In praise of comprehensive schools

[FreshHorizons]

It was cheering to see the Sutton Trust announce that 60% of Team GB medalists came from comprehensive schools.

I have finally come off a thread where certain people can't find a good word to say about comprehensive schools. They equate them with mixed ability teaching, poor behaviour and an inability to stretch bright children.

I would like a thread to celebrate the best of comprehensive education.

In my case it allowed my 3 , very different, children to be able to go to the same school without being judged by outsiders. It meant the stability of knowing one school over a long period of time and them knowing our family. It meant that days off and parent evenings didn't clash and that money was saved by handing down uniform. They were able to move up with the bulk from their primary school. They were able to mix with children of different abilities and backgrounds, as you do in adult life. It meant being able to enjoy education for the joy of learning new things, without the stress of an exam that would determine their path in life, aged only 10 or 11yrs.

Those things didn't really matter, although they were helpful.

What really mattered was that they could all blossom at their own rate.
They all got a good education and are now happily established in careers- the careers that they chose.

It wasn't all about the academic side- there were opportunities in sport, music, outdoor activities etc.

It would be nice to have some success stories. Please don't post about crap schools- start another thread for that if you have grievances you want to air.

It is the summer, the sun is out and some happy, optimistic stories would be nice.

Do comprehensives "catch up" children who are already behind by "dint of birth" or do they just obscure the problem a little longer? Serious question.

Elly - why just comprehensives?

Do comprehensives "catch up" children who are already behind by "dint of birth" or do they just obscure the problem a little longer? Serious question.

I would imagine that no school can be expected to compensate for all the disadvantages a child might have - some schools will compensate better than others. There's the innate ability of the child and the willingness of parents and schools to push them to the limits.

If you look in detail at the results of grammar schools (on the D of E tables) you will see there's always a clear gap between the GCSE grades acquired by those who went in with Level 5 SATS and those who went in with Level 4s. And there's a very big gap between say, a grammar in a poorer area of Kent and the superselectives like Tiffin and Kendrick (the gap is between one and two GCSE grades). I'm not in this instance knocking grammars, I'm using them to show that every school has its limits.

Sadly, a comp that is actually achieving well for its intake can be ignored by parents because they think its a bad school. I'm not sure whether the vaunted Progress 8 will be able to overcome that.

Elly - why just comprehensives?

Posters on this thread have repeatedly argued that grammars leave these children behind. So the next question is obviously, do comprehensives manage what grammars do not?

Comprehensives outscore secondary moderns for middle achieving children, yes. Overall Oxfordshire comps get better results than Bucks and Trafford for these children (also Kent and Lincolnshire but these are poorer authorities than Oxon), as do those in Maidenhead. Haven't checked all the authorities - a rather time-consuming job. I believe evidence worldwide concludes that selection disadvantages those not selected but there is a small advantage to the selected.

Is there public data on the cost of organising 11+ tests? Who currently pays for arranging the tests - presumably the LA in selective boroughs/counties? How many extra teachers could the LA pay for if the tests were abolished?

So what I am understanding is: comps are better for middle achievers, grammars are better for high achievers, and low achievers are failed by both.

This from the eleven plus forum suggests the cost to Kent is about 350,000 pounds per year. Haven't checked for accuracy

www.elevenplusexams.co.uk/forum/11plus/viewtopic.php?t=35065

Also a useful thread on what parents are spending:

www.elevenplusexams.co.uk/forum/11plus/viewtopic.php?t=44092

This forum has a reputation as being home to deranged pushy parents but I've always found it very rational, as you'll see from the posts above.

So let high ability pupils go to grammar schools rather than being used as academic makeweights to hide the academic failings of comprehensive schools!

"So what I am understanding is: comps are better for middle achievers, grammars are better for high achievers"

Not sure that this is what the evidence says.

A government has to try to make policy to benefit all, not just a percentage of the population. If you read the Telegraph article, you will see the author mentions how Grammar schools were unpopular with Tory voters also, because their own children were also failing the 11+. I have heard it said, the 11+ issue helped to bring down the 1964 Tory Government - although I myself have distant memories of a Government mired in scandals as being the cause.

So what would happen, in practice? Well, in those areas where parents aren't happy with the Comprehensives and pay for private schools, they would love it, because there would be a chance of saving some money. I can imagine the opposite happening in, say, Maidenhead, where the parents are happy with good Comprehensives - they will suddenly have to start paying for private schools for their offspring when they are not guaranteed a grammar school place. As indeed, happened to the author of the Telegraph article.

