Wilsons, Wallington, Tiffin, Sutton – why so many applications? Are parents kidding themselves?

[TheWomanOnTheBus]

I went to the Wilsons open day last night, and in relation to admissions the Head at his talk said basically the following:

Yes, there are 1400 applicants. And yes Wilsons have 150 places. However, the chances of entereing is not as bad as that sounds since each of those 1400 applicants is also likely to apply for all the Sutton grammars and also Tiffin. (And some will no doubt also be applying to/preferring indies - my point not his). In total, throughout those 4 schools there are 510 places. He encouraged anyone to apply whose DS was likely to get a good 5 in KS2 (ie 5a and 5b).

Now it is true that some DSs will have a bad day. But if they take 4 tests, and they were at the level the Head said they need to be to get in, then the chances of them having a bad day (if they are at the right level) at all of them is minimal.

So are 900 or so of the parents kidding themselves (nowhere near predicted to get "good 5")? Are their DSs nowhere near that level and they are applying anyway? That many?

Or is the Head being disingenuous and in fact you need DSs at a much higher level?

IYSWIM.

Hi TheWomanOnTheBus - my DS will be starting at one of the school's menthioned above in September. The same was said by all school heads last year and our DS was working at the level required so decided to put him forward for the exams.

There are children who sit the earlier entrance exams as practice for their preferred school and have no intention of listing the school in the CAF. I know this was happening last year so guess this will also be happening again this year. What percentage this equates to though is something that I don't know.

Thank you. And well done to your DS.

Thanks!

My advice - just go for it. I found out the week before my DS was due to sit the exam that children had been tutored for months beforehand. I honestly thought we didn't have a hope in hell but thankfully I was proved wrong.

would totally agree with what tiggytape hasd said. DD sat 11 plus for super selective in Essex. She is easily a level 5/6, but so were the other 900 girls sitting the test. The actual pass/fail rate was less than 1 whole point, seperating those who got a place and those who didn't. Hard to swallow but those are the odds you agree to when you sit the test.
DD didn't get a place. one of her class mates did. class mate is operating below DD in yr6, but those are the odds you play with. Really tough, but |I would say we have no regrets her sitting the test cos she learnt so much (more about not being complacent than anything. A valuable, but costly mistake on her part.

Thanks. I didn't understand the Head to mean: if you are high level 5, you will "pass" (ie be of a mythical GS standard with no guarantee of a place) and so do try, you might be lucky on the day in getting in the top whatever percentile you need to be to get in.

I understood him to mean: if you are high level 5, and you perform at that level then you will get in.

Perhaps - I wanted to hear the latter (DS is (predicted to be) at that level).... :)

Just to confirm, only Tiffins operate a no catchment policy, the remaining three apply a distance criteria when a one or more boys achieve the same score. I was surprised to see that many of the kids go gained a place at our grammar were local kids. Very few children where from further afield got in.

Agree with the above posters however with boys the numbers who pass are relatively lower. I believer Wallington, Sutton and Wilsons had roughly the same number of applicants however the pass rate varied from 365 to I believe 461.

I don't think the parents are kidding themselves.

Imagine 1500 take the test. There are 500 places.

The top 200 are way above everybody else and get a place easily.

That leaves 300 places up for grabs.

So 1300 children are fighting for those places. Imagine the bottom 200 are not up to the mark. Perhaps theirparents are a bit optimistic. That leaves 1100 kids for 300 places.

Then imagine 100 don't perform on the day due to nerves, sickness, etc.

So, you have 1000 kids after 300 places who are all in the Goldilocks zone. Not very, very good, not very, very bad, but just right. and still 700 will be disappointed.

Oh dear :( then I was wishfully thinking he'd have no problem...... thanks for putting me right.

One further point though - the Head also said the tests would not test anything that was not part of a standard curriculum for the time of the test (ie end Year 5). Is that right? Then - certainly for Maths at least - nothing for Sat level 6 will ever likely come up (although of course someone at that level, will find the time pressure easier for level 5 material IYSWIM)...

Yes, I was wondering about the "catchment" tie break - although I don't think its a "distance criteria" - its an in or out of borough distinction.

I thought a court judgement (Greenwich) banned discrimination between boroughs and Wilsons say that in the event of a tie between two boys it is not distance from school which counts (which would be fine) but the in-borough boy who gets the place (who might be furthe away than the out-of-borough boy).

