Kent test results

[Empathy101]

There was an article in the Kent Messenger earlier in the year (March)that said private school pupils (that took the Kent test) pass rate in 2023 had dropped to 25% from 59% in 2019.
The pass rate for state school pupils (that took the test - remember not everyone takes it ) in 2023 was 45%
I dug in a bit more as there have been some freedom of information requests (FOI) and very academic prep schools (like Granville etc) were seeing less than a 3rd of pupils passing in 2023 vs almost all a few years before.
Kent test scores are standardised and there are small adjustments for age (so younger children aren’t disadvantaged) - but these results don’t make sense?
The only possible explanations are state school pupils are getting 11 plus tutors at a far greater rate than private school pupils or the standardisation of scores also adjusts for state vs private ?
Im no conspiracy theorist - but understanding a few things around statistics - this dramatic change doesn’t fit with any logical model.

@Lawrancelouise - you can easily correct this quickly by including your own information on your own website (and advise the other local preps to do the same). Even if it’s just a small asterisk below your leavers list, if you have one.

There are plenty of parents out there who will want to know that grammar is a realistic option for them and I wouldn’t be relying on the Council to correct this information in the public domain very promptly.

I work at The Granville and teach Year 6 English. I'm highly involved in the 11+ preparation and can categorically state that those statistics are incorrect for The Granville. We are currently working on getting the data corrected and this may be the case for other Kent independent schools. For example, the data from the FOI request states that less that 5 of our pupils passed in 2019, in actual fact we had 13 sit the test and 12 passed so our pass rate that year was 92%. It is likely that other errors have been made and that in fact pass rates haven't dropped at all. We are really proud of our results and it's sad to see that KCC have published incorrect information.

KCC have come back to me with a corrected spreadsheet - I don't believe I can attach a file to this thread - but they said the FOI team will officially release it (I don't know when) - but all the private schools in Kent now show the correct results (and they don't look anomalous anymore)
I very much suspect that Kent Messenger in their article used the same incorrect FOI data - I would suggest the schools concerned contact Kent Messenger to issue a correction to the article (link below)
My work here is done....

https://www.kentonline.co.uk/kent/news/the-astonishing-drop-in-private-school-pupils-getting-into-303104/

Well done @Empathy101 - great work!

The Freedom of Information Act is such a huge positive - allowing everyone to be part of the solution, checking that things are working as they should. Crowd-sourcing before it became a thing! (the FOI Act was in 2000, wikipedia started in 2001)

@veedugg - @Empathy101 is quite right that your school might like to ask the Kent Messenger to publish a correction. They published an article which put the prep schools in bad light (and arguably fed into the current negativity against private schools). They were basing it on information KCC published, but surely it would be normal journalistic practice to approach at least some of the affected Prep schools for comment before writing an article damning them? Which they clearly didn't, otherwise the school approached would have corrected the mistake.

Can anyone explain this to me eg one of our local primary schools has 16-21 as “total assessed suitable for a Kent grammar school”. How can there be a range on the total assessed as being suitable? Surely like most schools there should just be a single number out of the total tested?

@Pip290 - headteacher appeal? (For the extra 5 - so technically they did not pass every element/overall score, but school thinks they are suitable and appealed with paperwork back up). Probably shows the school is on the ball.

Alternatively, could include FSM requiring lower scores if any local grammars allow that.