Is it harder to get into a selective state school or selective independent school?

[FiveHoursSleep]

I'm guessing it depends on the area and schools?
In our area, Middlesex, the kids who went private are the ones who didn't manage to get a place in the selective state schools in the Sout West Consortium , QE boys and Henrietta Barnett.
The girls who went private ended up in schools like Goldophin and North London Collegiate but when reading posts on here it looks like the independant exams are much more complicated than the state ones.
Is there just more competition for State places as you don't have to pay?

Although I agree it is very hard to get into the state super selectives, I'm not sure their tests always successfully pick out the brightest kids. Quite a few of DCs friends who got scholarships at Westminster, KCS, Colet/St Paul's, didn't get places at QE Barnet or Tiffin. Equally, quite a few of their friends who were bright, but not exceptionally bright (and definitely not at the same level as the scholarship kids), got places at QE and Tiffin but missed out on places at KGS, Colet court, Latymer Upper or Hampton. Some of the friends that got places for their DCs at QE and Tiffin did a lot of practice!

Yes - dellon. That's something that's occurred to me, too. I live close to 2 superselective grammars, and, given the competition to get in, I'd expect more Oxbridge places.

I think it may be partly the entrance exam, which is like the old 11+, and the vast majority are intensively coached for it. No interviews. Quirky or 'spiky profile' generally doesn't cut it. And also, perhaps, a lack of flair and experimentation in the teaching. They tend to be very conformist places. Whereas somewhere like Westminster seems to go out of its way to select the more interesting candidates and has the confidence to allow its teachers more leeway in an individual approach to the teaching of their subjects.

Mind you, they also spend a fair bit of time coaching Oxbridge candidates for their interviews.

thymeout

I agree - DS got into one of the top five superselective grammars...the desire to save the £££ is very tempting and others may think it mad, but because of the reasons you stated we've chosen the very selective academic indie (I am sure the grammar and the indie will have equally bright children) because the indie aims to go well beyond the curriculum ..... the overriding factors are that I want my non-conformist, quirky DS to learn how to think and do independent research ...not just accumulate A* and secondly, the extra curriculars by way of music, drama and sport are a cut above at the indie.

I wonder whether, as well as all of the reason we discussed previously for the differences in Oxbridge places, that pupils at the very good independent schools benefit from more time in the company of many interesting / intelligent teachers, not just limited to standard lesson time as in the selective state schools. Also the small pupil teacher ratio in the lessons must help to produce better discursive lessons.

DS may well end up at the same uni with same grades as he would from the grammar...(although admittedly Oxbridge chances are much higher % wise at the indie which just seems to be really geared up on that front) but we are interested in the journey as much as the end result ....again wish we felt differently then the grammar would be a no-brainer. I just feel the top grammars like Tiffin Boys with their super selective cohort should be getting similar Oxbridge success as the top indies like St Paul's, Westminster etc. given the raw material they start with and given Oxbridge is trying harder than ever to increase the state intake % wise.

And as for girls' schools:

St Paul's Girls - 45% Oxbridge
Tiffin Girls - 15% Oxbridge

Just makes me wonder why the huge difference given this thread seems to be leaning towards superselective states being just as hard if not harder to get into as the selective indies.

dalliancethat stat just shows that Tiffin has more imagination
only thick people think Oxbridge is the be all and end all

what an ignorant comment ....the point is if you can get as many as 45% into Oxbridge then it shows you have gone above and beyond the grunt work of A levels ...instead of being anti-Oxbridge you should be demanding to know why the creme de la creme of the state sector isn't doing as well as the best indies on that score....this is not a state vs indie question, but in our case a legitimate reason for choosing indie...

Have looked at Tiffin boys' leaver destinations - they had fewer Oxbridge places than Westminster last year but twice as many medics. I think that probably explains the apparent disparity.

Tiffin Girls obviously themselves think Oxbridge success is up there in terms of a yardstick of success as a school ...their 2013 Governor's reports calls it out on the first page:

"The girls continue to perform in an outstanding way. Students in Year 13 have received more offers from Oxbridge this year than ever before."

I am not "anti Oxbridge"

just pro Imperial, LSE, Edinburgh, Yale, Cornell, Stanford, McGill, Sorbonne, Berkely, Harvard, Princeton etc

piling half your kids into only two universities implies a very blinkered approach to careeers advice

Matsikula

That's interesting ...do you think in general more children at the top grammars choose medicine as a career path than at the top indies? If so, wonder what's behind that ..

so how many at Tiffin Girls really get into the Ivy League Unis you mentioned... ...again as a parent whose clever child has beaten off hordes of others to get a coveted place there ...I would want easy access to that kind of info. especially if I were in the lucky position of choosing selective indie vs. selective state?