I assume its legal, since otherwise they wouldn't do it, but hard to reconcile with the Greenwhich case unless I am missing something.

And I suppose going back to my OP, the Head is being disingenous in leading us to think we stood a good chance when in the end its - taking grethhorne's numbers - 1000 kids chasing 300 places. Those are not good odds.

Why would he do that? [Hmm]

No it's distance and nothing to do with borough. If two boys achieve the same score the boy living nearest to the school will be offered a place. For high scorers it's irelevant as you will be awarded a place regardless of where you live.

Oh..with Wilson's there were a number of places I think 20 which were reserved for kids who lived in the borough. Don't know if this has changed since last year though but think this is fair.

To clarify the odds of getting a place. My DS sat all three entrance exams last year. For all schools around 1400 applications were recieved however only roughly 450 passed Wallington and Sutton and 365 Wilson. Given that most people will apply to all school's, if your son passes the entrance exams then he has a good chance of getting a place at one of the grammars. Even once offers have been made there is always movement a bit of movement on the waiting list so I wouldn't discount it.

TheWomanOnTheBus

That's why people tutor!

It's such a silly exclusively MN thing to say, "the bright don't need tutoring". That's true for the absolute cream, the top 200 in my model above. But for the 1000 fighting for 300 places, just one or two extra marks make a very big difference.

The whole "if you tutor, yiou are setting your child up for failure when they get to the school" thing makes me smile wryly. I think 40 years ago, when the 11+ was nationwide and there were hundreds and hundreds of places for the kids who tested well, then yes, it made sense not to tutor. The 11+ was a test which selected those who performed on the day. And besides, hardly anyone tested, so there was no nuclear arms race of testing.

But with such limited places today, the competition is so fierce and so tutoring doesmake sense.

Same in Birmingham. There is a cohort of kids that apply for grammars, and that cohort applies for many schools, but each child can obviously take only up one place- it's pretty impossible to find out really how many kids apply per place- but it's at least 10:1 .

Brum schools again are super selective so start filling with the highest marks and top when all places allocated there is no pass/fail mark. In a very good cohort or an easy exam the places might be allocated from say 100% down to 98%, a hard paper or less clever cohort means that lower scores will get a place.

500 total places and 1500 applicants isn't actually too bad odds at all, assuming your child is of the required standard- there are a lot who apply just " on spec" here anyway without the child really being up to it (why, if your child is in the middle stream at primary, so really very average would you put them through the 11+- I've no idea!)

Theas18 - agree, we spoke with my DS's teacher before putting him forward. The whole experience is quite stressfull and it used to break my heart when I saw children coming out of the exam crying :(

Thanks, all, but just following up on the "tie-breaker" point. I just checked the policy here which says the following:

^Where candidates have the same rank order and where the admission of all would exceed the number of places available, places will be allocated in the following order:

?firstly to candidates whose home address is within the London Borough of Sutton in the order of the distance of their home address measured in a straight line from the main front door of Wilson?s School;

?secondly to those candidates who live elsewhere in the order of the distance of their home address measured in a straight line from the main front door of Wilson's School. ^

So it is a preference for in-borough kids. And I still wonder how this is reconcilable with the judgement in Greenwich.

Oh this has changed from last year as before they kept I believe 20 places for boys who lived in the borough.

Thanks, Tiggy, you have answered the obvious question as to how many kids does that tie-break apply to .... phew. (It would make a difference if the scores were so scrunched up - all super bright DSs don't you know - so that there were 50 with top marks and 100 with just one mistake!)

We are not 50 miles away, but certainly out of borough...

So I won't report the school to the admissions adjudicator (or whatever it is called) for having an unlawful policy :)

tiggytape - Are you sure that's right? So for example if a group of 20 boys scored the same top score would all of them get a place or would they apply the rule mentioned above?

All this still confuses me

I know addressed to Tiggy, but I think what she is saying is right.

The rule above only applies when there is tie in the first score where there are more people than places. So, first you give places to the DSs that got top score, then the next lot, and so on. Until you get to a score where there are more DSs than places left. For example, if after all the DSs who got a higher score are already in, and there are only, say, 5 places left for the people who got the next score down the list (lets say 20 got that score), then out of those 20 the rules above apply. First, Sutton kids (and if more than 5 of those by distance). Secondly, non-Sutton kids (and between those by distance).

That's what the head said yesterday, and what the policy says.