New grammars by 2020 which will exclude 90% of local kids

[noblegiraffe]

What an excellent use of scarce public funding, to build schools that most kids can't access instead of using it to build good comprehensives to improve the life-chances of everyone.

Word from the government (who appear to be ploughing ahead with the proposals before they've even published the consultation results) is that new grammars will only take the top 10% rather than the top 25% of kids. God knows where they've got the evidence that the top 10% of kids require a different school but they're certainly not sharing it with us.

It is also beyond me how making grammar schools even more elite will help with the promised social mobility agenda, when previous discussions were about how the pass grade would be needed to be lowered to increase the number of disadvantaged kids gaining access.

And if you were in favour of a grammar school opening in your area because you thought your kid would get in, how sure are you now? How much less tempting is a grammar school opening up if your kid is more likely to be sent to the other school?

In addition, expect to see furious threads in the near future from parents whose local school of choice has converted to a grammar and their kid is now being bussed to another school in the MAT that they wouldn't have chosen for them.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-38906594

I am watching a cohort of friends who I have known well since primary.

Where we live we have an excellent comp, and are also within reach of a school with a selective intake for which places are wildly over subscribed and intensely tutored for. It is 'super selective '.

I have watched:
-Several Students who failed to get in to that school get much better GCSE results at their comp than those who got selective places.

• students who started in middle sets at the comp moved to top sets for their strongest subjects
• students who started in top sets needing a slower pace in their weakest subjects being moved down.
• children who got a 'selective ' place at the other school being overtaken academically by kids at the same school who got in on distance (having missed a place on the 'selective' ticket.)

Selection / segregation at 11 is so much arbitrary nonsense. The comp is a representative community school, way higher than national average FSM, even has a community police officer attached to it (a factor often cited by MNers as to why a local comp cannot be countenanced). It offers triple science, (or double), further maths, students can do more than one MFL at GCSE, or they can do a range of Btecs.

The comparison between the kids as they grow and develop just shows what a blunt and meaningless tool the 11+ can be.

I didn't put my kids up for the exam because I know the comp is good. We haven't 'missed out' because I am watching my eldest working towards a list of As and A* s . This is just not the case for some kids who got the selective places in Yr7 (though of course many are flying, too)

So why spend extra money segregating kids into seperate schools?

Invest in good comps / making comps good. Places where later developers can be pushed with the best, where those with stronger and weaker subjects can get an appropriate pace for each.

I would like to know how much money the government spent on the green paper consultation before apparently chucking the results in the bin unread and forging ahead with selection regardless. And in a model that was not consulted.

What Lying, thieving shysters!

The point is, tutored or not tutored, a test taken on one day, when a child is 10 years old is as much a matter of luck and guesswork as it is of future academic development.

So why base a whole schooling system on it? The future high achievers who 'just miss out' on that one day deserve a good crack at education, as do those who never stood a hope. And if they can do well in these much-praised high schools, well then so can everyone!

Instead of 'rescuing' an arbitrary group of high achievers, perhaps things should be approached from another angle. Remove the disruptive to an environment that suits them, and leave eager learners of high, middle and lower abilities to make the best of what they each can do.

Better result for our society as a whole.

To be good at verbal reasoning you simply need yo read lots. A good vocabulary gives you a huge advantage in all exams and that includes the 11+. You can study VR all you like but a vocab will trump any Bond book.

Children can and do get into grammars from quite poor primaries. Several from ours which was RI for a while did. The percentage of kids from private schools are quite low. I nearly didn't put my DC in for the exam because of incorrect scaremongering on MN. On speaking to the heads it was clear although private pupils are there they are a very small fraction of the cohort as a whole which takes from a huge number of state primaries.

When I say get primaries to encourage- just inform all. Many parents have no idea they exist or that their DC could get a place. Many have also no idea that libraries exist and children can have access to unlimited free books which can be sent for free to poorer branches. Free as opposed to the huge amount of cash spent on phones and Xboxes. Inform and push reading/libraries. This should happen anyway as reading gives life long advantages within the comp sector too.

This it isn't for us stance is the cause of low pp places. Parents just don't enter their DC.Pp kids get priority at ours so clearly not getting the highest mark isn't the issue. Sitting the exam in the first place is.Grammars are working hard to improve on this area.

