Quality of teaching in your grammar school

[fcsale]

With the decline in the number of teachers, I am curious to find out both the quality of and the number of vacancies in your DC's grammar school.

• Selective/super selective
• General area of school (eg South East)
• Are you happy with the quality of teaching?
• Are there are lot of teaching vacancies and if so which subjects?

My DC are upper primary age but I've been searching for schools financial benchmarking and found one of the super-sective schools around my area (SE) spending at the lowest 10% of similar schools (not sure what that truly means) for teaching staff and wondered how other schools are like.

schools-financial-benchmarking.service.gov.uk

Generally speaking they have the smallest budgets as they have very little pupil premium and SEN so they've always had to be very frugal in terms of costs. A lot of grammar school buildings aren't in a great shape too.
However, they've always had less teachers. Kids in grammars tend to be easy to teach and don't need small classes. They're usually bright, eager to please and mostly have the same attainment level across the board. Obviously this will differ school to school but having small staff numbers is something I would definitely expect from a super selective. That doesn't mean their teaching will be bad.

Interestingly, it's one of the arguments the conservatives have used for small budgets. Look at all these grammar schools getting incredible results on tiny budgets. Unfortunately standing in for lack of social workers and provision for SEN are both incredibly expensive and something grammar schools, especially the super selective ones, don't tend to need in the same way comps do.

Agree in general budget wise grammar schools are slightly worse than normal comprehensive schools due to low percentage of SEN or PP.

School budget is not driven by public exam results. Some superselective schools funding is supported by constant parents contributions (such as QE boys, have a large group of competive parents body that willing to contribute).

Some other selective schools are subsidied by its linking endowment or charity trust but it is not enough.

I don't know how this fares, and I've posted similar asking how teacher recruitment/retainment is for selective compared to non selective schools. I'm interested solely because I have a dc at a grammar school (y7-so a fair few years to go yet).

In answer to your questions:

• Selective/super selective
Selective
• General area of school (eg South East)*
North Yorkshire*
• Are you happy with the quality of teaching?*
Overall, yes. Dc has mentioned things along the lines of, didn't cover x in biology and it was in end of year test, or didn't have x information in geography and so on; but dc is in year 7, so not too worried (yet!)
They seem to do very well when it comes to GCSEs and A Levels, so the school knows how to enable pupils to achieve their best.*
• Are there are lot of teaching vacancies and if so which subjects?*
This year the school have advertised vacancies for teachers in
German
English
RS
History*

I do want to add, parents do help contribute a lot through crowdfunding etc.
It makes a huge difference (such as upgrading equipment etc).

My DC attends a Grammar school in Southend, the teaching is absolutely outstanding. We are so impressed with the school, it's almost impossible to see how they achieve what they do on school such small budgets. The dedication to the wellbeing of each child goes above and beyond in my opinion. DC really appreciates everything the teachers and other staff at the school do and thinks they deserve so much more. Along with being excellent teachers they are incredibly kind. I hope they know how much we all appreciate them.

There are currently two roles advertised at the school, one is a teaching assistant and the other working in the Physics lab.

A lot of what @Sandyshore75 resonates.

As I said my dc is only y7, so a huge change (and definitely take what they say with a pinch of salt, when it comes to feedback about teaching/lessons 😂).

However, dc didn't follow a typical journey of primary school to secondary, and that was probably my biggest worry. I've been absolutely delighted with the pastoral care and the general care. Teachers definitely go above and beyond (I'm talking a phone call to let you know how well dc has done in test/email update and so on- with all the workload they already have, that IMO is them going the extra mile).

I do worry about teacher shortages, and how things will pan out in the next few years.

@NoTimeToThinkOfUsername It's interesting how teacher shortages differ from area to area too. North of England doesn't seem as effected, probably to do with more affordable housing. Most teachers in London have to live in flatshares so it's not exactly appealing.

However, I think grammars will always be more attractive to teachers as the behaviour tends to be far better and you can actually teach.

A key Q to ask kids is how many changes of teacher or short term supply teachers they have had. How many non-specialists have they had.

All schools have struggled to recruit. Increasingly they have to take people who are not who would really be their top choice.

By this stage in the year, most vacancies will be filed somehow. Now isn’t the most indicative time to know the problems.

There are big problems recruiting and retaining teachers. Grammars might have managed to avoid the probs for longer than many schools but the problem is acute and all schools including state grammars and independent schools are now being impacted. It’s increasingly untenable as a job and people are leaving and people aren’t training.

Quality of teaching will be significantly impacted by changes of teachers, lack of subjects specialists etc. Luckily for the Grammar kids, most can get by without huge input due to natural intelligence, especially if they’ve got some decent textbooks or online resources. However, it’s not as it should be.

@WombatChocolate Quality of teaching is the most important factor in the quality of education received by Dc in a school. No child can get by without high quality teaching. Not all Dc in grammars are the same. Plenty need significant input to achieve well.

Vacancies for teachers should be filled now. Resignation deadline is end of May usually. Staff on other contracts can be recruited at any time.

I think teaching in some schools remains an attractive job, but with frustrations like every job!! It still does have decent holidays. The best run schools still attract decent talented staff. But it’s a bun fight at many others. When slt, staff, parents and Dc work together you have a great school. There just are not enough of them.

