Fiona Millar on grammar schools in the Grauniad

[samsonagonistes]

This article here is doing my head in on a number of levels, not because I necessarily disagree with it, but mainly because I don't know what I think and I don't know enough about some of the research/thinking behind it to come to a conclusion on my own. So I'd be really grateful for any thoughts and/or pointers.

She's working from the premise that grammar schools are inherently bad, and that this is a clear thing for all right thinking left wing people. Now, when I read MN, I can see that plenty of parents want grammar schools and are fighting to get into them. So I end up feeling about this pretty much as I do about UKIP, that the point is not only/necessarily to condemn them outright, but what would be more useful would be to find out why people feel this way and what is actually going on for them right now. So what's the gap between theory and experience here and why?

Also, she seems to think that the main argument against grammar schools is that they are not engines of social equality. Now, this may be one argument against them, but surely the point of school is to deliver education, with equality of opportunity in achieving that. Lots of other things do not deliver social equality - like private schools, expensive clothes and London house prices to name but a few - but that's never part of the argument against them.

Also - and I am aware that this is going to be controversial - but an argument against their social mobility is that they take reduced numbers on FSM. Now, for this argument to be valid, we would have to assume that IQ is spread absolutely evenly throughout the population.* I would like this to be the case, but has this theory ever been tested/proven?

• and yes I am aware about the cultural relativity of testing, etc etc, but then schools are also culturally relative in that they privilege theater and art over other activities and there are so many knots in this problem that it's hard to disentangle.

I do know one child who passed the 11+ on HT appeal and chose instead to go to a church school. I don't know anyone that would choose a secondary modern.

In (Bucks ) so perhaps slighlty different to Kent I decided to send DS to the Upper School (non selective) rather than the grammar which he passed for.

That is because the school is good an DS will thrive in a COED and less hothoused environment .

However and maybe this is still the case in kent, I would not have dreamt of sending DS to the Upper Schools I attended in the 1980s. This therefore means that DSs school is not what is likened to be a Modern School on here.

I agree with your post of 9:05, Hakluyt. I have never had a good reason why my non academic son can't be in the same school as my academic son. I wait in hope for a reasonable reply that makes any sense.

2 things stick out for me in Hakluyts many posts in the subject. One is that a sec mod pupil was ridiculed by grammar school pupils for attending a meeting about Oxbridge entrance- with utterly no understanding that this pupil may be way more intelligent than many in the grammar school. The other is that it was the grammar school that had a Christmas concert in the cathedral with the mayor and all the town worthies?Why?!! I can see why they don't want two -but why not both, or take turns each year?
The message is loud and clear- dress it up how you will to make it out it isn't - the grammar school is better and the pupils are better.

Of course you can put them in the same school mehit that's your choice.

Parents who have high ability children aren't forced to put them in selective schools.

But I'm not sure why they want to prevent other parents from making that choice.

Losing the top 5% say, will have a thoroughly underwhelming impact on the vast majority who sit relatively neatly on the bell curve.

That is what an find really, really annoying Camelhump. Why?! He was academic and he needed a school with a 6th form and pupils who were just as good at subjects or better. Why on earth would I cut him off from this? I wouldn't want my non academic son there, he wasn't suited.
You have missed my entire question - why can't one school do both? Luckily they went to an excellent comprehensive and they both got exactly what they needed under the same roof- same Head- same teachers.

Good grief! I will go again if people are going to see my very sensible question as merely wanting my children in the same school.
I want the same school to cater for all abilities- in different ways it is easy and done well, apart from a tiny pocket of areas who insist in dividing children at a ridiculously early age.

mehit actually it isnt well done in many schools.

I visit lots of schools. My perspective is always on the high ability students. How they are served is utterly inconsistent.

Super selectives generally serve that cohort very well.

The private sector serves them even better.

I would imagine that those grammar school kids never got a place if they went on to apply then Mehitabel6, if they're that unimaginative. But I don't think one can generalize about the attitudes of all grammar school kids from the dodgy attitude of two clearly very silly teens. Nor would I read much into the cathedral gig. It might be a long running tradition - the grammar is likely to be a much older foundation than the secondary modern. That in itself is not a big deal although it would be no bad thing to do a joint service. Perhaps there's limited room? No idea, but there may well be a logistical reason. Also, it's apparent even in this thread that a lot of anti grammar Kent dwellers do actually perceive the grammars to be 'better', as opposed to 'different', so they're not actually setting a brilliant example themselves.

mehit actually it isn't that 'easy', either.

I've encountered a great many teachers and aspiring teachers and by no means all are in any way suited to teaching the very able. There's a whole spectrum of teachers out there for a whole spectrum of kids and it would be entirely unreasonable to expect all teachers to be capable of teaching to the entire spectrum. The teachers themselves need to be very able and need to be able to command the respect of the kids on an intellectual level. Certainly once you get to sixth form that's a tough call. It doesn't make those teachers any better than their counterparts in other schools of course, just possibly different.

