If it's so offensive to suggest you don't want your children to go to school with "rough" kids, why are schools in "good" areas always oversubscribed?

[lisbey]

It seems to me that the main difference in the results a school achieves is the "quality" (sorry know that's not the right word, but can't think of another one) of their intake and the parents of those children.

However, whenever someone on here suggests that they'd prefer their kids not to mix with the sportswear clad council house kids, they are universally flamed.

Who then is fuelling the increased demand for houses close to schools that are well away from those children?

BTW I live in a private house, close to a council estate and my DCs go to a school where 40% have free school meals. I have been delighted with the school and it gets decent OFSTEAD reports, but does badly in league tables, which is why there are very few families living in the privately owned "family homes" on this estate and why they are c. 25% cheaper than a similar house in the next town.

SMA...my parents have a house in Othery (not far from Bridgwater) and think that you're hard pushed to find 'proper' rough in Somerset!!

Oh I don't know PP, my family manage it ,shock> (not there any more though; skipped over the bridge)

Bridgwater has a big drugs and unemployment problem, i'd seen my first stabbing by 8 (in school) and my aprents still there regularly ahve thier house attacked and the agrden smashed up; last house we lived in someone tried to torch the wooden extension where ds2 slept, police said it would have been a sheltering druggy but wasn't their priority

othery of course rrather nice (used to nurse on the levels) but some parts of Bridgwater really do have a rep and problems. Working for homestart there was an experience indeed.

I lived in Bridgwater for a while and can attest that it has some problems!

Not least, the smell!

Ah cicil

Whoever said it depends where you live has it spot on.

We live in a part of south London where there is a huge mix of wealth and poverty literally on each others doorsteps. There is a also a huge immigrant and refugee community. It's all very ghetto-ised though - no social mixing really.

The state schools reflect that. Most are populated by kids from homes where English is not spoken. Some are 'rough', most have pretty shocking OFSTED reports and are massively underfunded and struggling. There is one primary school in the area which is good, and we'd have to be church-goers to get DD in, which we're not.

The majority of families who can afford it send their children to private school, or move. We have found one for DD which has a relatively balanced social and racial mix and that provides quality education, so we'll send her there rather than face the teeth-pulling, hair-tearing nightmare of trying to get her into a decent state primary.

Perhaps removing the faith association with state schools would help, I've never understood how that is fair or right?

I second that it is the lack of mix that frightens people rather than the true mix.

Schools where the overwhelming majority of people seems to be of a class that you don't belong to, whether it's the Boden or tracksuit wearers. We are all worried that this will turn our child into someone we don't recognise or that our child will not fit.

I have heard people coming on here worrying about "will the private school be full of really wealthy parents?" and that's the same as worrying about "will it be full of rough parents". And I guess wealthy and rough is always relative to you individually anyway!!!

I've heard people in rough areas calling rougher areas chavs and people in wealthy areas calling people from wealthier areas rich. My point is, I think most people would be happy with a school that has a true mix but this is very rarely the case, especially at primary. Segregation means school a) almost entirely x and school b) almost entirely y.

We have our DD at a village school which is very mixed and everyone loves it.

Somehow I don't think rich is quite as offensive as chav.

But I'm not scared of the boys tuirning into MC types. I think it would bebetter for them than DH's and my rough bumpkin accents and having to deliberately set out to learn niceties and MC ways to try and fit into the world we acquired as we moved 'up the ladder' career wise.

I do think it's sad in some ways but overall if it's better for them it's OK by me.

posy parker - My local is Ashton Park, which i think is OK, it got a 'good' from offsted a couple of months ago.

I think Bristol is a strong example of what happens when too many parents decide not to use their local schools - if half of the families are either going private or sending them outside the area, then it is inevitable that the remaining schools will struggle.

I would never in a million years have considered private education before we moved here, I don't really agree with it, but I have found myself looking at the websites for schools like Bristol Grammar and wondering whether we could afford it.

I was considering moving to Bristol last year (I worked there) and what put me off was the secondary school choice. You are right - a high number of people opt for private because the schools are so bad.

