If you live in a non grammar school area...

[Gobbledigook]

...what are your secondary schools like?

Is there still competition to get into certain ones, like at primary level, or do you just go to the nearest/local one and that's it?

Am off out now so will check back later. I'm just interested.

lots of competition apparently and a very very clear effect on house prices.
But our dd is not 2 yet so we haven't looked into it in detail, just clocked that if we want her to go to a good school it's hard cheese unless we suddenly become a whole lot richer

We border two other counties. We are in County C, the other counties are A and B. County A has excellent state schools in the nearby town and, except for very particular reasons, no one from County C goes to schools in County A. County B has a different school system (first/middle/upper) and the local town is less socially desirable (how can you put this in a nice way) but has very nice villages around it.
In my area in County C, we have only one state secondary school and as it is a rural area the only other choice is to get on the bus to the county town 10 miles away where you could go for a place at the church secondary (if you have your forms signed by vicar etc). Our local state secondary has much better results than the schools in County B, so lots of children from County B apply to go there - and in order to do this they have to attend the County C primary schools for at least two years.

Our local secondary has a good reputation as does the nearest one to it. We are not in the catchment area (not called that anymore but ykwim) by chance. When we moved to this location, we checked out the schools and bought a house in this town because of the school's reputation (and other reasons).

There is a regular influx of families moving to the area from the nearby city (their children joining the primaries from about Year 3/4 onwards) so that they can go to the secondary school here rather than one of the secondaries in the city which have a poor reputation.

So yes, my children are attending the nearest school, but only because we deliberately moved near to it. Other people do compete for places at both the good secondaries from outside the catchment areas.

No grammar here in SW16 but there is a heavily over subscribed comp (2000 aplicant for 200 places) and it is selective.

no grammar schools here (Southampton). Some mixed schools but also 4 single sex schools - the girls' of which are excellent and the boys' of which are pretty awful. A couple of the mixed schools are not bad.

Very poor choice especially for me as the mother of boys

only a few posts so far but already a pattern.

Grammar school or not, a good school means people want to move to the area thus inflating house prices blah, blah - so what's the difference?

yes, lots of competition. my town has two single sex schools. everyone wants their daughter to go to the girls' school, but avoids the boys' school! unfair imo and ime, they are both perfectly fine schools.
neighboiuring towns are posher and therefore their mixed sex schools suffer, because those who can afford it pay for private

there is one, small, secondary state school in a village location near here with a fab reputation and everyone would cutr off their arm for their child to go there, or sell their souls for the house prices to get in catchment. this is called "going the route..."

the difference is academic selection Jools....

(Jools, your man Matthew Wright is on celebrity masterchef tonight)

we don't have a grammar school (but have one in a neighbouring borough - people don't move to go to it because where you live has no bearing on your application) and we have no selective state schools - we have a very good single sex girls' comp (done on distance but v hard to get into - all done on some weird quadrant system) and a reasonable mixed comp. People don't move here for the secondary schools.

(what, Matthew Wright cooking???) (sorry for hijack)

Yes the difference is academic selection.

I know this is not popular at the moment, but I would give a lot to have the option of sending my children to a selective school. I know they would get in [cocky mother emoticon].

The irony for me is that, although people go out of their way to try to get their children into our local comp, I am nt pleased that my son is starting there in September. We simply had no choice.

one hand academic selection
other hand financial selection

?????????????

the first one seems fairer to me!

I don't hold with the old 'can afford to tutor' argument. In the first place not all 11+ sitters are tutored, far from it and where's the evidence that tutoring actually achieves results (ie someone who was considered an unlikely candidate for grammar school suddenly finds themselves at the top of the class, so to speak! I mean, all the tutoring in the world would never have taught me how many men does it take to dig a hole this big, in this many days if it takes 6 men 4 days to dig a hole that big )

I'm hopeless at maths!

