Candidates flying from overseas to sit super-selective grammar 11+

[PopcornPoppingInAPan]

A friend told me for one of the super super selectives in London that some candidates who live overseas had flown in to sit the 11+ exam. If successful the whole family was relocating here. (This is foreign nationals, rather than “ex-pat” British families living overseas.) The school has no priority area.

I wondered if anyone had heard this and whether it was credible or if it’s one of those internet rumours?

I was also wondering if it’s even possible to do this. Obviously families do relocate to the UK and assuming they and the kids have a right to reside then the kids will be entitled to a school place. But can you do it before you’ve moved here?

I guess if you can put down a relative’s address as your address for the purpose of sitting the exam and then submitting the CAF maybe that’s all you need. I wasn’t sure if LAs did any more checks on candidates who aren’t already on their books at state primary, IYSWIM.

I have heard of a family moving from Yorkshire when their DC got a place at the same super selective school so perhaps this is just an extension of that.

We have a huge group of children being let down by their parents by toxic levels of exposure to the internet and all the safeguarding issues there. Go focus on that instead

Why don't you start a dedicated thread to discuss that? You seem more passionate and urgently concerned about an issue that you yourself have declared as not urgent. IMHO, it is fundamental.

@bluegoosie

IQ Heritability and Twin Studies
Research into IQ heritability is not inconclusive; rather, it is extensive and complex, with many studies showing that IQ is influenced by both genetic and environmental factors. Twin and adoption studies have provided some of the most robust evidence for estimating the genetic component of intelligence. However, even these studies acknowledge that environment plays a significant role, especially in childhood. This underscores the point that intelligence is not fixed and that early educational advantages (such as tutoring and test preparation) can significantly impact outcomes.

This is an interesting but lengthy discussion, I would need to post lots of research papers which would be off topic. The research is vast of course but no less inconclusive 😁 There has been yet another paper recently discussed even here on MN, the authors claim IQ is over 85% hereditary or something like that. The numbers are meaningless as there will be another paper disproving this, then another paper and so on and so forth.

Having studied neuroscience, I am of course pro-nurture as the brain has an enormous potential to develop, even beyond childhood. And of course intelligence is not fixed and depends on the environment. This is exactly why parents will continue fighting for good education! 😂

There is no economic case for getting rid of grammar school selection. They are excellent value for the State, producing outstanding results at low levels of pupil funding. There really is no argument here that the State is going to go on yet another vanity project that makes no economic sense like the private school VAT.

@Dtnews - no it is you who keeps going on about social mobility. Screen exposure is the number one factor in social mobility right now.
The whole type of school question is a thing of the past.

Are Grammar Schools Improving Education for Society as a Whole?

A major issue with grammar schools is that they do not operate in isolation. Their existence directly impacts non-selective schools in their areas.

Research from Durham University (2018) found that regions with grammar schools did not perform better overall than fully comprehensive regions.Areas with selective education systems tend to have worse overall GCSE outcomes than areas with fully comprehensive systems.

This challenges the claim that grammar schools raise standards across the education system. Instead, they may simply redistribute high-achieving students without adding significant value.

If grammar schools do not significantly improve academic progress, and if they do not promote social mobility at a societal level, then:

• What is the justification for maintaining a state-funded selection system at age 11?
• Why should public money be spent on a system that lacks scientific scrutiny and independent oversight?
• Wouldn’t resources be better spent improving comprehensive education for all students?

The whole type of school question is a thing of the past

Yet you write paragraph after paragraph of random thoughts, attempting to justify something you yourself claimed is 'a thing of the past'

Raising levies, charging fees, stopping funding, and converting them into private schools makes economic sense.

My daughter is already segregated from the community we live in, just because we aren’t like most of the families that live here. Yeah, we’ve found some other familes like us, but it’s not the norm.

How will it have a detrimental social effect on her not be be sat in the park smoking weed with dickheads off the estate after school like the teenage girls I walk past everyday?

People who spout diversity really need to spend a week in the shithole I live in. You’d soon change your mind.

It's not just QE that doesn't have the catchment area. HBS is the same as many other grammars.

HBS used to be very representative of the local area - then people with a massive chip on the shoulder or rabid ideologies hated it for being "rich Jewish tw@ts school" 🤷‍♀️

Haters gonna hate. It's not as simple and straightforward as you picture it. It's in British culture to hate high achievers and there is of course a huge class hatred between different strata of the population, too.

There is not really much of a grammar system left over though? It is 5% overall, some superselectives in London that we were talking about that really do attract very bright kids from all sorts of areas, then there are the last remaining grammar areas in Kent, Bucks, Lincolnshire and apparently the people in those areas still like their grammar schools. When you look at the affluent parts of Bucks and Kent, there is not really an indication that the results of all kids, taken as a whole, are adversely impacted by the existence of grammar schools. If anything, places like Bucks hugely benefit indirectly. People move there bringing affluence with them into local councils and house prices are steady etc.
If anyone wanted to get rid of state grammar schools in those areas, surely it is up to those areas to decide what they want? If it means a fall in-house prices, people leaving etc, displaced kids, I really doubt they would vote for it.

rabid ideologies is bad, but the area was, and is rich housing, and large proportion of Jewish communities. The school itself clearly not a reflective of their local community. Whatever the local community means.

