Value added scores for independent schools

[papalazaru]

Is there a way to find these scores? I'm looking at different schools for my daughter who is currently in Year 5. When comparing the schools using GCSE results obviously you can rank them but if a school is highly selective with its intake then it follows that their results will reflect this. However, a school with a good value added will be making the most of their less able children.
Some schools I've looked at do publicise their value added but others don't. How can I find it out? Will I specifically have to ask?
Thanks.

Div is short for division at Winchester which is basically a form with a Div Don who teaches free range History, English Lit, RE and anything allied.
I think IndridCold is confusing it with Divinity as a RE type subject.
The boys at Winchester also get extra History or English Lit depending on their year pre sixth form.
As everybody has said I suppose Winchester can get away with it because of their track record. It certainly opens up horizons and engenders enthusiasms from what I have observed and allows the teachers to share their love of a subject rather than be too stilted by curriculum constraints.

Thanks - it sounds very good: happily my son's English teacher shares his distaste for 'to kill a mockingbird' and goes off piste enough to keep them interested while being a good enough teacher to get excellent exam results... It shouldn't be like this IMHO.

As said above, whilst I would love to see Div or similar extended to other schools, it wouldn't be possible in practice because universities know it's what's done at Win Coll (and done well) but it would be harder to believe that students at 'bog standard comp' or 'bog standard indie' we're being delivered a suitable curriculum without exams to prove it.

Why is it hard for a "bog standard comp" or a "bog standard indie" to deliver a suitable curriculum. As a person with a degree in a subject unrelated to my occupation I briefly looked at escaping my current job and teaching. What put me off was how rigid the curriculum is, no opportunities to go off piste and teach my fascinating wonderful subject. I would have thought any teacher whose truly passionate about either history, Eng Lit or even wine tasting (I believe it's been done in 6th form Div) would relish the opportunity to teach Div. As I've said I don't see it costing any more.
It's aim is to produce all round educated articulate individuals who can formulate complex ideas on paper and when they go off to university they have not focused narrowly on just a few subjects. It's not done at the expense of A levels or in Win Colls case Pre U's but to compliment examined learning. So surely universities would welcome it however unmeasurable it's achievements are.

happygardening
Why is it hard for a "bog standard comp" or a "bog standard indie" to deliver a suitable curriculum

because in a comp with a cohort of 300
there will be around 50 RG Uni level students
around 50 'new' Uni students
50 skilled trade students
50 service trade students
50 labouring trade students
and 50 kids who struggle with basic numeracy and literacy

also, the budget per student is around £5000 per year - which has to cover teaching, exams, buildings and everything else

the maths just does not add up

No, no, I totally agree that most schools would be able to deliver it, I just mean that if you've gone to a.n.other school you would have to put a paragraph on your cv/ Uni application justifying/explaining why you don't have an Eng Lit qualification (not so much history as not all students would choose it anyway, but Lit is more or less an expectation for all but the weakest students who do the joint lang/lit qual), whereas if it says WC on your cv, unis know why you don't. That's all.

And I also believe many parents would object to the ideas as being too wishy- washy or intangible so it would be a hard sell, even to educated/aspiration all parents.

Not to me, but I'm far more concerned with the education than the qualifications.

Lots of autocorrections on ipad tonight. Grrr.

Why won't 50 skilled trade students, 50 "new" Uni students, 50 service trade students, 50 labouring trade students and lets not forget 50 kids who struggle with basic literacy and numeracy benefit from being taught and being allowed to talk about and try and write about Shakespeare, and perhaps reinact it in an informal way say in the local church, Wilde, 18 th century history, current affairs, listen to an opera, or discuss Dali? If I wrote that Id have the wrath of half on MN come down on my head. My grand father believed that education in the broadest sense of the word was what made you as a person he came from the aspirational working classes, who read, attended concerts and regularly went to galleries etc he didn't say because I'm skilled trade working class this is not for me.
Talkin friend used to have a poster on her wall saying "Limits only exist in your mind".

This is the problem parents want tangible measurements, so education has been formulated to be measurable and that has given us the thoroughly narrow prescribed unsatisfactory one size fits all examination results/league table obsessed education that we have now. Frankly I find it thoroughly depressing.

happygardening
They most certainly would benefit from it in an esoteric manner,

but I do not see the CBI calling out for more students skilled in 'div' when they leave school.