Mixed your experience is a prime example of how schools can and do exist happily with grammars. You are lucky you are near a good comp which stretches it's more able. Stats show other comps can struggle to do this. Plenty of schools exist near grammars and still serve their pupils well so let's keep ensuring that continues. Just because you've lost a tiny fraction of pupils the vast maj would never share a classroom with anyway doesn't mean the foot must come off the pedal.

Far far harder for bright DC from poorer schools and with less family help to get in - sutton trust has done relevant research.

Why shouldn't these students from deprived areas have the chance to better themselves if they are indeed in the top 10%

They won't get in. Or hardly any will. If it takes the top 10% the majority will be tutored to death.

My middle son is at a grammar (supposedly super selective, but nothing like the ones in the SE). It doesn't do anything for social mobility. It offers lots of expensive trips & has a ludicrously expensive uniform & 95% of kids are tutored to get in (not mine incidentally - he said only one other in his class wasn't). My youngest son's school (a slightly unusual free school - i.e not remotely Govian) has a cheap uniform, gets the kids abroad for under £40 & a £2 group passport & offers an enormous number of free enrichment type activities & puts the kids in contact with businesses & colleges & art galleries etc. That's what encourages social mobility (the school is in a deprived area & selects almost entirely by distance).

GreenGinger: but what is the point of a grammar if a good comp can do the job? What is the point in a grammar if there is a good comp nearby?

Why introduce something that relies on segregation based on a test taken in one day and serves a minority of kids?

If you do not have good comp nearby, then you are lucky that your dd did pass the test on that day. Suppose she had missed out by two points?

If the answer is, she would have done well in the high school instead, what is the point of the seperate school? If the answer is she would have gone to a terrible comp, then the terrible comp needs improving. Not just rescuing the few who have both ability and luck on the day.

Sutton has done a study and it says enough aren't there,no studies to see how many never apply in the first place.They suggested measures to get them in which schools are taking up. They need time to bed in.

Mixed at ours there is an appeals procedure which looks at primary grades,they can reapply at 13 and places crop up every year as people move etc.

Grammar schools (ime) are not remotely interested in social ability. They are interested in grades as that is how they are judged. They have to pay lip service to it, but if they were genuinely interested they would not have uniforms with PE kids costing over £200 or foreign trips starting at £500

Our uniforms are cheaper than the comp( same online supplier). Free for pp kids. Grammars are judged on progress (which can be harder to show) the same as everybody else.

The headline figures are never about progress. Always % A*-C

My son's grammar doesn't have a supportive ethos - there doesn't seem to be much about actually supporting kids to make progress (although to be fair some individual teachers go out of their way to be helpful - it's really not part of the school's ethos) - just an assumption that if they're not progressing they're not working & their middle class parents will bollock them into working harder (or pay for extra tuition to get them through GCSE's - which seems to happen a lot - they select again at A level of course).

I'm sure there are some things you can praise grammars for - but it's delusional to think they aid social mobility.

So to 'correct' the faulty admissions system children need to move school at 13. Disrupting friendships etc.

What is the point of the grammar school in the first place?

They seem to need so many ifs and buts, so many factors to make them accessible and effective in identifying the right students (let alone fair and equitable).

Work on tutor-proof tests, fiddle about with the intake, wrench teens away from friends at 13, build a seperate building to keep the slightly less intelligent at a safe distance....

Why not just make sure every comp does a good job?

The politics of all this could become interesting:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-38919383

I think we will see a lot more campaigning from Heads around this issue. Tory MPs are actually very divided and I suspect many are wondering why No 10 is so determined to push it. According to the Times the thinking behind the 10% is to persuade waverers that existing comprehensives will not be too badly affected. But in doing that they have removed their whole rationale for having more grammars in the first place.

Angela Rayner is a little bit too professional Northerner for my taste but she is a very smart political operator. Her tweets have exactly hit the spot- the contrast with cuts in school funding, the cosy political cronyism (similar to the Surrey County Council deal). If she takes this case to wavering Tory MPs she has a good chance of stitching together a rebellion on this.

Someone further up said they were bullied at their comp for being bright. I think things have changed, or certainly seem to have where we are. Being bright is seen as cool. Kids want to do well.

And just on the brighter kids being disadvantaged, well no they're not when a comprehensive system truly works. DS goes to a big inner city comp. They stream, so in academic subjects kids work with kids at their level. The groups are fluid, so a child can drop down a set or move up. They do triple science, etc, etc. So what's wrong with that? All kids can flourish at DS's school. That's fair, so why not just make comps work?

btw, genuinely shocked by the snootery about Angela Raynor. Unbelievable that people on here can decry another woman like that.

