the young people coming out were young people you would be proud to meet. I know that there are comps who also do that very well, but not near me!

Going back to the 'top 200 comprehensives just as socially exclusive as grammars' point - surely you're not including faith schools in that top 200? If London Oratory features, it should give you a big clue. And if non-denominational, can you prove that they select on distance only and not on (a) music, tennis, languages (b) gender plus obscure catchment definition?

I live in a 'leafy' metropolitan area but the FSM-eligible proportion of the LA comps meets national average. My nearest (outstanding) comp has 20% which is five or six times the average for grammars. The wealthier the area, the more likely there are private schools to cream off the wealthy and a certain proportion of the top so very few comps achieve similar exclusivity on distance alone. I though Hertfordshire was an exception (v. low FSM) but as Talkin says, they have selection there too.

Steppenmun. I said something similar about your reasoning for using a grammar school on page 7.

Oh Hertfordshire with the Grammar sounding, Watford Girls Grammar that is a comprehensive but is really a Grammar. That is a bit of a tongue twister isn't it.

'Secondary modern' no longer exists as an official category

Yes it does.
Go to the DfE performance tables.
Filter by admissions policy.
Select 'modern'
There are 170 of them.
There are 38 in Kent.

Straggle - Thanks, I didn't know that.

I think the answer to soul2000's question is simply "no" then. "Modern" only refers to the admissions criteria, and this doesn't change depending on the results the school gets, so it's not going to become a comprehensive.

statistical first release:

Table 3b:

Comprehensive Schools 2,726
Selective Schools 164
Modern Schools 134

[assume the 36 moderns missing since 2012 results got turned into sponsored academies and counted as 'new schools]

In fully selective areas there is no comprehensive school.

But they have schools which don't require an 11+ test to be passed. Can parents not opt to just send their children to those rather than sitting an 11+?
I know Trafford still has a grammar school system, but children are not required to sit the exam, they can just opt for a non-grammar school. Some of the non grammar schools are very good in Trafford.

norude but that isn't a comprehensive, it's a school whose top set has been taken off it. And the whole unpleasant system isn't one I'd want to be in.

Sorry but unless you introduce a lottery system(I believe some counties have tried) for all schools and keep Ofsted results secret it's pointless whining about a few kids going to grammar.

The unfairness re schools is a bigger problem and more spread as regards Outstanding schools which starts from primary.Parents buy into the top catchments thus not only stopping poorer local kids from going to the schools their parents went to but from even living in the areas their parents did.

Once these parents have bought their place into the top primaries other kids are screwed as they will never get into the equally Outstanding feeder schools from their crappier primary but even if thy did would be disadvantaged by not getting into the top booster sets in year 7. Once you're out of those sets it's 10xs harder to get into them.

The house price inflating for these top primaries and lovely comps you all keep banging on about is another huge inequality for many kids.I went to el crappo comp as opposed to leafy suburb comp as did my dp, and sorry it's no different than the grammar system in which at least parents are honest.Being bright in the crappier comp is shite but hey all those with kids that failed their 11+ in leafy suburbs can bleat about grammars and pretend how right on and socialist they are.Well they're not and imvho such comps do far more damage than any grammar ever could.

it's pointless whining about a few kids going to grammar

For years there have been grammars left over from a system that existed 50 years ago and we haven't got rid of them. What's often mitigated their effect are changes to the law where LAs can't reserve places within their boundaries so grammars have widened their catchments and become 'superselectives'. So even where the surrounding schools are still called 'moderns' (e.g. in Kingston upon Thames) they are actually very effective comps despite it all.

It doesn't justify expanding those schools or introducing new ones.

There is if is there is the demand and if you're going to expand leafy suburb comps. Stretching the catchment of a leafy comp a few yards in these places does sfa for those never likely to afford to live anywhere near the catchment.

Parents will always select unless you take away all means of selection.

"it's pointless whining about a few kids going to grammar"

Well, possibly. But that is what this thread is about! And it's important if you live in one of the 12 wholly selective LEAs. And there is always an undercurrent of support for the expansion of existing grammar schools and the setting up of new ones. So maybe not quite as pointless as you think.