[Closed] Secondary school - did Jnr get in?

us went to lesser achieving schools

Er, when you say lesser achieving, do you really mean that or do you mean less selective?

Have you actually seen the value add figures for this grammar ?

Very fortunate with ours that we have an outstanding Ofsted school in our small village and a space is 100% when applied for if living in the village. It performs very very well in results tables and is a 5 mins walk for him to school.

Have you actually seen the value add figures for this grammar ?

Yes, did a lot of research, visits and meetings aka due diligence before selecting schools from all the various sources.

LOL at people that think an Outstanding Ofsted school will be outstanding for their child.

I would just like to congratulate Jr before this turns into a complete shitfest!

Thanks Martinhutch.  Well yes, it’s not going the way I thought it would.

Anyway I hope there are lots of happy parents today.

Well yes, it’s not going the way I thought it would.

Does it ever, on one of your threads? 🙂

Bizarre.

Up here the kids just go to their catchment school, and if they work hard, they get results.

LOL at people that think an Outstanding Ofsted school will be outstanding for their child.

Well its a good starting point, and preferable to one in "special measures"

Up here the kids just go to their catchment school, and if they work hard, they get results.

Not always.

In my daughters P7 class 56 out of 58 kids all put placement requests in to go to an alternative school and were accepted.

This happenes every single year.

I'm waiting to hear if my youngest kids placement request has been accepted.

That's a geographical thing rather than an academic thing though. The primary school is zoned for the wrong high school in almost everyone's opinion....except the council.

LOL at people that think an Outstanding Ofsted school will be outstanding for their child.

Well its a good starting point, and preferable to one in “special measures”

Absolutely agree matey. It may not be perfect, but you're in with a chance.

Tbf I had to put in a placement request for the wee yins primary school, as her catchment was 1.2 miles, our nearest school is 0.5 miles away, and we wanted her to walk.

Nowt to do with school performance though.

Yes, eldest in at the local high school.  He didn't want to do any of the extra tuition and testing required for the grammar school(s) so the local high was the only other choice really.  In some ways it's good as the high school is only a 5 minute walk from home (rather than 2 buses to the grammar) and a lot of his Y6 classmates will be going too, in other ways not so good as it's a very big school and their results are only average.  Still, I went to a grammar school and it didn't really make any difference to my educational attainment as I'm a lazy ****er with almost no ability to apply myself.  Looks good on a CV maybe 🙂

Sadly he's now paved the way for his brothers as my Mrs is adamant that they'll all go to the same high school to avoid any issues around different schools being "better" or "worse" and to avoid having to travel to different schools at different times etc.

Yup into local school, thank God as been running around going to grammar tests etc for ages and with two of them it meant one did better in some and one did better in others creating some possible issues but into local high school that gets good ratings and is currently on an upward trajectory due to new head.

Well its a good starting point, and preferable to one in “special measures

I wouldn't send my kids to the top performing school in my area because they don't have the kids best interest at heart. The school is purely focused on getting top numbers not the education of the pupils.

Congratulations to Kryton Jnr, I wish him the best.

Have you actually seen the value add figures for this grammar ?

Usually not as great as more main stream comprehensive because it's a selective school, the kids are already high on the attainment scale when they start so the school doesn't have the opportunity to 'add as much value'. Same thing is sort of applicable to the Outstanding classification, take in weaker kids and 'add more value' and it's easier to get rated Outstanding.

Up here the kids just go to their catchment school, and if they work hard, they get results.

Our local catchment school has been in special measures for 4 years, has falling numbers, staff retention issues and terrible buildings. Not many people want their kids to go there. The 1st choice school for most of my lads year (last year) has turned out to be a similarly terrible choice, weak head and bullying is rife to the extent out 20 who went there from his primary school 6 have left that we know about already plus many others from other primaries.

We do have a fantastic comprehensive locally but no chance of getting in there as it's popular. So options are sink school, wild west school or Grammar if you're bright enough.

PS well done to Kryton Jnr and to you Kryton for supporting them. The real scandal is that its usually necessary to get you child tutoring to do well in the exams and the primaries often won't provide this, means the kids with the more supportive parents stand a better chance. In the old days of grammars there was a higher level of social mobility based upon the child rather than the parents.

Kryton - congrats to Jnr! Both of mine are in Grammars and very happy. Its a long day with train travel, but they both wanted that route. We looked at all the local schools and had an open discussion with them. The eventual school choice was theirs.

