7% at comps get AAB

[Judy1234]

Just looking at today's FT schools tables/reports. Only 7% of comprehensives get pupils with grades AAB at A level. 62% of pupils get that at the best 50 independent schools (about 70 such pupils a year per school) and about 31 from selective grammar schools.

However the top 10 comps have 31% getting AAB which isn't too bad and the bottom 50 comps have 1% of pupils getting AAB.

The best comperhensive - Watford Grammar gets 8 Oxbridge offers a year.

But then surely you'd expect that. If the school isn't selective, whether it's fee paying or not, you can't expect to get lots of high a level grades so why does the Government want more children proportionately from comprehensives and (new rule) whose parents didn't get to university? It's like saying I want people who aren't right for this given preference over those that are. That these really bright pupils from the state grammar school whose parents both went to univesrity will not be allowed in but these rather thick children who have left it too late to be brought up to an Oxbridge standard age 19 will get preference.
www.ft.com/cms/s/4037c7f2-ceae-11db-b5c8-000b5df10621.html

I've just remembered about the time when I was paying for 2 kids in childcare that I worked out we would be better off (financially and in other ways) if I gave up my job and looked after the kids during the week and then worked at ASDA during the weekend while dp looked after the kids. Again, this kind of shift parenting is common in our society but it's not good for the whole family.

Why does Mary earn less than Fred? Is that because you think women in general even without children in the same or similar work generally don't get equal pay for equal work? if that is so why don't people like Mary becomes porters not cleaners for example if that's better paid?

I'm not even sure it's worth answering those questions. Men, on average earn more than women. I've already suggested many reasons why this could be the case. Women being paid less than men for the same job is one possibility (yes, this is becoming more difficult but it still happens) but crucially as I've already repeated jobs which largely employ women, from child-care and teaching to cleaning and hairdressing, are under-paid and under-valued BECAUSE they employ women. Women choose to do these jobs because they enjoy them or because those are the jobs they are qualified or not qualified to do and neither you or I should tell women or anyone what jobs to do. Once again you reveal your own values and prejudices. If Mary doesn't get PAID enough as a cleaner why doesn't she become a porter. So again it's all about money with you. This is not what motivates everyone you know. But, let's think about it anyway. Maybe Mary WANTS to be a cleaner and not a porter. Maybe she has skills and experience in cleaning. Maybe she can't get a job as a porter or maybe she wouldn't want to work in a largely male environment. More likely she can fit cleaning in with her other responsibilities like child care (and again many women who can't afford childcare are forced to take shift work or flexible work and these jobs are often less well paid than full tiem jobs with family unfreindly hours) and being part-time or working flexibly limits your possiblities for promotion etcetc. And you're missing the point which is if loads of women suddenly started becoming porters and men stopped being porters then that job too would become under-valued and under-paid (this is exactly what happened to typing - when it was first invented the typewriter was considered a masculine plaything). Although having said all that I don't know that being a porter is any better paid than being a cleaner. We've already been through what happens when children come along. Even if Mary and Fred earned the same wage then it is likely that Mary would take on most of the childcare which might mean that she wants or feels it necessary to limit her working hours or give up her job. There is no biological necessity why it should be Mary that does this but society is geared up to women doing the childcare. That is how it's been for years. Most men don't want to take main responsibility for childcare and some don't want to do any. But some do and don't feel able to admit this to their employers or even their wives. And boys are still largely not brought up to think they should be responsible for bringing up children. THey are brought up to beleive this is women's work and as such it is undervalued.

blackandwhitecat - people (men and women) are paid ACCORDING TO THE VALUE THEY ADD and their ability to convince their client/employer of that value.

In "cerebral" jobs there is no discernable pay gap.

In manual/low-skilled jobs men often earn more than women because they are physically stronger and therefore better (= add more value) at the job.

Who, on average, is better at working on a building site, men or women?

Where women do have an issue is in having the self-confidence to negotiate higher wages or fees and valuable promotions.

blackandwhitecat - the critical skill for women to learn is to negotiate their own lives (wherever they may be, in or outside the home), rather than whinging about unfairness at great and almost incomprehensible length...

Twaddle. Is someone who makes nuclear weapons really more 'valuable' than a nurse? If there is no pay gap between 'cerebral' jobs then why are teachers paid considerably less than solicitors? Are you saying that childcare and nursing aren't 'cerebral' jobs? How can you possibly decide whose job is more 'valuable'?

TBH this is just turning into a forum for you and Xenia to spout your misguided and ignorant ideas especially about evolution (when you obviously don't understand what that means - and won't even accept you're wrong when a geneticist amongst otehrs tells you that you are) and ignoring any kind of inconvenient facts in order to justify the way things are and your position within that (which as you've both smugly pointed out is that you're loaded and will happily use your money to get what you want without feeling any responsibility for anyone else or any concern for those less fortunate. Your post of 9.01 yesterday was an absolute classic of boastful selfishness, Anna, congratulations).

There's nothing I or anyone else can say to change your minds because you aren't interested in facts just your own assumptions about what human beings are like (based it seems increasingly clear on your own behaviour and attitudes - which again seem motivated entirely by money - rather than any kind of information or concern for fairness or equality or responsibility for others).

I suppose ultimately I feel sorry for both of you. Because if your view of human behaviour is so overwhelmingly negative, if your values prioritise money and appearnace over anything less superficial and meaningful, if you feel the need to boast and compete in the way that you do then you must be really quite empty and insecure.

bw, there's certainly a gap but it's more of a gap between you and me than between male and female pay. We have a whole load of equal work for equal value cases going on at the moment which is seeing male wages, dustbin men etc being substantiall reduced so they get down to the £14k a year full time wage of another council female group of workers. The male unions have dragged it out and are not criticising the women who are using the law to get the back pay they're entitled to. So I certainly accept in some areas at the lower end there has been a pay gap but even there I think it's gone or going. There are a lot of women now who drive trains on London Underground after adverts in Cosmo - traditionally male work with yes higher pay than some female jobs so I suppose that's all disappearing.