@bluegoosie

Should taxpayer-funded education be structured in a way that exacerbates inequality, or should we be focusing on making high-quality education accessible to all children, regardless of background?

The elites have already answered your question :)
The answer is "f@ck ya all!"

Well, if the government can act on the 7% of private schools, I don't see why it wouldn't address the 5%. It seems like a straightforward task that wouldn’t cost much but could easily put the debate to rest. Besides, this isn't urgent for you as it is the past issje anyway.

I still have no idea what kind of elite you're talking about—those from grammar schools, whose parents proudly believe they are top 5% natrually born special?

There are 163 grammar schools in England, educating around 188,000 students—a significant portion of government-funded education. Grammar schools also receive additional targeted funding, including £200 million allocated for expansion, with £50 million distributed in 2018-19 through the Selective School Expansion Fund (I do not know if this will continue)

State education is funded by all taxpayers, meaning its allocation is a concern for everyone, not just parents in selective areas. The debate over grammar school funding is not about individual parental choice, but about whether this system benefits society as a whole.

A large body of evidence (see my previous posts) demonstrates that grammar schools do not significantly improve educational outcomes or enhance social mobility at a systemic level. Given this, why should taxpayer money continue to fund an opaque, selective system that does not provide clear, measurable benefits to the wider education system?

What exactly is the rationale for focussing on those parts of society that work e.g. private schools and grammar schools? So the 12% of kids who are being well educated or whatever and will likely pay shed loads of tax in the future.

Why would any sane Government go for them?
Why would they not focus on what is urgent, child poverty, SEND crisis, mental health crisis toxic screen exposure to make sure that those kids from there grow up into something with a reasonable future. They already have the statistics and kids from those groups on benefits. They have admitted it. It is urgent, it is a huge problem. Sort it out.

Why would anyone be stupid enough to believe that the children in the former group are somehow responsible for the Government’s failings on behalf of the latter.

I would like to reiterate the main point of the post:

Grammar schools claim to select students based on "natural academic ability", yet their student intake disproportionately consists of certain socio-economic and ethnic groups. This shows that selection is not purely meritocratic but is instead socially selective.

If the selection process does not reliably identify the most naturally able students, then grammar schools fail at their stated purpose. This raises the central question:

Should taxpayer money be used to fund a system that is, by design, socially selective?

You still have not answered @bluegoosie the key question on why should the Government then fund a comprehensive system which is socially selective by design as it is catchment based and address based and people rent and buy in catchment of the best schools.

So do you want to abolish all of state education? Answer the question.

It is meritocratic in the sense that S Asians work really hard.

Take HBS, for example, as someone said the area itself is quite well off. So if it became a comp overnight would much actually change in the short run? All that would happen is that next Year’s 7 would be catchment based, the reputation for many years would be an academic school, people would still only choose it if they wanted an academic education for their DCs. And loads of people who could afford it would quickly move into the catchment to get into HBS. It would become more socially selective, not less.

I couldn’t give a shit. I’m just glad my daughter won’t be going to school with the scum who walk past my window to the local dive comp every morning, vaping, swearing and causing trouble.

They have already selected themselves to be the social underclass by the way they behave, as did their parents and grandparents. My daughter goes to the same primary as they did and yet she excelled - they could have too if they and their parents wanted them to. Weed and Tabasco aren’t free either - their parents could have paid for a tutor instead of sitting on their doorsteps in dressing gowns chain smoking and swearing. They didn’t, and that’s not my problem.

It’s dds her fault I suffered mental breakdown which saw us lose it all and have to move here. I want better for her.

@Araminta1003
The key difference between grammar schools and comprehensives is that grammar schools are explicitly selective by design, whereas comprehensives are intended to serve all students within their local area.

Yes, catchment areas can create socio-economic disparities, but this is a wider systemic issue that requires policy solutions—such as better funding for disadvantaged areas and improving overall state education—rather than selective schools that do not contribute to social mobility. Inequality in across the education system is a much wider and complex issue that requires addressing the long-term socio-economic inequalities between regions.

Grammar schools, however, actively select students through an opaque, unregulated process that disproportionately benefits certain socio-economic groups (and apparently ethnic groups according to this forum). This is not an unintended consequence—it is inherent to the selection system itself.

Unlike comprehensive schools, grammar schools are not essential to providing state education. The state has a choice in how it structures and funds education.

So the question remains: Why should the state fund a system that does not achieve its stated goal of selecting based on "natural ability" and does not improve national educational outcomes?

This is not about abolishing state education—it is about ensuring that education policy and funding is evidence-based. If the grammar school system of selection does not provide a clear public benefit, why should they continue to receive taxpayer funding?

There is substantial evidence suggesting that many grammar schools, after abolishing selective intake 30 years ago, became much less popular, while nearby schools gained more interest. When educational resources are distributed equitably, the reputation for academic success appears to be more of an illustration of the social selection effect, and nothing more.

Tobacco, not Tabasco. And not DDs fault. I’m partially sighted so prone to mistakes. But you get my point.

Hard work is meritocratic in itself. You could also argue that parents valuing tutoring and enforcing a strict, disciplined regime of hard work over years to gain entrance is part of meritocracy too. However, neither aligns with the original purpose of grammar schools, which were intended to admit children based solely on their 'innate academic ability. Not to mention, the original intent is outdated and no longer fit for purpose.