As it happens, my dd is in a 'rough' school with a load of council types. It is crap in the league tables. However, it scores very hightly on the value add scores. The school is excellent, even if the cohort are generally Gloucester chavs, and it does very well, due to the fact that bright kids are siphoned off at 11+ (Gloucester has 4 excellent grammar schools, and 4 'crap' comps).

DD joined the school midway in Year 9 - she used to go to a selective school in Cheltenham, which looked fantastic on paper (excellent results, brilliant facilities, loads of extra curricular activities, a really prestigious school). She was badly bullied there and was very unhappy.

It is perfectly possible to send a child to a sink school and not have them turn into a wild monster. Not 100% of the kids in sink schools are knife carrying ruffians. DD has a happy group of friends who are good girls - yes there are fights and truancy at the school, but dd does't get involved, and is not distressed by it.

Yes thought there is a difference between just a normal bog standard comp, than the really frightening schools in large cities (such as the ones on Bristol).

DS's primary (it ahs a SNU attached) is gorgeous. It also serves an excluvely council estate area. Most of teh kids ahve first anmes that would attract the bad side of MN snobbery and a hiuge proportiona re on free school meals.

At the other school we use, the lcoal juniors, 9 kids are on free school meals. I know tis as some prat left the list lying in a road and I found it; at least I am CRB checked so knew the kids anyway, horrible to think it was just left abpout with names and other details.

Anyay.

When the ods3 attened the local school the mums took offence; why's he ehre (even though we live opposite and most of them commute in). DS3 has a TA assigned and they would actively block our access to her in the mornings and place their DD's (don't know why it was dd's, just ahppened to be so) in her hands with firm 'Take Mrs X's hand, we're all entitled to use LEA staff equally'; ds3 would be crying as his routine was disrupted. He wasn't invited in to do anything, I ahd to go voer to change nappies even at full term pregnancy becuase every teacher refused (his TA managed to get the Head to allow her to do it in the end) and we weren't even allowed a spot other than the floor- at 9 months gone battling a wriggly 5 year old it was hard and painful.
he won;'t drink water (in an ASD no way) so was refused drinks and the teacher went to active war with the LEA over it and just kept refuisng him anything else so he would go without all day.

Now, whenever he turns up he is welcomed; his report is glowing and tahcers and staff coming running out to meet DH and I and compliment us on our lovely ds3. At teh school play parents were clucking voer the 'cute little one from teh learning centre' as the SNU is termed. Nobody begrudged 'their' taxes being spent on teh TA ds3 needed to participate in MS but were palesed that he ahd managed it as the only learning abse child in his class able to.
Instead of droping heavy hints about how their school ws intended for academic kids not SN ones, his report states how very glad they are to have him and what an asset he is. And I cheered when he went from sitting silently at the back (or crying alone as I later found out) and learning little to getting lvel 2 for verything, albeit with support for attention, at the end of KS1. if the school were not so far away I would pull the otehrs out like a shot and send them there too. The kids with reading isues (IME a great amny) don't even get help as the Head allocated the time for worrship and the SENCO is in despair, new school all kids get the help they need in a positive way. The ridiculous thing is old school is over subscribed, new school under . All beacuse of location, a posh uniform and a rep 20 yaers out of date.

The assumption that high proportion of foreign kids is an disadvantage is quite offending and incorrect. It maybe true in secondary school if the kids have just arrived to the country, but in general foreign kids do better, especially in English and reading because they are bilingual. That's why posh parents send their kids to Gaelic/Welsh/French schools.

Yep, IIRC it's fairly acknowedged that kids raised bilingually start slowly thena ccel;rate rapidly isn't it?

All teh kids ehre have to elarn Welsh and many go to Welsh school (it's abit far for this city but ehre's talk of a lcoal one- even though we have a near 0% medium using population). The local school is also introducing Frendh as an extra language (so 3 including English) from next eyar in Primary and I am very pleased about that.

I think Bristol is a good example of where it has all gone wrong.

Our 'nice' southwest town is Bath, and our secondary and primary schools have few problems.

But that is why I don't understand why people in Bath get so anxious.

The two unpopular secondaries get 47% 5gsceS.

The other secondary not full of Bath children is full of children who have escaped from South Gloucester.

