Parents' Buying places at Grammars

[Judy1234]

From the Telegraph today which is quite interesting...

"Middle-class parents are "buying" places at grammar schools, according to a leading academic.

Up to a third of children admitted to grammars in some parts of the country have received tuition at fee-paying preparatory schools, it has been claimed.

Professor David Jesson, of York University, said the findings underlined claims from the Conservatives that selective state schools "entrench" social advantage.
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It will be a boost for David Cameron, the Conservative leader, who has faced a revolt by backbenchers after severing the party's long-standing ties with grammar schools.

Mr Cameron said that selecting pupils by their academic ability at 11 benefited families from affluent areas but condemned working-class children to an inferior education.

Prof Jesson analysed the 22,000 children admitted to England's 164 grammar schools every year. He found that 3,000 - more than 13 per cent - entered grammars after being educated at private prep schools.

But just seven per cent of children in England are schooled in the private sector - suggesting that children from wealthy families are dramatically over-represented in grammar schools.

Prof Jesson said that in at least one local authority area 33 per cent of the grammar school population was from prep schools.

He also said pupils from the private sector scored similar results to state school pupils in national tests taken at the age of 11. However, they appeared to do better in the 11-plus - the grammar school entrance test - fuelling claims that they are "coached" to pass the exam.

He said: "Shouldn't we be more strict in looking at grammar admission procedures if wealthy parents are buying their children into schools that coach them for the 11-plus? On a national test basis, they are no better than state school pupils."

The most sought-after grammar schools get more than 10 applications for every place and their popularity continues to grow. League tables for 14-year-olds published earlier this year showed that 81 of the top 100 schools were grammars.

Parents are believed to be going to increasing lengths to ensure their children get in.

A report last year said that children as young as eight were being sent to private tutors for up to three years' coaching for the 11-plus. Some parents are spending up to £1,500 a year paying for one-to-one tuition. In Warwickshire, it was claimed that copies of 11-plus papers were being circulated among private tutors, who can improve their reputation by helping pupils into top grammar schools.

Brian Wills Pope, the chairman of the National Grammar Schools Association, said the figures underlined the need to build more grammar schools.

"The grammar school ethos is to take pupils from any background," he told the Times Educational Supplement. "I'm sure 11-plus coaching does go on in some areas. It's just a shame there aren't more places."

A separate report published this week by the London School of Economics said that a grammar school education could be very beneficial to children from poor backgrounds. But it warned that many could not get in because admissions procedures were skewed against them."

hardly a suprise is it

I'm interested to know how the headteachers at selective schools view the coaching. I thought if you were running a selective school, you'd be thrilled to teach very bright children and rather exasperated by the averagely intelligent but well prepared. Or am I naive in thinking there is a difference.

I think most teachers at all levels do like very bright children. That's why some schools try to invent some tests you can't easily coach for (in the private sector). Grammar schools in the state sector I am not so sure about.

When my parents passed their 11+ into the state system in about 1939 I suspect no one was coached or prepared much except a few practice papers and everyone in the local state schools did the exam and then the 10% or whatever it was who got the best marks of boys and girls (done separately because girls are much brighter so have to be kept back so numbers were 50%) went through to grammar school without any fixing. Then if your parents were well off and you failed they sometimes could buy you a place at some state grammars in those days in some areas of the country.

This is ridiculous perverted logic!

Are we supposed to be cross because Preparatory schools manage to get their pupils into Grammars? The clue is in the name for goodness sake.

How about getting cross because the State primaries fail to do the same? They are the 'villains' in this, not middle-class parents.

I didn't read it as implying that anyone needs to be cross. I thought it was saying that grammar schools were originally intended to offer a highly academic education to the sort of highly academically able child who would benefit from it. And it was believed that child could come from any background. And now, children of well of parents are coached so efficiently for those tests, the schools end up with the well tutored not necessarily the clever. Isn't that what the academic is saying?

Not perverted logic at all.

Prep schools are part of the private system. Using them to cram rich kids to pass the entrance exams and take state school places from poor kids is amoral at best.

Cat 64 - and every one of the parents ignores him I presume?

I suppose in the end, the children all accept that education includes being tutored.

cheaper to get kids to grammar than pay for private senior schooling.

would be interesting to know what happens to the prep school kids who don't get into grammar - secondary modern????? No way - bet they stay at private school.

Presumably private selective is easier to get into that state selective.

I actually know 2 families whose kids went to state primaries, passed the grammar exam (uncrammed) but chose to go to local independent secondaries instead.

Because there are so few grammar places nowadays children have to get 98/99 % in the 11+

I agree with wychbold. If state primary schools were enabling all children to reach their full potential there wouldn't be an issue.

WendyWeber, everyone pays taxes that support the state system - I don't see why paying for primary education should mean your child can't return to the state system at secondary level.

(My younger children are at a state primary school and the eldest at a grammar school, which he got into without tutoring).

NKF, hard to compare as most places in England don't have grammar schools so they are a complete irrelevance. The grammar schools were abolished where I was from Newcastle before I was 11 at school even and I'm 45. The selective privates do much better at A levels in the major subjects than any of the selective grammars so either the chidlren are cleverer in the private system or the private schools are better at teaching or having money at home makes you do better in exams.

Actualy it is very very rare in my experience for parents to go to private prep schools and then enter the state system. most parents in the private system at primary level expect to carry that through to age 18. It might be one or two children at most a year who leave for state schools and then usually because of family financial problems. If you look at the desinations of leavers at my sons' prep school about 6 or 7 go to boarding school, most to private day schools and about 1 a year out of about 43 boys go to a state school.

Xenia - that's what I assumed, that people who started off with private schools intended to go private all the way through. So the north London selective schools attract who? The children from the better state primaries and church schools whose parents coach?

Cat - I've heard that too. Suddenly in year 5 or 6, a child who was doing okay suddenly falls behind because classmates are being tutored.

I presume that kids at prep schools get taught how to take the 11 plus exam. I could be wrong, but I imagine this is not necessarily true of state primary schools. Hence the fact that some parents of children at state schools are resorting to a couple of terms of private tutoring prior to their kids going head-to-head with their prep school equivalents.

As I understand it, this tutoring teaches the kid how to take the 11 plus exam, so that they know what to do when they get into the exam room. What it cannot do is teach a not-so-bright child how to pass the exam. This levels the playing field a bit for those who can afford tutoring - but it also means that those who can't afford it are a couple of steps behind their tutored equivalents, and probably a mile or so behind their prep equivalents. Life isn't fair - but I don't know what you can do about it, and I don't believe that doing away with grammar schools is the way to start.

I though the non verbal reasoning type tests were designed to assess raw intelligence (if indeed there is such a thing) but in fact you can be tutored for it as easily as for maths.

The Telegraph is wrong.
It will not be a boost for Cameron, he lost that battle, and won't try again.
He's going to stick to a bit of Paki bashing (AKA protecting British values, some tree hugging (like the short lived windmill on his house), and pandering to focus groups.

Of couse the system is gamed.
You'd have to be as dim as the average Telegraph reader to believe it not so.

tutoring & even just practise can help with logic tests - same for verbal reasoning.

I hear the Pope's catholic too. And bears shit in the woods.

The fact that this goes in illustrates yet again the disparity between supply and demand when it comes to grammar school places. It doesn't mean grammar schools are a bad thing - far from it. It illustrates how sought-after they are, and how places at them should be being expanded, not contracted.

As long as the curent situation persists - or gets worse - then the middle-classes WILl take advantage in this way.