Traalaa She didn't go to a grammar so her social mobility story doesn't count.

Essex heads here also rebelling about funding although not linking to grammar issue as Essex already has them

www.yourharlow.com/2017/02/08/headteachers-write-to-mp-robert-halfon-over-funding-crisis/

Noble may like 3:45 on the video where Vic says Maths teachers can "name their price" . That new yacht is closer than you think!!

Here in. S London where our comp educates those involved in gang culture, those in a well supported 'support' strand, and high ratios of children from groups associated with under-achievement, there is no bullying for being bright and / or working hard at any academic level. It's even cool to work hard AND play a musical instrument. Even a violin!

Same here, Mixed Grill. Also London.

Just to add to the only tutored kids get into Grammar mantra. This is anecdotal, but still interesting. There's one super selective in North London. I know a mum who's son took the test. Six from his primary did. All similar ability at primary, so top table, etc and had been for years. Three were tutored weekly/ privately for a couple of years. Three not. Guess which three got in?!

In Buckinghamshire there is a marked difference from area to area regarding the actual percentage of catchment area children who are selected for the grammar schools. This directly correlates to the "wealth" of the area. The Aylesbury Vale area has traditionally had a "first time" pass rate of 16-18%. Appeals bump this up. In the Chiltern and South Bucks area the rate is closer to 35% and they have a much higher concentration of prep schools. Therefore the notion that it is 25% or 10% is totally dependent upon the ability of a certain percentage of children to pass the test. In areas of less wealth, the number of children getting appropriate coaching is less. Some parents are duped into paying for coaching when there is little prospect of their child passing because they simply will not accept that their child just is not that bright. Believe me, the biggest sense of failure is those parents and children who have paid for and received years of coaching and still don't pass! Parents should know better, but they don't.

There are many parents in Bucks who have children at a grammar and a secondary modern. As mentioned by a pp, the results in many secondary moderns in Bucks is good for the very many higher achievers who go there. Many parents are more than happy for their child to go to the local secondary modern and some of them are very impressive schools. The biggest problem is the lower achievers, but that is another story. There is less and less evidence that families are ripped apart by the division of schooling. The grammars have fairly ordinary uniforms - massively changed from my very expensive and distinctive grammar school uniform of years ago. The secondaries have smartened their children up! The biggest problem is quality of teaching between the types of schools. Also, it is how many children need to do triple science that matters, not the size of the school. If a tiny school has lots of high achievers, triple science is viable but may not be viable in a large school with a tiny cohort that want to do it.

If some MATs are going to run with this (and I wish they wouldn't) then keeping the percentage low is better than high. Having said that, controlling the "low" percentage is difficult. In some areas one could imagine less than 5% being selected so one would imagine grammars are only viable in the wealthier areas. Aylesbury Vale is very leafy in comparison to some deprived areas but still has schools where the pass rate is 2% or even 0% some years. There is little evidence to suggest grammar schools anywhere are full of FSM children! It is definitely not all high achievers who are grammar school material, either. In Bucks is can be half of them. This is why parents are often mislead as to possible success. Any money should go into providing better schools for all and usually that means better teaching!

Haven't there been numerous studies that show grammars don't give any advantage to the bright kids but their very existence disadvantages the others?

KathyBeale, exactly my point I was written of age 11 into a failing school with my other written of peers and 75% of us in my year have more than exceed expectations... funny that ...

I'm in two minds about it. We're in Trafford, so the system is Grammars already. The secondary schools here are okay, some better than others, some go up and down, but overall not excellent. They are probably not great because of the grammar schools.

On one hand, more grammars would make it fairer for bright local children, who currently have to compete with children from across the NW. Seriously, we get kids here sitting grammar school exams from places like Southport. In my mind, these kids are depriving local children from a place in their local school. Then our local children are having to travel to schools in other areas. That's pretty fucked up.

On the other hand, no grammars at all would probably mean the secondaries would improve.

Re 11+, if only. All our grammars hold their own different tests now, so kids have to prepare for individual exams. Madness.

Do any of the grammar supporters want to comment on the conundrum of the maths/science genius who doesn't qualify for entry to grammar due to dyslexia/dyspraxia/ADHD?

KathyBeale Loads. The government appears to have decided to treat them as "alternative evidence"