IT was what happened in the 'old days' of 11+ , parents of 'failures' looked to private education. Not so easy now as most will be priced out.

It was lovely to open my local paper this morning and find them celebrating local GCSE results.
The first mention was of a girl with 12A* and an A with distinction in further maths. Lots of other great results and all comprehensive schools. The 2 private schools did well too.

Elly

Tricky - comparing Kent with Oxfordshire again the High Attaining child gains the same average GCSE grade in both counties. I don't have my documentation here but I think its about 380. But of course in Kent those high achievers are split between the grammars and the secondary moderns (from memory about 75% to 25%) with the HAs in the grammars understandably scoring higher than those in the SMs. However Oxfordshire outscores Kent for Middle Achievers even when you account for the fact that some of them are in the grammars. So no doubts there.

What we don't know is whether all the children are achieving the same given their entry scores or whether an advantage to the grammars is balanced by a disadvantage to those in the SMs. Many have tried to establish "the grammar school effect" but it is very difficult because of course you can't put the same child through two different systems. So establishing a like-for-like comparison is problematic.

As to failing low-achievers I think there's no real idea as to what success looks like for this group. As jobs for the unskilled shrink it's hard to see what an alternative "vocational" education would look like or what jobs it would prepare you for.

But Fresh in a grammar that child would have achieved 13 A*s. Her life is ruined!!

That would be an A* with distinction for Further Maths, I expect. An A^! (There isn't an A with distinction) So live not ruined after all!

I just copied exactly what it said in the paper- seemed pretty good to me!

I would be thrilled if there were a tutor proof test- I don't think it is possible although it is in the school's interests to find one.

The 2 adults that I know who have been good enough to make music a career both failed 11+. One with the violin and one with the flute.

"Music tuition brings huge advantages not just with uni entrance but results and concentration throughout school life. Reading to your child increases their vocabulary which gives big advantages in CEM.An outstanding primary is more likely to give you good sets results."

Actually, music tuition makes sod all difference to university entrance unless you are going to study music.

I do find it completely baffling when you say "I am opposed to dividing children into "academic" and "non academic" and sending them to different schools at the age of 10" and somebody says "Oh, so you want to ban people from reading to their toddlers, do you?" It makes no sense at all....

Peregina I may has well ask DD1 if she thinks the ERM fiasco in 1992 finished the Conservative Monopoly of Government, such is the relevance of 'Douglas Hume' and 1964 Secondary Modern schools !

Schools have nothing in common with 1964, so why do you think, Conservative voters will live in dread of 'secondary modern' schools when there are no such '1964' type modern schools in existence !

The top 40% selected for selective schools would probably work for 'Conservative' voters because the vast majority of their children would make the grammar schools or be in private education !

Clearly this won't happen , but it would work 'wonders' with Conservative and UKIP voters.

One thing i do find 'hilarious' though is the posters who never shut up about how 'GOVE' was destroying education , their greatest 'ally' in their fight against selection has gone !

Schools have nothing in common with 1964, so why do you think, Conservative voters will live in dread of 'secondary modern' schools when there are no such '1964' type modern schools in existence !

Well, if you want 1950s style grammars back, who is to say that we won't get 1960s style Sec Mods?

BTW - it was just one set of opinions, although if you weren't around in the sixties, you may not realise just how much anger there was about the 11+ system.

The government doesn't have any real plans to bring back a grammar system.

If they did, surely they would need enough grammar schools to match the number of children they want attending university. If 50% are supposed to go to university, then 50% should be in grammar schools.

Really? are you suggesting that only children who go to grammar school go to university?

If we're still looking at great comps this was in the Times (no link-paywall)

Poppy Noor went to Cambridge despite being homeless when she applied. In her words:

"My school, Parliament Hill in Camden, had some exceptional teachers. They had sent a number of pupils to Oxbridge. Not only did they know the ropes, they pulled them ferociously on my behalf"

I thought this school might be too leafy but realised that every school we highlight is going to be objected to for some reason. So well done, Parliament Hill!

No, obviously not.

I am suggesting that if you want a grammar system, it makes sense to roughly match the number of grammar school places to university places. Presumably the aim of grammar schools is to prepare children for further, higher education. So why set a target of 50% in university, if you don't prepare 50% for university. (Presuming that grammar schools are the system's intended preparation for university.)