Grammar schools to be means tested for free places

[dera35]

Are admissions to Grammar schools going to be means tested for free places ? I.e Children from affluent families will pay fees ?

I can understand if it goes that way because there is lots of independent research that points to Grammar schools being dominated by affluent families and especially using expensive private tuition for entrance tests.

I think some grammars use means testing (or rather FSM) to select their final student(s) in the event of a tie. So if you need 128 to get in and 4 people are tied on 128 and there is only one space, then it would go to FSM if there was one.

Could that be what they meant?

@Needmorelego Thanks for the education. I dropped out of school don’t understand the nuances.

I asked a question in my post. A question implies I don’t know.

You've made this up.

Your pointless post and then that. Whatever you've got going on, no need to take it out on ppl here

As grammar schools are state schools which are not paid for by parental fees then means testing would mean state schools become fee paying.

So the question really is
Will state schools become fee paying.

No Current political party is proposing this.

I’d love to know why parents at your school were discussing this.
Can you ask and let us know.
Thankyou

Grammar schools are state schools (apart from a few private schools that call themselves grammar ). So perhaps you should re- title the thread, are we going to be charged for state education?

Why should grammar school parents be charged, and not affluent parents in wealthy areas. Eg leafy Surrey or Hertfordshire?

This is not going to happen.
Other things that will not happen:
Aliens are not going to land in the UK in the next few years.
The Royal Family are not lizards.
And dinosaurs are not going to be brought back to life like Jurassic Park.

OP there are a lot of conspiracy theories going round. When someone tells you something that seems unlikely ask them where it was reported. If it is in a mainstream newspaper fair enough. If it is Joe Bloggs blog bringing you the hidden truth they do not want you to know - then ignore it.

@EarthlyNightshade . Thank you. I was not aware that Grammar schools did means tested allocation in case of a ‘tie’ between students.
That may well have been the basis for the discussion at school in the first place.

If there were VAT on PE, I'd have been over the moon, as my mother wouldn't have paid it... but that was when PE meant physical education/running around a frozen-muddy field in November with a teacher in a warm tracksuit complained we weren't moving our frozen blue legs fast enough, not this month where it's apparently become the way to described independent education.🙂

The school do not means test themselves its based on free school meals.

As an aside our two local grammars do not select based on FSM. The places are given when 11+ results are the same to those that live the closest to the school

Maybe these parents are thinking that, with the imposing of VAT on private schools, some will seek to wholly or partially enter the state sector? IF that was the case then MAYBE they might go through a transition where affluent parents paid but there were free means tested places in them? I have heard absolutely nothing to suggest this has been proposed by anyone but it might be a way to deal with good schools which will otherwise become financially unviable.

But this would be nothing to do with existing state grammars.

I was not aware that Grammar schools did means tested allocation in case of a ‘tie’ between students

They don’t.

Agree.
Its usually based on distance, siblings already at the school and looked after kids.

@ClaudiaWankleman yes spot on. I was trying to write the next novel in the Harry Potter series and thought why not start a novel about schools !!

This is not means testing OP.
If a private school has one place and they have two potential pupils with the exact same marks on the entrance exam will use other factors to decide who to accept. That could be sporting prowess. But you would not say the school is selecting pupils on the basis of who can run fastest.
Your private school mums do not sound very bright if they can misunderstand this concept so spectacularly.

Henrietta Barnett School in London gives preferential access to looked after children, children living within a 3 mile radius of the school ... and children eligible for pupil premium.

@allwewant My kids attend a state school.

@dera35 then I am puzzled why some parents thought entrance to grammar school was means tested.

well, then, you know state schools are not means tested.

how would that even work? Who at a state school is set up to assess parental income and send out bills? how would the money be collected and what would be done with it? What would happen to children who's parents were late paying?

State schools are completely without the apparatus to even begin to manage fees. Surely that is obvious????

Think you may have got the wrong end of the stick Op or your school friend mums are dense