Common entrance - how does it work?

[plea77]

A headmaster had once told me that if a child passes the pre test they are pretty much in and if they don't do too well in the common entrance they will still be accepted.

Is this true?

How does it work? if they don't get the grades at common entrance do they get extra tuition or will they not be accepted?

If they pass the pretest to a realistic school, and stay on the same trajectory, CE is a shoe-in.

depends on the school

A pretest offer is subject to them remaining on the same trajectory.

So not unlike a University offer, it is a conditional place. It is assumed that you shoud be able to get the marks required, but if you do no work you won't.

Over the years we have known a couple of boys who failed to get the CE marks for Westminster, and one St Pauls. Though the latter was the infamous year a decade ago when St Pauls over offered and one of the Westminster boys was not at a traditional prep so undershot on the work needed. We have also known the odd boy who has been warned by the prep school that they are too close to the borderline and so need to give up extra-curricular and really focus. (It worked!)

It depends. If you are at a recognised prep, it is their job to make sure the expected progress is maintained.

For senior schools who pre-test that is the qualifying exam. But as the children can't come to them for another 2/3 years they need a way to ensure that all entrants to a particular school are at roughly the same level at 13 - this is what CE is for. Otherwise, having passed a pre-test, a child might as well just go home and play GTA (or whatever this year's equivalent is) until they reach yr 9.

I have heard the words "one boy a year" bandied about in relation to CE failure after a successful pre-test. A child would have to do disastrously badly for the senior school to genuinely feel they would not be able to work with the rest of their cohort.