Are year 6 SAT results used to project GCSE results?

[Marypoppins19]

I think DS will do in ok in SATs but I also think he could make much more progress in Secondary school. Primary has been bumpy with changes of teachers, one sacked! He has suddenly grown up, found a bit more of a commitment to working hard - but probably all a bit late in the day for primary results.
How much will sats effect his secondary school journey?

[HaroldsSocalledBluetits]

Hopefully the school are sensible about it. We actually found it useful to have lower targets for dd to begin with. She did badly in sats as she'd missed a lot of yr 6 due to illness so the targets she initially had were manageable and took the pressure off. Now she's more or less caught up and her targets have been steadily adjusted. She's also moved up sets but again it was good she got the extra time and support in lower sets to begin with because like I say she'd missed a lot of school. DS on the other hand aced his sats and the setting tests and has had very high targets throughout which doesn't seem to phase him but I personally think it's a lot of pressure.

[CordeliaWyndamPryce]

Whilst what individual schools do internally changes, OfSTED look at progress from SATs to GCSE. In my previous school (with shit slt) I was told that the extra work I did with a kid at lunchtime didn't matter because he had no SAT data and so it wouldn't help the school data. I moved schools rather than deal with such narrow focussed slt, but it would have been easier to simply focus on the kids that counted for ofsted (which is what slt were implying I should do).

So if you are bothered about his progress and how school will handle his progress I think sitting the SATs are a better plan than skipping them. If you ask the school you'll get an "every child matters" response. In good schools that is true, but in shit ones it isn't. But it's almost impossible to tell which is which unless you've worked for them.

[Marypoppins19]

We have chosen a school with the highest progress 8 in the county. Results not as high but still on top 20%, progress is highest in the area though. I’m hoping that really helps him.

[CordeliaWyndamPryce]

Sorry, I was probably being unclear. By "good" I categorically do not mean "what ofsted grades as Good". I mean decent, genuinely interested in the progress (and health and wellbeing) of all children. Progress 8 only includes students who have SAT data. Ofsted and progress 8 will give you literally no indication of how children without SAT scores do. Every child without SAT data could literally fail every GCSE and the progress 8 score would remain unchanged.

Btw, I'm really not a fan of SATs and as a teacher I absolutely think they should be scrapped. But, until they are, I think that children who won't be mentally harmed by the process should sit them as a fail-safe against unscrupulous secondary school leaders. Even if you like the school leaders now and they are decent folks, a lot can change in 5 years.

[modgepodge]

Regardless of what everyone has said on here about how their child’s school doesn’t care about SATS and does their own assessments in year 7 - their child’s school will be judged on progress from y6 sats to GCSE, so they do care, regardless of what they tell parents. They can do any assessments they like, but it’s all irrelevant when it comes to statistics at GCSE. One poster mentioned that sats results are ignored until they are looked at for statistical purposes after GCSE - there’s no way the school simply ignore the data until after GCSE then analyse it - there will be discussions going on yearly or possibly even termly, most likely from y7 onwards, about which children are making expected progress and which need to make more progress and how to achieve that.

What Cordelia says is unfortunately likely true in many many schools where data is king. No teacher wants this, but the pressure is immense.
Incidentally, the same thing is happening in many primary schools with y2 to y6 data - particularly junior schools with a separate infant school (rather than through primaries).

[OpalTree]

I had every intention of dd2 doing sats as her older sister had done but my husband died just before they started and she was in shock and in no fit state to take exams. The school gave her a target based on cats and put her in a maths set that was right for her. I just have to hope that not being included in progress 8 won't disadvantage her as she moves up the school

[TeenTimesTwo]

A decent school will look at SATs but will not be constrained by them. They will look at the child in front of them and treat them as they see them.

Our school doesn't let on to the pupils their formal SATs based GCSE target. It just says how they are getting on and their predicted grade based on current attainment, progress to date, and work ethic.

Similarly a decent school will not prevent progress based on sets. Every child should be being pushed/encouraged to do their best whatever their set.

[Helix1244]

Where will this leave dc in the incorrect cohort? I believe their results are not counted towards the school? So will schools put themin bottom sets? Not help them?

[noblegiraffe]

Every child without SAT data could literally fail every GCSE and the progress 8 score would remain unchanged.

This doesn’t mean that schools can shut kids with no SATs data in a cupboard for 5 years. They still count in the headline GCSE figures for the school and despite not counting for progress 8, the school will still want them to pass maths, English and the Ebacc.

[TeenTimesTwo]

And you have to remember that teachers and schools actually do want to help the pupils learn and pass exams. Teachers wouldn't put up with their working conditions if they didn't care about the pupils. So they aren't just going to ignore pupils because they don't have y6 SATs results.