Also, it's apparent even in this thread that a lot of anti grammar Kent dwellers do actually perceive the grammars to be 'better', as opposed to 'different', so they're not actually setting a brilliant example themselves.

That's because they are better!

I cannot see why a super selective, whether state of fee-paying, should serve outliers better than a comprehensive, even one with the full works; high FSM and dollops of less academic children. The better schools manage to be flexible and, frankly, humble enough to make a difference even to the outlier child, who say excels at literature and can get an A* iGCSE in primary school where no one has had one for, well, a very long time. Whether they are state or parent funded is quite irrelevant. Indeed some super-selectives have difficulty coping with the true outlier; the more sought after, strangely the less creative. They have a narrow 2% ability range to deal with, and have tools fit only for the 1.9%. I'd be aware in choosing one of those to check that it's a worth spending years of a life at. Arguably less competent that the comp that can only handle 95% of the 100% range.

Provided the school has the right ethos, it copes magnificently even with the 0.01+%. Likewise, the children, from varied socio-economic families, also step up to the situation because their daily practice is that decency and respect is fundamental, not an optional extra. The outlier also gains the expectation that they belong, and their contribution is as worthwhile as everyone else's. Everyone gains, not for just a few years, but long after their parents are gone. What on earth does academic selection have to do with a good education? Assuming the school is primarily about training minds to do what they are capable of. Not egos, meal tickets, socio-economic tidiness.

Camel. Grammar school was absolutely the right choice for my two DDs yr10/9 they thrive and enjoy the competitive atmosphere the school has (though as a recent thread of mine noted DD2 should do more homework !)

Individual children are better served by different schools, offering what works better for them . This is the case that DS enjoys sport and is better provided for at the Upper School than the Grammar of course this as long as the school is able to provide the correct and appropriate education for the child !.

" Also, it's apparent even in this thread that a lot of anti grammar Kent dwellers do actually perceive the grammars to be 'better', as opposed to 'different', so they're not actually setting a brilliant example themselves."

Of course they are better if you have a "top set" child. But my point is not about which school is better but that the segregation is inherently wrong. The grammar and the secondary modem could be outstanding examples of their type- but they should not exist.

When it comes to Kent schools, I was under the impression that Kent had more than its fair share of failing schools, the majority of which are not the grammars. There are some genuinely truly awful schools in Kent, and changing their names as they academise and then continue to fail doesn't do enough to hide the fact, imo. I also read somewhere that over half the county's secondary moderns (albeit they are generally called academies or high schools these days) are classed as "failing schools," (ie less than 30% of pupils getting 5 A-Cs). It is a bit soul destroying to be attending a school described as failing, I would have thought, even if it is a school trying to do its best by a limited-ability intake. So I think Molio* is being very naive to think that because she lives near a superselective school in a largely comprehensive area, she can be judgmental of parents who are a bit peed off about their children not getting into the local non-failing grammar. Something is going wrong in Kent, and it's not just the parents' attitudes.

mary no one makes anyone apply to a selective school.

If parents feel as you do then poisoned darts are not aimed your way.

It's a free country.

But personally I would like to see more of the most able pupils have the choice as they do in the private sector.

CamelHump Sun 17-May-15 14:03:32
I do. Quite a number. I have met with primary heads to discuss it as well.

Kent is a big county. I'm guessing your experience isn't in the same area of Kent as me.

"Individual children are better served by different schools, offering what works better for them"

But why?

People who argue for 'different schools for different children' really believe that you can sort children into 'academic' and not academic' at the age of 11 based on the outcome of the 11+. You can't.

" Also, it's apparent even in this thread that a lot of anti grammar Kent dwellers do actually perceive the grammars to be 'better', as opposed to 'different', so they're not actually setting a brilliant example themselves."

What utter bullshit! You live in a county that has a divisive system, you can't afford to send your kid private and you don't live in catchment of any other schools other than a dire secondary modern. Of course the grammar school is "better" if you have an academic kid.

That is possibly one of the least well informed comments I've ever seen on MN.

Schools have to take policy decisions which will be in the best interests of most of the pupils but all will be affected. Like it or lump it.

Last year I visited a school that only offered double science for example.

No doubt there were well thought out reasons for it but it was absolutely not in the best interests of any DC with high aptitude for science!

I'm not being judgmental of those parents' peed-offness rabbitstew. That's completely understandable. I'm being judgmental of parents who offload their own 'devastation' on to their kids. That is not a necessary corollary of any system, even the shabby one in Kent. I made no comment about my own local comps, but inevitably with the superselective taking the most able in the area there will be a knock on effect, which is why many parents round here feel strongly too. I think you may be making a leap to assume there's no impact here, simply because it's not Kent.