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.

duchess
nope, there are opt out forms - it was handed out at options evening and lots of us filled it out
it frees up timetable space for more useful subjects

Talkinpeace -

No idea. I don't even know if such stats exist since the government doesn't seem to distinguish between real comprehensives in non-selective areas, and what are called "comprehensives" but are actually secondary moderns.

And then there's be the problem that some kids from the secondary moderns would transfer to local grammar sixth forms for A Level, and would then show up as having gone to university from the grammar.

I don't understand, straggle.

RE is not compulsory- taking some RE lessons is, but the exam isn't. In the school I am talking about, the RE course is particularly interesting and challenging, and a lot of pupils choose to do it. So typically, they do 3 science, maths, MFL a tech subject/art or music, 2 English, a Humanity, then another option. Often another MFL or another Maths. So if they choose RE as their humanity they will not get the EBacc. If they do History they will. The school is confident enough not to insist on History for the sake of their stats.

Talk- you weren't just opting her out of the GCSE then? So she has nothing in her curriculum that's not examined but is RE-like?

not much more enlightening.

^Key Stage 4

During Key Stage 4 most pupils work towards national qualifications - usually GCSEs.

The compulsory national curriculum subjects are the ‘core’ and ‘foundation’ subjects.

Core subjects are:

English
maths
science

Foundation subjects are:

information and communication technology (ICT)
physical education
citizenship

Schools must also offer at least 1 subject from each of these areas:

arts
design and technology
humanities
modern foreign languages

They must also provide religious education (RE) and sex education at Key Stage 4. Pupils don’t have to take exams in religious studies but schools must provide at least 1 course where pupils can get a recognised RE qualification at Key Stage 4 and above.^

Duchesse
www.secularism.org.uk/religious-education-and-the-law.html
RE appears nowhere on her timetable at all in any form

But anyway.

Low Ebacc figures does not necessarily mean poor school.

straggle, I never said that grammar schools were better at achieving all round excellence, just agreeing that academic all rounders were more likely to get in grammar schools (or selective independents) than children who are relatively weak in English or maths but gifted in the other. As I keep on saying, the label of a school is less important than the quality of education it delivers.

Summerends- would you send your child to a secondary modern?

Recopying my previous post
Theoretically yes, if a) the school could get the best out of my child and
did n't throttle aspirations (that is a question in all school choices including in the comprehensive system) b) there was movement at sixth form entry by which time an academically inclined late developer or specialist or non tutored but well taught child would come into their own. The private system is full of the equivalent of secondary moderns. The grammar school style of teaching might not suit or get the best out of my child in the early secondary stage.

"The private system is full of the equivalent of secondary moderns"

Really 25% FSM, 33% SEN?

DS - top of the top set of a comprehensive (except in English, his weakest subject, where he is rightly in a middle set and where he encounters exactly the same work ethic and stretching teaching as he does in his top sets) has exactly the environment you describe:

"I want them at a school where being academic is cool, and where studying hard is valued - and where everyone is singing from that same hymn sheet"

It is not necessary to be in a grammar school to encounter that scenario, so to cite that as a rationale for grammars is erroneous. Yes, there are better and worse comps. The task is therefore to raise the quality of the comps, not to create a separate grammar system.

My attitude is very similar to LaQueen's.

It's quite simple really. If you get a group of people together to work collectively on a task, and all of those people have a similar understanding of what the task is, of the value of it, and are personally excited and motivated by it - then they all benefit from the way that the environment around them reinforces the task.

If you get a group of people together where some of them are focused on and motivated by a common task, but their numbers are severely diluted by others who are disinterested and in some cases actively disruptive to the task, then their focus on and experience of that task will suffer.

This is true in education just as it is in a football team, a symphony orchestra or a business. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and the nature of the whole feeds through to affect each of its parts.

Many schools are just the most phenomenal time wasting factories. There are many ways this might be addressed. Forcing the students who don't personally feel the need to waste that time to suffer the effects of those who do, is probably not one of the better ones.

Grammar schools are full of children who already have all the advantages in life that money can buy and then their parents think, fuck those who have less than my child how can I get even more advantage and save myself schools fees as well.

teacherwith2kids -

But that surely depends on the area you live in, and the particular school.

It's all very well to say that "the solution" is to make comps better. Actually I'd probably agree with that as the ideal solution, though I think the changes necessary to do so are probably more radical than most people realise.

But that's not going to happen any time soon, especially under this government. In the meantime the parents of bright, motivated kids in challenging areas, who have very limited capacity to influence the ethos of a school they share with many hundreds of others, have to find an environment that works for their DC.

It's unfair to judge how they do that unless you're in the same situation.

curlew I don't think your DC's school is balancing the options well if there is no room for Geography and History on top of RE. It's not a 'facilitating subject' for A-level either - while I'm critical of the government expecting yo apply this measure widely, grammar schools are expected to feed into universities. The London 'gold club' only admits grammar schools or independents with more than 90% Ebacc. (Very few of them then!)

LaQueen in a non-selective area you would inevitably go private then. It's unlikely from your tone that you would put up with dyslexics, children with SEN or children at an early stage of learning English either. Back to the OP - is it any wonder grammar schools are monopolised by the wealthy?

Grammar schools are full of children who already have all the advantages in life that money can buy

Absolute bullshit. You don't know what the fuck you're talking about.

Fast, but that assumes that the children are 'all part of the same foortball team', which is not the case.

Using that analogy, the first team live, work and train as the first team. Yes, they are joind by trainees and subs and others are called up from the second team on some occasions, but essentially they are the first team.

Some are in the Sunday League team. Although sometimes a secoind team player will be with them, and sometimes one of them will play with the first or second team, they will, in general, live, work and train as the Sunday League team.

The experience of the first team is not diluted by the Sunday league team, because their points of contact are fairly limited. However, simply by having all the teams based in the same training ground (school), players can be promoted, relegated and switched around easily - and importantly, they all benefit from having the same facilities to work in.

is it any wonder grammar schools are monopolised by the wealthy?

So can I just clarify here: are we defining anyone who's not on free school meals as "wealthy"?

Can I just ask - is there anyone here who has their child in the top set of a comprehensive who does feel that this matches their experience in a school today:
"top-set pupils, who have to run the gauntlet of hassle and jeers whenever they step outside their top-set classrooms."

In RL, I don't know anyone who does, and many such statements onhere come from grammar school or private school parents wanting to justify their choices. Is it a real issue, or is it a 'straw man'?

I have a child in a top set of a secondary modern, they are not running any kind of gauntlet. They are challenged constantly in lessons and do not have to put up with disruption

I do know what I am talking about when it comes to grammar schools in my area.

I actually have more than one child in the top set of a secondary modern . Two have been through secondary moderns and gone on to top universities.

It's a real issue, but one that affects some areas and schools much more than others.

You can find plenty of examples on Mumsnet of people having problems with DC being bullied for being geeky at rough schools, or wasting their time and not learning anything at schools that fail to teach to their level. You'd have to be pretty selective to think the problem doesn't exist.

I don't know where you live, but I'm not sure why you insist on thinking that your experience is the same as everybody else's.