The system has enough problem finding qualified maths teachers without diverting resources into frankly airy fairy stuff that is a nice add on for very bright boys with very rich parents

THose who seek to learn will find ways to do so outside school
those who do not seek need to be guided tightly

happy you may be correct and it is parents who want tangible measurements, but more than that, I think it's the outside world who demand it.

At Win Col, the world can assume that div is being well taught, that the students are able enough and engaged enough to get the best from it.

That's simply not the case in many schools. I'm a governor at a school where TBH there are no teachers I think could teach div like that andvery few students who are able enough and engagaed enough to get anything out of it. We get them to attend English lessons because they know they need a C to access their next course, but if they didn't need that C, I'm not sure they'd bother...

You seem to have a very constrained, blinkered idea of what is of importance in education Talkin. Frankly if you think all that is airy fairy then you are missing out on a great deal. American and French education manage all those 'add ons' in humanities including philosophy without losing out on technical and scientific expertise.

summerends
US state school education is dire in the sciences : the expertise at Universities is imported.
I've read enough of Bonsoir's popsts to be unconvinced that the French curriculum is flexible and variable.

Personally I hate the kow towing to the CBI : if they want trained people they should cough up for the apprenticeships

but in a world with reducing employment opportunities for those in the left third of the bell curve, concentrating on core transferrable skills is essential.

It is also NOT the job of schools to fully stretch the right end of the curve - kids only spend 1/6 of their waking hours in lessons after all.

If France do anything well it is maths and science. We really could learn a thing or two there.

And the bac is far more wide reaching than what state schools here offer.

But yes, it is very rigid. Top down NC. Though, unlike here they at least have consistency and haven't suffered the endless fecking tinkering with curriculum and exams.

Talkin science education in the States lags behind the specialism of the UK but as you say more than catches up once the students do specialise.
The French education is very prescriptive but does mean that students leave with the basics of culture and philosophical thinking.
I don't think a Div equivalent has to stretch, just allow the good teachers to teach about what might inspire at least some of the kids. It could be just as much about listening to legends or looking at paintings anything which gives some colour to their life, present and future.

Sorry, missed out what you said about the expertise in USA science being imported. That is rubbish, science is international and the USA has a lot of the best research facilities and funding which attracts Europeans and Asians but that does n't mean that USA universities are relying on non Americans to teach science.

I agree with you that the top third can and should 'stretch themselves' or have their parents do this for them, but what about those who don't have access to, or knowledge of wider culture. Even many of my degree-educated friends, I wouldn't call cultured in the ways being talked about.

(Not to mention the idea that the middle and bottom thirds might well enjoy this kind of stuff if exposed to it, too.)

"Those who seek to learn will do it outside of school those who don't need to be guided tightly"
Utter rubbish for only a short period in our lives do we have the time to exposed to the many different things in our world. We need our schools to encourage us to be inquisitive questioning individuals who are able yo appreciate the many diverse things our world offers. This is what makes our society civilised, and how ideas are generated that will change our world. Not once have a I said Div should replace formal examination but I really struggle to see why so many children are being asked to do 12 GCSE's when they could be covering some of the subjects in a much more informal informative and enjoyable way, feeding their imaginations enabling them to think outside the box and also function more effectively in work.

happy- with the best will in the world, many schools are trying to stop DC chucking chairs around, as it were.

I do think that by the very nature of being in a paid-for school, you have automatically shut out quite a lot of the sort of DC who certainly wouldn't benefit from 'Div'.

And few LEAs would support the channelling of cash towards such a relatively small group as those who would benefit from 'Div'. Maybe, with all due respect, if all you've known is the private sector, maybe you don't understand what state schools teach and why? And it's frankly absurd to compare WC DSs with the great mass of state school DC.

OP (While the world waits for Tansie to discover Advanced Search...) it's worth repeating that you're looking for the wrong thing.

Particularly at a very sective school , people aren't generally expecting value to be added - they just want their child to fulfill the potential they arrived with.

....sorry - lenses, small screen etc. selective.

happygardening - it does rather go back, though, to the fact that not everyone is agreed on what it is most vital we expose ourselves to... You have chosen Winchester for your ds because its values mirror your values. I fear there would be a huge amount of scope for whiney parents to complain about a teacher's choice of mind-broadening subjects in a school full of children from diverse social and racial backgrounds.

And yes, I'm sure that children at Winchester come from a range of racial backgrounds, but their parents have all bought into the establishment in a big and expensive way.

Once again I agree with rabbit. I know from my time on Mumsnet that what I value and what I want my DC to be exposed to isn't what most parents want. So I have to pay for it.