Well, I think firstly a test that has no essay-writing element will favour a more scientific brain in the first place, but, second, lots of these children are from families where there is no family m

no family money you mean Matsikula?....so more from grammars heading for a secure professional career for life like medicine and hence heading for London unis rather than applying for Classics or PPE at Oxford.....hmm, I think you may have something there.

Though there are a lot who sacrifice family finances to go private too.

Oops - meant to say lots of grammar school children come from families without much in the way of money or connections to fall back on, and that means they are more likely to choose clearly-defined career paths rather than just pick a subject for love. And I expect lots will rule out the Ivy League universities as just too expensive, even though the difference is now not as big as it used to be.

I type too slowly on my phone! X-post!

It was 20 odd years ago now but my husband's parents turned down his Tiffin place and made big sacrifices to send him to a private school. He thinks they were nuts because if he'd gone to Tiffin he would probably have ended up as a doctor. He did English instead and is now a lawyer (which is 2nd best!), but no doubt caused them plenty of angst on the way.

There's a line in Yes Prime Minister with Sir Humphrey talking to Bernard and he's listing all the great things about the UK...
"our universities...both of them".
I agree with TalkinPeace, there are other good universities and some courses may be better at other universities. It's a very narrow way of measuring success.

aah i guess it depends what type of lawyer vs. what type of doctor Matsikula....hindsight is a wonderful thing ..you do wonder if your kids will think you are nuts and should have saved money for their adult lives instead of choosing private over a free grammar.

Say day fees are 15k on average - private secondary through till 6th form - 75k in total (and that's not including extras.)

Compare that to a free, selective state grammar (with similar results) - it's a no brainer for most families.

Also, that's just for one child - what about siblings? You can't send one private and the other not, that's not really fair.

I think if I was given that choice or my parents had that dilemma (they didn't), I would rather have that money put aside for a house deposit or towards university.

Just come back and read the answers to my original post. It's been an interesting discussion.
I have often wondered if private education is good value for money for bright children, as they seem to do very well in most schools. Surely a good state school with a tutor for subjects they need stretching in makes more financial sense?
Perhaps the middle of the range children are the ones who will benefit most from the smaller class size and more 121 attention that they get at a private school?
Also, I'm not originally from the UK, so don't get the obsession with Oxbridge places when there are other good universities to attend. This is despite DH having gone to Cambridge so I'm probably officially a hopeless case!

What bizarre posts Matzikula I had no idea that what you choose to do in life had a league table. I think some of my friends who are doctors and lawyers would laugh at the idea that they are in the fields that are nos 1 and 2, especially the doctors when they were struggling with inhumane working hours and women lawyers who found that their high flying city career had to grind to a halt when they had the competing demands of a family. Surely you chose the career that is right for you, will best use your talents and has the best chance of enabling you to get what you want out of life, be that money and / or happiness. That is what I encourage in my DDs choices. Not many people coming out of banking at the moment thinking thank goodness I sacrificed my health sanity and happiness to make "loadsamoney"!!!

DD knows lots of girls whose parents pushed them down the medicine route when they didn't have the aptitude or personal qualities. Most are now on Biomed and related courses which are full of frustrated A* students who can't work out why they "failed" . Thankfully DD knew from the start that whilst she would enjoy the medicine she would hate patients so she has gone down another Science route and loves it, has Masters and PhD funding and a career she will love planned out.

My DD turned down her Tiffin place partly because, already a Science geek, she found the Science teachers uninspiring and the labs dingy and under equipped. Given all the facilities at the indies she didn't consider it as an option for very long.

And to answer OP as others have said you are not comparing like for like. The tiffin tests were narrow and though intended to identify the top 2 or 3% by ability rather than attainment they have not been invested in so that they do that job and are apparently tutorable (though I would never have put my DD through endless repetitive practising of VR and NVR tests, zilch educational value). So the pupils who end up there are evidently not in the top 2 Or 3 % of ability, they might be, or they might have spent years of endless practise to get their scores to that level. It is either that or the quality of the teaching that explains the shortfall in their results compared with the indies. I have no idea if including Maths and English in the tests will enable them to more effectively identify ability?

In contrast the indies build up a much more holistic view of a child via effective VR and NVR tests, exams that test not just attainment in Maths and English but also the way in which the applicants think, creativity , lateral thinking etc., general knowledge, and interviews and references etc.

LEH say that their girls tend to be in the top 5% of the population on reasoning tests so in theory it should be harder to get into Tiffin which used to publish that to succeed pupils had to score in the top 3% (but now I gather only publishes the stats in relation to those taking the test ) but whether it successfully discerns that level of ability is another matter.... You won't get into LEH via years of tutoring.

Shooting, I agree with what you say and have thought that myself and that holistic approach is also what we are after in choosing indie over the grammar even if it costs 75k to do so vs free and again, it's the extras too - the music, drama and sport that you pay for not just exam results.