DH had decided DD should not go to grammar school - Help!

[supadoula]

Our gorgeous DD passed her 11+ without any tuition and then got into a grammar school 10 minutes away. She is not happy because she will miss some of her friends.
Without my knowledge, DH phoned the headmistress of her previous school (a failing middle school in special measures!) to ask if they would have her back. Of course, they said they would. Now, DD is convinced she is going back to her middle school...
I am going to mediation tomorrow with soon to be ex DH in order to sort this out ASAP. She is registered at the grammar school anyway but I need ammunition so that DH realises that it is his parental duty not to give into his daughter's whims and think about her long term future. Help!!

All I can say is that I passed the 11+ with no tuition, went to grammar, and hated it.
Thank goodness my parents listened and moved me back with my friends.
I will listen to what my children want, because as an adult, I'm so grateful my parents did.
I knew my mind at 11, and I couldn't reach my potential in an environment I didn't want to be in.

LaQueen I don't know which area you're in, but the Kent grammars do not all deliver 'superb' exam results, by any means.

They actually do score very very highly. DD's got 100% c to a*'s and came just outside the top 10 in the country and is undersubscribed

Which Kent ones don't?

The measure of 100% A* to C is fairly crude, since you'd expect 100% at any grammar. I know some are excellent, especially some of the mixed ones, but plenty don't deliver what can objectively be called 'superb' results.

Exactly Molio, even appalling comps generally get all A*-Cs for their top 20%.

blogs.ft.com/ftdata/2013/01/28/grammar-school-myths/

If you aren't an Ft subscriber you can access the artucle by googling 'FT Grammar School myths'

I'm not sure tbh LaQueen.
It was a world I didn't fit into.
I was one of only two or three who came from non fee paying schools, and it was like I lived on a different planet.
Perhaps if I'd had a close friend it would have been ok, but I wanted more than ok.

Polonium that blog is fascinating - thank you for posting the link.

Selective counties select their grammar school children by wealth, pretty much. They may as well dispense with 11+ and get applicant families to fill out a 'means' form then raffle 5% of places to poor families who are sufficiently motivated to buy a raffle ticket.

LaQueen How does having friends with older sisters at a school make your DD familiar with the school?

Re the great grammar school debate. I live in an area with grammar schools and these are my personal impressions.

1. Stepson. Tutored at mother's insistence. Got grammar school place at mixed school about 10 miles away. (His and mother's choice. Father would have preferred a nearer school - though that was single sex.) Stepson found Y7 difficult. Lost everything possible. He's never been a morning person and the early start didn't suit him. Mother kept having to drive him to bus stop at last minute. As teenage years progressed, he rebelled against the schools traditional style. School very poor at communicating with parents who didn't live together. Repeated requests to copy father in on communications ignored. Stepson became increasingly unhappy, didn't do well at GCSEs and was not admitted into sixth form. Later it emerged that stepson had Aspergers. My impression was that pastoral care was poor, and that another school that was more interested in individuals' general well-being and development, might have picked up on his somewhat different functioning. Essentially he was regarded as a square peg in around hole.

2. Stepdaughter. Tutored as above. Went to local comprehensive school. Rather slipped under the radar there, and did okay but not spectacularly. Similar story at sixth-form college. Became more ambitious and focused at university and now doing well in chosen career. Happier, and more 'stable' than her brother - as well as earning a great deal more. (He's been unemployed and in casual employment mostly.

3. Daughter. She decided she wanted to apply to go to grammar school. We bought her a couple of books of sample test papers and let her decide if she wanted to do them. Offered a place. Initially found school environment difficult after primary school, but always coped with work side. Currently doing UCAS forms etc. Our main concern is that she has become almost too driven under school's regime. Meaning that as parents we have to tell her to chill out. Also the school can be very results driven, but no so good at looking at education in a broader way.

A very intersting account MarianneSolong. Hope I'm allowed to add another:
I have a daughter who seemed likely to be hovering "in the middle" at school. So I was glad to live in a comp area where I felt she'd have a better chance than at a secondary modern. However in last couple of years she's really motored and at end of Year 5 had levels of 5B, 5C and 4A. Of course, I don't know how this relates to passing the 11+ but I would imagine she'd have a chance of setting into a non-super selective gs.

But I really do feel no differently even though my daughter would now have a chance at getting into a gs. Because I can't get round the fact that I wouldn't want her to be labelled a failure and be in an environment where other children feel they're failures. No matter how much a sec modern might strive to overcome this ( and I'm sure that many do strive very hard) its not what I would ever want for her. And I can't tell other people that it's good enough for their kids when I would never want it for mine.
I've read lots of good, well-reasoned arguments on both sides but in the end that's what it comes down to for me .

Only posting to say to Rowan - please move your dd. if she is bright and has a good work ethic, which it sounds like she has from your posts, she will do fine at another school.
Please don't underestimate how much bullying and being miserable can impact how a child learns.
She probably doesn't want to move because she is in a familiar place, and she will be worried about settling in somewhere else.

I went to a Grammar school, I hated every second of it.
I was bright, but could not reach my potential because I was so miserable, and still haven't reached any kind of potential, as the feeling of being a useless failure sticks with you.
If the school is anything like mine was (and still is by all accounts), it is a middle class bubble, populated with tutored children who have had at least two years of intensive training to scrape in.

Children do best at school if the parents are happy with it and supportive. This has been proved time and time again. The detail is less important.

I feel so sorry for the child - it is so close to term time, and she will not be able to please both parents, whatever she does, and does not have the adult experience to make the choice on her own. The parents need to sort themselves out and stop using MN to score points.

It would be interesting for someone to do a study comparing GCSE results of the "last 10%" to get into a grammar school and the "top 10 %" who failed. (Hope that makes sense). Done over three or four years that should be enough children to be statistically valid in a county like Bucks or Kent.

LeQ, the GS near me does get good gcse results, but they are comparable to comprehensives who cater for everyone.

Several children are tutored through GCSEs and probably beyond.
If this generation is anything like my own, their mediocreness shines once they reach university and beyond, and slip beyond the grasp of ambitious parents.
Of my peers, most are mediocre, some are amazing. I can see how the grammar school system has worked for a minority of genuinely academic students, but for the rest, although they are undoubtedly bright, their career has not matched up to their GS expectations.

There are a few famous alumni, one of whom memorably turned down the opportunity to speak at speech day. If rumours are correct, because the school couldn't wait to get rid of him until he excelled in his field, something that had nothing to do with his GS education.

I'm not against grammar schools at all, but where I live, it matches up to Rowan and Quint's descriptions. (IMO I should say!)