48% 5 Gcses A-C... Absolute no?

[SwiftRelease]

Just canvassing opinion re dd2 for next year. Local secondary got 48% through 5 Gcses A-C inc maths & English this year, similar results previous 2 years. V offputting but some local parents v positive about school overall. Thoughts pls?

I've looked at schools in my area. Grammar has a high result, c of e in the 60s. All the others vary 38 -50ish.

Grammars can have fantastic results and still be crap. There,s one with results in the high 90s that's in special measures. And some schools with paper rubbish results are amazing places.

Dig deep into the stats. And visit on an ordinary day, not a specially planned open day. And if they don't want you to, ask yourself why.

Follow teacher with two kids link and check the value added. If it's high, your child will reach beyond expected GCSE levels, if it's low your child would achieve less then his expected GCSE levels. Value added measures how well aschool does with the kids they've got

By expected I mean the levels he's expected to get personally

This is very interesting.

It also clearly demonstrates that raw league table results are a flawed tool.

I am also of the opinion that people who 'reject' schools such as the one in the OP because they completely misunderstand what the results might mean. I think the drudge work of mining the stats is critical if you want to make a legitimate comparison.

People do take, when they see '85% pass rates' to mean 'My DC has an 85% chance of passing to this standard' so it's 'a better school'.

My DC's high achieving, vair MC comp with a vair 'above average' intake, academically 'the best' in the county has just witnessed my allegedly 'above average' DS fail a Y10 GCSE, one of only 20% in the school who did. He was absolutely not identified as a potential fail.

A salient lesson!

Unfortunately for me that link tells me nothing as it doesn't have a breakdown of high/low attainers. Most if the categories are blank or with NP in whatever that means

NP = not published.
The cohort is so small that individual pupils may be identifiable if this info is included so smaller schools don't have to publish certain figures.

That figures as there is between 18-36 pupils in each year

Here's a school with headline 48% GCSEs:

www.education.gov.uk/cgi-bin/schools/performance/school.pl?urn=121165&superview=sec&qtype=LA

It's a 4-19 school.

Looking at KS4 results you can see only 7 pupils doing all EB subjects, which suggests a poverty of ambition.

Not a large school, only 28 'high achievers'. Makes it difficult to do extra-curricular activities that would interest this cohort (chess club, etc.).

Average grades per GCSE aren't that bad, but not great either. High achievers appear to be doing vocational qualifications - average entries per pupil 10.7, average GCSEs per pupil only 8.6

Ofsted'inadequate'

Now renamed.

GCSE choices seem very weighted towards art/D+T

www.iceniacademy.org.uk/studying-here/curriculum/secondary/

It could be worse, but not the ideal choice....

tbh, my first thought is that OP is privileged if they get to turn nose up at it.

I don't think recent results should be a decider, other factors have to come into play (friends, facilities, community, convenience, cost, etc.)

Our nearest school has headline GCSEs around 44%, I may send DS there. I know loads of parents very happy with this school and at least one of their leavers goes onto Oxbridge most yrs.

I do data-mining for a living & the idea of diving into those tables makes me want to scream. Anecdotal evidence is more powerful for me.

Nosy,

he only problem with anecdotal evidence is that it HAS to be up to date. 'Change in reputation' of a school in a community moves at an absolutely glacial pace and / or can be swayed by entirel trivial things.

When we first moved to our current town, people were shocked that we chose school A rather than school B. On enquiring further, the basis for this prejudice was

a) That school A had been an all-thriough 3-16 school, with the 11-16 bit being secondary modern, whereas school B had always been a primary. When? 20 years previously. However, school A was still - wholly unsupported by any data whatsoever, all of which showed that school A's puipils made much better progress and got higher KS2 results - seen as 'less academic' than school B.

b) That school B wore shorts and ties, whereas school A wore sweatshirts and polo shirts, and some girls even [said in shocked voice] either wear trousers or SOMETIMES the smallest ones even wear stripy tights.

So I wouldn't choose anecdotal evidence alone, unssupported by data, as a basis for choosng a school....

I would find out all the info and visit, doing the same for any other school options.

That is what we have done ( visited 5 local pstate primaries in our vague area and six preps) and it was very helpful.

We also wrote a list of our priorities and important things ( mostly non academic related).

Good luck!

48% would be extremely high in the area I live but I do think you have to look at the likelihood of what your own child can achieve. I would be happy for DS1 to go to a school with poor results as he is naturally academic so I think he would be fine regardless but I wouldn't be so confident about DS2.

I wouldn't rule the school out, it is worth looking into it properly and not just look at one statistic. If it is a small school then say 4 out of 50 children not doing well at GCSE will make results look worse than 4 children out of 200. Totally could depend on the cohort also.

I would be worried and have the following questions:

• are there grammar schools in the area?
• what is the demographic?
• how many children are getting 8/9/10 GCSEs all at A*/A?
• how academic are the options (triple science for example)

If it goes onto 6th form, then:

• how many get 3/4 A Levels all at A*/A
• how many get a place at Oxbridge
• how many go on to read Medicine or Veterinary Science

If over the previous 5 years there is a decent cohort (say a minimum of 7 or 8 students) getting a clean sweep of A*/A at GCSE and the same at A Level, and a couple of students going to Oxbridge or medical school every year then I would consider the school as it would indicate that there is the ability to cater for high-ability students and teach to the levels where they can achieve in line with their potential.

If it's more along the lines of my local secondary (38% 5 A-C grade) where they're lucky to get a handful of kids getting a single A grade and haven't got a student into a RG university in the last 3 years, then no chance.

Sad for the teachers, and the school as a whole, that many parents would share my views. However, my DD only has one life and if I have options then I will make sure that she takes the best one for her aspirations and abilities.

A few years ago I taught a student who had arrived in England aged 14 from Poland with no English.

When I taught her she was resitting GCSE English, but had passed her other 10 subjects with good grades.

There is no doubt she was a clever girl, but her grades would not be in the 48% you quote.

Have a look at the actual school and how it fits with your child, that is what matters.