State funding - gender differences in spending?

[ISNT]

Hi all

I just saw this on "in the news" and thought it worth bringing over here so that we can have a chat about it. I hope the OP doens't get upset about that!

My instinct is that there must be a good reason for this - I haven't read the links yet. However experience tells me that my instinct in these things is sadly sometimes wrong...

thread here

Bloody hell.

That's staggering.

It surely can't just be sexism can it? Have the Taliban taken over at the education dept?

Is it such a surprise, more resources should be targetted at those who have lower educational attainment to help them improve. Girls outperform boys educationally and so it stands to reason that on average more money will be spent on boys than on girls

Do they get better GCSE's and A Levels then?

And by that measure, that means that secondary modern schools will be getting more funding per pupil than grammars then?

Is that what's going to happen?

I don't know about those 2 particular schools but nationally girls get better GCSE and A Level grades.

I don't know how much funding each different type of school gets

Your argument (which may be correct) only makes sense if secondary moderns get more money spent on them than grammars uyter. That's why I asked.

Yes the non-selective schools do get more money spent on them, in general and this is largely based on the extra funding for SEN pupils and additional support.

But the schools I have looked at have such a similar SEN level and profile that this seems an unlikely scenario.

Which is why I can only conclude that the funding difference is solely gender based, somehow.

If the intake is the same (bar gender) why the funding differewnce and why is it OK so long as the girls are still achieving better grades? Don't they deserve the same funding if the pupils have the same ability?

With the 2 schools I mentioned initially the girls school outscores the boys school by approx 5% on a* to c passes on an approximately annual basis (not every year obviously).

I am just so suprised thaat so few people have issue with this.

If the schools were both co-ed and had the same demographic and pupil profile, wouldn't you expect them to receive the same amount of funding per pupil? It would seem unfair if they didn't - so why is it so OK that 2 schools that are so similar receive different funding, because one is a girls school and one is a boys school?

But it can't be the case that student for student, where there are no reasons eg higher levels of additional support needed, that boys just automatically get more money than girls?

Can it?

financial if this is true it is big news. Could you contact the council in question and ask them to explain this discrepancy to you? And if there's no reason, hit the broadsheets with it?

I am considering contacting the council. It just seems so strange.

Perhaps some equation somewhere does take gender into account?

I really think you should, financial.

Funding is all worked out through all sorts of complex rules and it may be that they will come back and explain that the girls school had a lump sum 5 years ago, or the boys school has much smaller grounds and so they have to pay for sports, or anything, I don't know.

I think you need an explanation though, and I'd be keen to hear what it is as well

just had a look for my area and seen exactly the same, both for selective and non selective single sex schools, higher funding for the boys. And as someone pointed out on another thread, more grammar school places for boys than girls in my LEA.

Good lord

Going to look at my area...

No problem with this around here from what I can see.

They are great tables

A sensible suggestion someone on the other thread made was that more boys tend to want to do science subjects, so maybe the extra funding is because of that (i.e. more labs and equipment in boys' schools)?

But then I though surely both schools would get the same amount of funding and whilst the boys' schools would spend it on extra science stuff the girls' schools could just spend it on something else like an extra art room or something?

Do any teachers/heads hang out of the feminism topic, maybe they could tell us a bit more about how funding is allocated.

Our area has quite a few single sex schools and single sex grammars as well. The funding does not show any gender bias. Really odd if it does in some areas and not others - really does make you wonder what's going on.