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.

Parents who have the money to pay, will often have their children go through some process of informal or formal selection

They pay to trade up, never down, or to opt out. That's why a third in the two most desirable Tonbridge's grammars came from private prep schools - they can afford to pay but they don't need to. While Tonbridge's independent schools get fairly mediocre GCSE and Ebacc results, they cater for the average ability range (and below) who can afford to opt out of the moderns.

Laqueen
so long as the child my DDs are working with is sharp, and fast and academic, and with a good work ethic, and isn't going to ever disrupt a lesson, or kick off in the lunch queue, or playground
Out of interest, what sort of job do you expect her to have after university when you have so carefully segregated her from spending time with the sort of people who will be working for her?
The failings of our current politicians stem from their total lack of comprehension of the people outside their circle.
And you wish to perpetuate that?

LaQueen - you do know that both grammar schools and private schools also have children who behave very badly and that intelligence / academic prowess does not preclude any tendency to bully, for example? Or be highly strung, or over-excitable and distracting?

And that there are lovely middle ability children who are kind, hard working and have aspirations of their own?

But Talkin, lots of schools have free clubs and music groups, Winchester obviously has a fantastically well subsidised music service unlike lots of other counties, to offer such cheap one on one lessons! However high end music and sport usually occur out of school. A lot of mixing happens in football or rugby clubs or club academies or county music groups, you don't need to be in a comprehensive.

I think the assumptions about who goes where are very out of step with reality.

Just to throw some more evidence in - the latest PISA results are expected tomorrow and some news reports are already commenting on the ignominy of Poland reaching (and marginally overtaking) the UK. What isn't often explained is that since communism fell - and especially since the first 2000 PISA study - they've carefully taken on board lessons of what works and what doesn't.

So out went rigid segregation at 15 between vocational schools and the top 20% in grammar schools. They now offer the same curriculum and learning opportunities to all up to 16 and more progress testing along the lines of the SATs.

Lots of evidence in PISA that non-selective systems are linked to better results.

Straggle, agree that paying may allow trading up but parents will pay for their children to go to schools with the same academic mix and learning issues as secondary moderns because they want / need a different sort of teaching than the state or private selective. You don't need all abilities within a school and it may not be desirable.

The comp I use has much better extra curricular clubs than the highly thought of uber competitive comp I use.

In fact there are quite a few things I prefer about the comp in comparison to the grammar. But it was a simple case of choosing the right school for the children I have, rather than choosing schools based on my ideals.

summerends
no subsidies of the music lessons - which are not 1:1 - normally 1:4
as subsidy would be illegal
but they have reached economies of scale
www3.hants.gov.uk/education/hms/hms-aboutus.htm

which comes back to getting schools to get the best results : they need to federate and cooperate so that all schools can get the best out of all pupils
(and that might even involve a combined PRU to keep LaQueen's DD safe from the unsavoury types)

You don't need all abilities within a school and it may not be desirable

PISA provides evidence it's desirable for the country. The country needs well-educated people. Selective system counties do worse than non-selective. Selective system countries do worse than non-selective.

But you like grammars. Parents getting grammar places may like grammars even if it's at the expense of the whole system.

I absolutely agree about sharing special expertise and the cost of peripatetic teachers but not about having the equivalent in school terms of a federal Europe

Actually straggle, I think that the selective system (private/ state, or at university) is successful in producing highly educated people, just that the patchy provision of good teachers means that not everybody is being educated to their potential.

I think selective education probably does have a detrimental impact on the whole cohort.

However, the brightest are better served by it, though of course they are statistically few in number.

"the patchy provision of good teachers means that not everybody is being educated to their potential."

Agree very strongly with this.

why does it have a detrimental impact on the whole cohort? You have top streams at comps for the most able right? so I guess if there were no grammar schools some of those top stream kids may be relegated ...how would that be better? You have other kids that are gifted in other ways but not academically.

If you have a child who is very able, able enough for selective grammar taking the top 5%...but if there were super super selective schools only for children in the top 0.005% IQ range of say Olympiad standard I wouldn't mind if he did not get in and had to go to one that was lower tier academically ....as long as he was in a school that met his abilities and got the best out of him ...the last thing I would want would be for him to feel left behind or way out of his depth...some children excel in a grammar environment (and let's not talk about the mediocre grammars but the best ones for this purpose) ...others would not and an ethos can extend to a whole school so it would not be the right ethos for them. I want a school where the ethos of the whole school is highly academic whether private or grammar (and yes not all privates are highly academic, we all know that but the academically selective ones tend to be). If my DS happened not to be academic then I would not want that.

Um Straggle you're cherry picking.50% were taught in lower ability schools.Poland has since completely overhauled the system,brought in performance related pay and new tests.

Also Sutton say different ie schools who lose kids to grammar don't fare any worse.

What about the huge amount of state selective schools that select through catchment which Sutton have pointed out have even less disadvantaged kids in?Does Pisa say those in the other schools do worse?

And that has equipped us with the most able politicians and bankers? Do many of them them come from Kent?

Kent certainly doesn't feature in the top 10 local authorities sending students to a Russell group university or Oxbridge of students who took A-levels. Is it because of the standard of the grammars (because secondary moderns don't tend to have sixth forms)?

Indy5 What about the kid who is top .5% maths but mediocre in English or vice versa? They deserve to be academically challenged in their area of excellence with peers of the same ability and also taught appropriately in their area of mediocrity and this can only happen in a comprehensive - not in a grammar or a secondary modern.