Secondary moderns

[CookieDoughKid]

There's a lot of talk about new grammar schools 'destroying' the existing comp schools or creating terrible secondary moderns.

I would like some help to understand this better. I would also prefer that people didn't relay their experiences on what happened 50 years ago as the education systems have changed a whole lot since then.

Remove the friendship issues of kids being separated at 11.

How is it we have to rely on the top 25% of students to think we are creating terrible non-grammar schools? And if the wealthier students are getting in to grammar per se, surely that means better funding for the non-grammar schools?

I think I'm missing something entirely. If we have dedicated resourcing and teaching for the non-grammar kids -how is that a bad thing? I believe in selective education not necessarily in different buildings. However if comprehensive schools insist on whole ability classes for all their subjects then I'm against that. Not all comps are the same. I just don't understand this issue about bad schools being created if we remove top 25% of kids.

HPFA Wed 21-Sep-16 10:54:09 I'm really puzzled by the number of people on Mumsnet who live near terrible schools?

+1

I'm especially puzzled by the claims one OP is making that suggest the majority of comp. in Devon are failing and that you can't buy a house near the good comps. in that area for less than £300,000 (unless they are referring to a 5 bedroom house of course).

sandyholme Wed 21-Sep-16 10:56:17 That's a good idea send the bright kids to the same schools as the 'ner do wells' who terrorized BexleyHeath !

My DH grew up and went to school in that area. We still have family members living there.

Because a child is there to learn and do his/her best, garner relevant qualifications to the highest standard possible in order to enter HE or the world of work. Their primary role is not to inflate the scores of school by dragging up poor performers - that is the role of teachers, and the parents of these children.

We tend to choose grammar schools because we know they are brilliant, given that they work with students who have met a minimum academic benchmark. These go on to attain mostly very high qualification grades (certainly at our grammar school), in most cases beyond comps. I am sure my children would not do so well in our three local comps. I know kids attain great grades at comps, but there is more likelihood of it at grammar schools. So, until they retire grammar schools and comprehensivise them, aspirational parents will always choose grammars. Btw, my children's grammar school is two LEAs away. So you can see how serious about it I am.

sandyholme Wed 21-Sep-16 10:56:17 All non selective schools will have a small no of 'Scummy' kids that can not be removed and make the lives of teachers and the majority of pupils lives hell.

No mention of the selective schools here I notice.

The above post as my response to BertrandRussell

portico Wed 21-Sep-16 11:02:06 We tend to choose grammar schools because we know they are brilliant

We know they're brilliant or think they're brilliant?

Is a Grammar school that has 25% of a co-hort fail to meet expected levels of progress in Maths and/or English brilliant?

This should be a link to schools in Devon:

www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/compare-schools?phase=secondary&selectPhase=true

Almost all get GCSE(E and M) rates over 50% and many are much better than that.

The vast majority are also rated Good by Ofsted with a few Outstanding. Of course those few with lower judgements might be clustered in particular areas but on the face of it there doesn't seem to be too much of a problem with finding a decent school in Devon.

"we know they are brilliant, given that they work with students who have met a minimum academic benchmark. These go on to attain mostly very high qualification grades"

So they only take on students who are achieving highly, and then they turn out students who are achieving highly?

Doesn't sound like inspired education to me.

Really talented teachers help children become better learners, not just keep them in a holding pattern for 6 years.

Remember, HPFA, for many mumsnetters there are only two types of school - Outstanding and Failing.

Just to add - I went back and re-jigged the data to show only High Achievers. Almost all the schools got five GCSE (E and M) rates for High Achievers at 90% or over.
I quite accept that that is a fairly crude measure - that's why its being replaced by Progress 8 - but again it doesn't suggest that Devon schools are disastrously bad.

Mini fingerz said

"we know they are brilliant, given that they work with students who have met a minimum academic benchmark. These go on to attain mostly very high qualification grades"

So they only take on students who are achieving highly, and then they turn out students who are achieving highly?

Doesn't sound like inspired education to me.

Really talented teachers help children become better learners, not just keep them in a holding pattern for 6 years."

Or they can go to comp and have a more likely chance of not making the commensurate upsurge in performance that theywould achieve at a grammar school

"Remember, HPFA, for many mumsnetters there are only two types of school - Outstanding and Failing."

Also a dogged determination not to acknowledge that there are very very clever kids who thrive in non selective state schools. They can't acknowledge that these children exist - they can't do because 'the system failed them' regardless of the fact they loved school, got 10A* and left to study medicine at Bristol. Obviously had they been at a grammar they would have had a better time, got better results, and leave school to immediately take up a post as leader of the BMA.

"they can go to comp and have a more likely chance of not making the commensurate upsurge in performance that theywould achieve at a grammar school"

Well,mit's not exactly an "upsurge" if they achieve their expected outcomes, is it? It's just staying on track.

Why do you think they won't achieve their expected outcomes in a comprehensive school?

portico Wed 21-Sep-16 12:36:39 Or they can go to comp and have a more likely chance of not making the commensurate upsurge in performance that theywould achieve at a grammar school

Where this argument falls down is where you take the comps. that have a comparable intake as some grammar schools and the results are better, I think it's safe to assume those DCs would not have done any better in a Grammar school or perhaps this just doesn't happen?

It's also important to remember that to some people, some A*s are more equal than others.

Interesting:

This appears to be a pressure group set up to promote the Cameron and Gove ideas about education:

schoolsweek.co.uk/pro-academy-campaign-group-launched-by-superhead-rachel-de-souza-but-funders-remain-anonymous/

The anti-grammar campaign has made for some weird bedfellows, if the proposal gets defeated it will be amusing to watch the coalition fall apart...

BertrandRussell said "It's also important to remember that to some people, some A*s are more equal than others."

I didn't think we were discussing private schools.