In the professions etc there is not really the pay gap except for women who choose not to ask for pay rises etc and do themselves down. The main problems seem to be at home - women doing most of the work at home which again they need to negotiate better with their other half where they choose to have an other half.

You have not convinced me about partners though... I am sure subconsciously women go for men who will support them financially even if that idea disgusts them on the surface.

And yes the nuclear person is hugely more valuable to this planet. We might all be dead if we didn't have the nuclear deterrent and most nurses or dustbin men are not clever enough to invent nuclear power so clearly those rare people who are ought to be better paid, not that scientists are particularly well paid. I suppose you're against nuclear weapons too.... sigh...

if you marry/find a partner young then all this welathy partner bit goes out of the window somewhat doesn't it?

eg abramovich and wife

Yes, but they probably still assess his potential - is he a medical student (as my father was when my parents married young) or the local window cleaner. Are his parents well off and he has good A level results or did he leave school at 16 and works for the council etc.

?If there is no pay gap between 'cerebral' jobs then why are teachers paid considerably less than solicitors??

Hmmm ? very tempted to make scathing comment.

Keep it up Anna and Xenia. I am ashamed that I am not helping your defence but I can?t be bothered to argue with the lefties.

On that point - the point I was making earlier was that there is no pay gap between men and women in the same "cerebral" job ie between male and female teachers or male and female solicitors or male and female consultants...

fembear - Thanks for your support. I don't really know why I'm bothering either... except perhaps that it gives me some insight into the startling extent of the ignorance of some people (eg teachers) who have a claim to knowledge and intelligence

blackandwhitecat - given that I suppose that you do believe human beings need some money to live on... what about people who manage large companies successfully and provide jobs for thousands of people who then pay taxes to pay for nurses, teachers etc? Do they deserve more pay than their workers to reflect their added responsibilities, or should everyone be paid the same in your book?

It's good to meet people with different views given most people's natural tendencies to stick with their own. it's one reason I think the hindu culture of mixing in is better than many Muslims separation here in the UK.

They tried in communist China paying street sweepers more than doctors or the same. I can understand left wing arguments but I don't think they work in practice.

It's market forces which say more solicitors are paid more than teachers, that's all. Clients will pay me £xxx an hour for what I know because few people know it. They would pay my ex husband £Y an hour to tutor their children. I don't think that's unfair. I suppose the unfairness is that some peoplea re born with a brain that means they can't get a job that pays them £xxx per hour so in that sense life is unfair. We could remove that unfairness by everyone being employed by the state and everything provided by the state so little money was needed, communal eating areas, free childcare etc.

In a sense I live in that state in my microcosm of this at home with 5 children. I support those at university and I don't say I eat more or better food because I earn more than you. We share.

Rambling on now... back to my bills...my most important task of the month of course.

To refine what Xenia said about "more solicitors" being paid more than teachers; yes it's not a blanket thing. A solicitor in a specialised field with few practitioners will usually earn more than, say, a high street conveyancing practitioner in a sleepy market town. The latter's earnings will most likely be eclipsed by those of the dynamic head of the large state comprehensive in the city nearby, and perhaps even by some of the experienced heads of department in the same school.

Having an opinion different to another person's doesn't make one ignorant Anna.

Personally I find other people's opinions fascinating and well worth bothering with.

I'd just like to step in at this point, for no particular reason at all, to underline that teaching is emphatically not childcare.

If teaching is viewed as such by parents in this country, it is no wonder that a) it is undervalued (ie teachers only doing what parents do all the time, but paid) and b) teachers have unreasonable expectations placed on them re social and emotional development of their pupils.

A teacher's job is to develop the thinking of their pupils, not basic skills such as bottom-wiping and not hitting people. In an ideal world, teachers would only be reinforcing what is taught at home in these respects, not attempting to instill values that go against those acquired at home.

When I was still a teacher (secondary level, languages), my gauge of a "good" day was one in which I had not been sworn at. Unsurprisingly, I am no longer a teacher, which given that I have 6 years of post A level study (degree + PGCE + MA) under my belt, which frankly is a loss to an increasingly unattractive profession. I loved my job but was unwilling to sacrifice my health to it.

saggar - I agree. But blackandwhitecat is ignorant (her facts are wrong) and misguided. I'm sure, also, from reading her posts, that she is incredibly well-meaning.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

duchesse - of course childcare is not teaching.

There is lots of excellent childcare available. And lots of bad childcare.

And lots of teachers are excellent. And there are plenty of mediocre ones too.

Anna - it doesn't matter how many times you write it - the overwhelming majority of posters on this thread know that B&WC is most certainly not ignorant.

You on the otherhand continue to be deliberately offensive and personal, which isn't the basis on which this site works.

If you really cannot post here without resorting to personal insults, then I think it says a lot about your inability to articulate your views. In the meantime I am reporting your posts to MNHQ and will ask them to keep a watching brief over your postings, as they most certainly breach the MN philosophy that one should not make posts which are a personal attack on another poster.

soapbox - you can, of course, do what you like.

But anyone who looks back over your posts and those of blackandwhitecat will find plenty of rudeness, provocation and scathing comments to which people have responded very patiently.

I'm sure you will do us the kindness of pointing out where that is the case. Nevertheless the MN philosophy does not say one cannot be scathing or provocative. It does however say that one should not make personal attacks on other posters.

I really can't be bothered, I'm here for the debate, not to whinge.

soapbox - so it's all right for you, and people who you support, to be rude - we just mustn't point that out to you or, even, retaliate?