I think that is exactly what I said. I’m not sure which parts of what I said are the parts you’re commenting on to be honest. Children everywhere are being done a dis-service by the crisis that has been generated in teacher retention and recruitment. All children need stability if teaching and quality of teaching. They all lose out without it. Those in Grammars might be able to struggle along a bit better with less input, but no-one does as well as thy could without it.

And yes, vacancies now don’t necessarily represent how hard schools have found it to recruit. Lots will have advertised more than once and by now have appointed someone they’d really rather not have done.

All schools are struggling. Even in ‘nice’ schools with nice parents and staff theee are lots of significant pressures and the funding issue makes it incredibly hard for everyone.

We need to acknowledge the problems all our schools are facing and that children are being sold-short.

“Luckily for the grammar kids, most can get by with without huge input”. I merely disagreed with this view @WombatChocolate . Not everything you said.

My son's grammar school has just had a huge new extension, muga, new canteen, new sixth form block... £££££
It is an excellent school with fantastic pastoral care. They actually do have a large number of asd/adhd boys (it's an all boys school except 6th form).
The teaching is generally very good - a couple of the science teachers aren't great but no complaints with the rest or the gcse/a level choices on offer. They also do a lot of sport, extra curricular sand enrichment activities.
The staff retention is very good indeed, most staff have been there years - only really hear of retirement or maternity leave vacancies.... compared to my other son's local comp where the retention is terrible and they simply can't recruit....

This is in Kent close to Greater London borders. Also a friend is a teacher at an all girls grammar in Kent/Medway borders and also has good staff retention and no issues recruiting.

I believe that poster said:

Those in Grammars might be able to struggle along a bit better with less input, but no-one does as well as thy could without it.

Which I think is fair and accurate.

@TizerorFizz and even earlier when she said:
Luckily for the Grammar kids, most can get by without huge input due to natural intelligence, especially if they’ve got some decent textbooks or online resources. However, it’s not as it should be

I also completely agree with this. You've sort of taken bits of what that poster said and quoted it out of context. The poster is acknowledging it's not as it should be, but grammar school kids can mostly get by without huge input. It's not as it should be, no, but it's nowhere near how difficult it would be for a middle or low attained from a comp. Just look at the 11+ threads. The amount of support those kids get at home is immense, there's no way parents wouldn't step in to support. They almost exclusively come from homes where education is of utmost important and they have natural ability. That's not saying none have issues, but it is far easier for kids from homes like that go achieve well with crap teaching, than those in comps. There's no denying that.

@Aria20 they likely have a wealthy PTA, church backing or healthy reserves they've invested.

DS in a grammar school in SE, so far I have been pleased (and surprised!) by the enthusiasm and passion of the teachers, lots of bright young teachers who don’t yet seem disillusioned with it all! I do think it must attract good teachers, for a start they can can actually get on with teaching as there is v little disruption unlike the local comp. The kids are generally motivated to learn but even when they aren’t they don’t seem to disrupting the whole class.

Generally there seems to be lower turnover of staff because it is probably an easier job than teaching in other schools. I have found them to also be somewhat more experienced - many have been there for years. There is also more motivation amongst parents to ensure that their children behave because they are strongly invested in their child attending a grammar school. Not that there isn't disruption but I think less than in other schools.

Daughter is a Chelmsford old-girl. Asian and African parents work their kids exceptionally hard. Consequently, many leavers are earning £100k early, some at 25 a lot more at 30.
Tutoring throughout the 7 years is common, essential for competitive A-Level subjects.
The Boys across the road enjoy better facilities and I felt the girls moving there for sixth form improve their stats.
I'll happily settle for a 30 year-old comfortable in her own skin.

@Foxesandsquirrels no pta that I'm aware of and my son is year 10!! Not church run either. We do have to give £20 school fund a year.

They increased to 7 form entry a few years ago so I think they got funds for expansion. The original building is very old though.

Quite possibly it's been in the pipeline for a while. There are also improvement grants given to schools but they're few and far between. Your son's school may have just been lucky.

@Foxesandsquirrels interestingly, DS has mentioned a few teachers are from the south (he finds it interesting because they have 'my accent' 😂 as originally from south west!)

Makes sense, if you can buy a 3 bed house instead of a flat share, with job security, I think most would take it.

Thank you all for sharing your experiences and thoughts, I'm sure I'm not the only one to find it interesting. Next year I'll keep an eye on staff vacancies around May so I know how much staff they will be losing.

Thanks @WombatChocolate for the key question to ask - I will keep this in mind. In fact we'll be going to visit a grammar in the next couple of weeks so I would be most grateful if anyone asked or wish they'd asked when looking around a potential school?

When we looked round, there were hundreds and hundreds of other parents doing the same. It was jam packed. We looked at two that are our catchment ones. Not a chance to ask anything. It seemed easier to get info from existing parents. You really are not going to know about quality of teaching or turnover from a visit. You just have to trust they have everything covered.

They both had decent enough buildings but both felt too big for their sites. Sports facilities were cramped to say the least. We were not overly impressed but other parents desperately want to get to these schools. The exam results are impressive snd so is progress 8. That’s the best measure. They are highly sought after.