"Good" state secondary when looking at league tables?

[RichTeas]

I know this is a "how long is a piece of string" question and that it's essential to speak to school heads, etc, BUT the league tables do provide a standardised measure across schools. Where do you draw the line between a "good" state school and not so good? My sense is that looking at GCSE(Eng,Mat) around 70% or above constitutes good? Or is it lower than that?

creamteas
single sex schools are generally only Catholic (at least in name outside London) or fee paying.

if you look at the Hampshire stats I linked to above, all of the top performing state schools are mixed sex comps : who have the economies of scale to offer fantastic education to bright kids
and support and opportunities to less bright kids

the nice lady from the Daily Mail a while back who wrote about losing her house to pay for private school lived in the Bohunt catchment ....

NB
statistically, anything over 33% Ebacc is really rather good because of the breadth of learning skills it requires in the pupils in a non selective school
www.bbc.co.uk/news/special/education/school_tables/secondary/11/html/bacc_850.stm?compare=

Look at the Value added, and ask each school about their SEN department and how many per year have SEN, and what results they achieve, then ask about their G&T pupils, how many they have on average per year, and the results they achieve.

On paper, my local Secondary (almost fully Comp, except the highest lvl 6/7's will have gone to the superselective Grammar) has a not so good value added, despite being 'Good with Outstanding areas'.

In practice, even their SEN pupils are achieving 5 A*-G's. and most if those will be D and above, despite pupils like my DD starting that are 4/5 years behind their peers.

Their SEN Dept is amazing.

However, very few of their G&T pupils achieve a clutch of A*'s.

So that's why their Value Added slips down.

Best school in the town if you have a DC with SEN's, best school in the town if you have an average DC, not so great if you have a high flyer.

I personally think Value Added combined with knowledge about which groups of DC's do well FOR THEM in the school is the best measure of a school.

Talking my DC are all at non-religious single sex comps and we don't live in London

creamteas - yup we had a couple of them in Soton - but they got turned into mixed sex academies! They are still pretty unusual.

But all those who say comps have dire results seem to have gone ever so quiet since I posted the Hampshire page
and my DCs school is NOT the top one!

They seem to compare well with the independents! I think the 2012 league tables will include all the IGCSE equivalents (not all boards were accredited for the 2011 tables). What private schools don't reveal are all their figures for FSM or SEN (big fat zeros), attainment level on leaving primary school, value added...

Muminlondon
indeed - IGCSEs must have not been included as I do believe that the school that happygardening pays lots of money for gets better results than my comp!!
BUT
Comps when they are truly that (with the bus picking up from millionaires row each morning) then the results for all the children
academic / sporty / arty / musical / you name it : are fab
something that selective schools miss out on by being too narrow.

Dd's school is not as high as 70%, yet I consider it a very good school indeed. One reason for its lower grades (still among the best in the city) may be that it has a very good reputation for pastoral support, so it attracts families with medical issues. This doesn't necessarily mean any other child will get their studies disrupted: dd is hard-working and ambitious and certainly not disruptive; she just misses a lot of school due to illness. We appealed to get into this school for this reason and I know others who applied out of catchment for similar reasons.

I agree with what Talkin said about the vibes. It's not just about which school is the best one in general, either, but which school will be best for your child.

We have just been looking at Sixth Form Colleges, and dd has decided she is not going to apply to the most prestigious top result one, because she feels another one would get more out of her.

i went with the 70 per cent too op i didn't go and feel the vibe - i thought my dcs could get that part right iyswim

cory
Good on her. PSC is great for many people but by no means all. Where have you decided on (coded answer is fine!)
BTW did you see the splendid coverage of the purple school and their visiting speaker. NOT.

DS2's school (mentioned upthread) also gets lower than 70% A*-to-C-inc-Egn-and-Maths (we need a shorthand for that!).

They do, though, have a truly vast range of extracurricular activities and opportunities, a hugely robust line on bullying and bad behaviour, and a welcoming attitude to parents and children alike.

In DS2's case, I suspect this means he may well be having just too good a time to be concentrating on hitting the top grades. I don't remember ever waking up as a schoolchild and saying, 'Yay, Thursday, double science, drama, choir and English, life is good!' (but then I wasn't quite that sort of dramatic teenage show-off).