So, when I say that I send my children to the nearest school even though it is considered 'rough' and has a very high proportion of free school mealers, it isn't a great worry or a massive socialist statement. And I want a mix (hence not running to the local mc school) but we talking about an interesting mix, not a lot of children with knives.

I disagree that it makes no difference if the intake has a lot of different cultures and first languages. Living in east london it's not always the case that they are bi-lingual, they learn as they go along, which can be a problem. There's also the problem (in primary school at least) that the parents can't communicate with each other and so any social life outside school is very difficult or impossible. A lot of the good schools thrive (particularly the faith schools, although I don't have first hand experience) because the parents are involved in a big way and there's a sense of community. We had a huge amount of muslim pupils, with mums wearing the full burqah on top of not being able to speak English. It's a huge obstacle to overcome and most wouldn't/couldn't mix with non muslims. The other problem was that they couldn't communicate with the school and the school couldn't communicate to them. I was on the PTA and fundraising for the school was extremely limited because any activity where parents could come together and socialise was extremely limited. This may be more of a London problem, however. We moved from the school as I think the social side of primary school is extremely important. Then, as others have said, in secondary school you have to worry about knives, guns etc. all very worrying.

True Giddy, but like schools where there is a high % of SN kids the key isn't just the stats but how much support the school is able to deliver. Somewhere that is good and supportive with 20% non englush peaking kids will fare betterr than soemwhere confused and lost with 10%. Or even 5%.

It's something I have seen time and again with SN kids.

cicil I think you're right: Bristol is a case of it all going badly awry. What's needed is some kind of managed ingration to mix it up a bit and allow for teh huge areas that seem labelled either good or bad but the trasnport costs etc make that prohibitice atm I guess, and where a sizeable number opt for private anyway it would ahve limited effectiveness.

'I was on the PTA and fundraising for the school was extremely limited because any activity where parents could come together and socialise was extremely limited

In fairness though whilst I am sure what you say is true, out PTA at one point got down to one eprson in a faith viullage school; even in fairly homogenous groups there is quite a sense of 'somebody else can do it' in my very direct (I was Secretary in the 'rescue' year) experience.

Sancti - what an absolute nighttmare. I am so happy your son is happier in his new 'crap' school.

Similar situation to dd. She was incredibly badly bullied (physical and emotional bullying) and her selective, excellent Ofsted, in affluent area school did naff all about it, opther than to put my dd into internal exclusison (to 'keep her away' from the bullies). No intention of doing nything about the bullies, there 'were too many of them to deal with'.

She also struggled with finishing her work. Teachers just said that she needed to concentrate.

She is now at a school with high free school meal provision, but she was welcomed and reallt looked after - the pasrtoal support worker knew she had been bullied and rang me to give me a daily update on how she was for weeks. Her reading level was also notice to be poor for her age, and she saw an ed psych within 4 weeks, and was diagnosed with dyslexia after being there 2 months. She now has extra time on her exams, a lot of help from the SEN departmentm, and lots of dedicated teachers who really care, and are really passionate about the school.

It is a far, far better school that the other one. I am evangelical about it - I tell everyone now NOT to judge a school on the prettiness of its cricket pitch, the A-Cs ate GCSE, the nice blazer, the smart buildings.

Exactly GetOrf

teacher attitude is everything

The juniors atathced to the bad school is so much better (ds2's dyspraxia was picked up after not being noticed for 4 years inc. reception in infants, despite his speech being very unclear indeed at first) but on balance ds4 will go to the local council estate school over the the 'posh' nearer one if we can get a place.

I was speaking to my SIL who knows a couple of teachers who work in another 'crap' Gloucester comp. She says that they actuvely choose to work in a schools which are lower down on teh scale - apparently it is far more satisfying and you can really make a difference to kids lives.

They also say that you have to be a more skilled teacher (thoug they would say that, wouldn't they!) as any teacher can work in a grammar school with well behaved and motivated kids, you have to be a better teacher to effecditvely teach 'challenging' kids.

deleting - I am a governor at a school with a large proportion of children who do not have english as their first language. It is very difficult for the teachers.
And communicating wiht parents is also very difficult.
Even small things like trying to get the girls t wear suitable footwear for games is a mare.