Three secondary schools here. One only 6 years old, but supposed to be good, very good Ofsted etc. Right at the other end of town, so caters mainly for that end of town, the villages on that side of town and the next town a few miles on. No-one my side of town would send their children there simply because it doesn't make sense with 2 great schools on our doorstep, but most of those I know who live near the new school seem to like it.

The two other schools are right next door to one another, their playing fields literally merging. Both are really good, one especially has brilliant academic reputation, in Ofsted's best of best list etc, although the other is also well regarded.

No real competition to get into those 2 - everyone living in the town itself (i.e. not villages) is in catchment for both. Children living in villages nearby are 'allocated' to one or other of the two schools, but can still apply to the other and always get in except in really oversubscribed years - this is very rare. I don't know anyone in the 10 years I've lived here who hasn't got into their first choice. Many of us only put one choice down on the application form.

No selection, academic or otherwise. House prices aren't affected because everyone is in catchment for both schools - so you could live in the roughest area (and there are a few!) or the most expensive house in the town, and you'd have the same chance of getting into the schools.

In practise, parents seem to choose the school they like the feel of best, although there is a minority but growing trend for parents to let each child choose for themselves, because of the schools being next to one another. I know lots of families with children at both schools.

lots of people opt out of the state sector here and send their kids private at secondary age

(yup kathy, he's cooking on celebrity masterchef!)

But grammar school areas = financial selection and academic selection - much like private schooling.

I think it is impossible to separate financial and academic selection tbh.
but both systems are unfair. neither benefits poor children. there is plenty of evidence to suggest that grammar schools don't really benefit those from poor families.

I suppose that in my area there is some selection - (see post below for set up) as house prices are significantly higher in the catchment area than in the not so good town in next county. The children from the next county who go to schools here will probably be the ones who are most concerned about education and are able to transport their children by car to out of county schools for 10 years plus.

No grammar schools round here (Sheffield) but there is definitely a hierarchy of secondary schools. Some are very good, some are very poor, with not that much in the middle TBh. The best schools are over subscribed and generally the housing in those areas have a large premium. We have cathcment areas, but obviously people can and do apply out of catchment where they can. None of the state schools here are selective.

Kerry I was educated in Ireland and have a sister a primary school teacher and a Brother a Head there so I may be able to help you with Irish ed questions.

I now live in London so my understanding is that in UK you used to have a system where all primary school kids were tested at 11 and the top performers were put in grammar schools which were more academic and had more money spent on them. The less academic were sent to Secondary Modern schools and they were less likely to get good qualification.

At some point this was deemed unfair as how can you know at age 11 how academic a child was likely to be and Grammar schools and Sec Modern schools were scrapped in favour of a new idea (which I think came from America) of mixing all abilities and teaching them in the same school. However some areas in the UK refused to abolish the Grammar school system and there are still a few around.

Private schools educate about 6% of the population and can cost anything from about £8000 a year upwards.

I'm in Sheffield too and I'd agree with hulababy's summation, except I'd argue that there is more of a spread than she implies - it's not all top-heavy and bottom-heavy. There's the entire range. I think the problem is that everyone knows which is the top one (S), and, surprise, surprise, it's in the area with the £300K houses. There's then a big drop to a cluster of another 5/6 or so which get around 65-70%, then a batch in the middle, all the way down to some dreadful ones.

Of course it's not just the marks - there's beahviour and general ethos to consider as well. I have a firiend who lives down the road from one of the "nicer" ones (T), and she says the kids she sees atlunchtimre aree awful - they smoke, spit, swing on her gate and chuck rubbish on people's lawns.

Grammar schools are not only in affluent areas you know.

UQD: I agree with what you say about T. I live not to far away from there and pass the area in the car a fair bit. The pupils are always milling about at lunchtime and after school, all over the road and in and out of shops, dropping stuff, etc. It's our catchment school (although won't be using it) and have to say I was suprised at what I saw based on it's reputation as such a good school.

But people move into grammar school areas for that reason.

I suppose it's "good" by comparison! I've heard bad rumours about a bullying culture at KE too. Ours will go to Br, which is very good but doesn't have a 6th form... bah. Blame Blunkett!!