PS - ask him how to spell Grammar!!!

Congratulations kryton_junior.

Schools are a huge part of childhood, it is a big decision, assuming you have a decision.

We didn't have a decision, but were fortunate enough that our secondary is the 'best' state school in Scotland, so much so that our new neighbors moved from London to access it, 8 years before the kid will attend.

There's huge differences in values and expectation. One of mine won the Dux medal - the highest exam results in the leaving year/sixth form. In the highest results year for a few years. The thing I'm most proud of is not his exams. It's how nice a lad he is, that others notice it, and that he is a hard worker too. Imo he didn't get this from the school, he got it from Boys Brigade, bike club, Abernethy staff and Gravity camp team (incl. Mr Cathro, see below) and, our family and friends.

I know others views vary - after the ceremony in which he was awarded the Dux we were multiple times asked for the tutor who we used. I'm hoping Ben Cathro got a few calls, I gave his name...

We've friends who are only focused on the fact thier son got into medical school, on exams and tests only. Thier choice, and thier lad is great.

Three minutes walk from a quality school with a brilliant head. It was a shoe-in for a ton of reasons but good news all the same.

Slightly different but just transferred my yr 9 daughter from a 'Good' girls school to a mixed school which requires improvement in a couple of areas. She had a hard time with all the bitchyness and cliqueyness at the girls school.

Sometimes the 'better' school isn't the best fit for the child.

Wouldn't want my kids to even sit the entrance exam for the local grammar school as I disagree emphatically with the principle and I've seen the way that kids are tutored by parents who are so desperate for their little angels to go there.

Thankfully it wasn't a choice I had to make as neither of them wanted to go there anyway.

She had a hard time with all the bitchyness and cliqueyness at the girls school.

This is why we steered Miss P away from an all girls school. She's quite a sensitive and caring type. She would have been ripped to pieces. She did ring me last night to tell me she had got into her first choice school and if she's happy, I am happy.

Have you actually seen the value add figures for this grammar ?

Usually not as great as more main stream comprehensive because it’s a selective school, the kids are already high on the attainment scale when they start so the school doesn’t have the opportunity to ‘add as much value’. Same thing is sort of applicable to the Outstanding classification, take in weaker kids and ‘add more value’ and it’s easier to get rated Outstanding.

Grammar schools do have the advantage of pulling down other local schools though.

Well done to mini Kryton for getting in though, we all want our kids to do well, its just a shame the Grammar system is fundamentally flawed, but you can only work with what you've got.

We got our girls into the local grammar school. Well, it’s called a grammar school but it’s actually non-selective LEA. Still, it’s good and walkable from home (rather than the 4 mile round trip to their catchment primary).

AA, not sure why it's an advantage to the grammar school to pull the others down, makes no difference to the grammar. I do agree the grammar will top slice the brightest kids and potentially better teachers, more of a disadvantage to the other schools. Same applies to comprehensive with a good reputation. I don't think the grammar system is fundamentally flawed, just very badly implemented and that includes the pre-comprehensive era education. The one size fits all approach of comps is flawed, kids learn in different ways and have different capabilities, a good education system accepts this and uses the knowledge to let everyone achieve their potential.

I also accept that grammars aren't perfect, kids get lost in the system, our eldest went for 2 years and found the environmentquite difficult at times as there were many kids much brighter than her. There's also plenty of behavioural problems, maybe less than a sink comp but there's still plenty of issues and not every kid or parent is focused on achievement.

Well in the context of Kryton looking for the best school for his kid the negative impacts of grammar schools on surrounding schools will mean its more likely to look better than the competition.
The evidence is pretty established that grammars in an area mean worse outcomes for the majority.

https://ffteducationdatalab.org.uk/2019/06/long-term-outcomes-do-grammar-schools-make-a-difference/

If you have a grammar school you cannot have a comprehensive in the same catchment area

AA, there's some right guff in that study you link to.

The author admits that is pretty much impossible to conduct meaningful analysis because you can't make a true like for like comparison:

Unless we were to introduce some sort of lottery system, the evaluation of grammar schools through randomisation would be impossible to achieve.

The author then goes on to make some pretty crude assumptions.

Even then, the A-C GCSE performance is the same between the sample, and the summarising paragraph reads thus:

More generally, pupil outcomes tend to be higher when pupils attend schools with higher attaining cohorts. This is the case whether pupils have low or high prior attainment. The grammar school debate will ultimately always come down to whether you think it is acceptable or not to segregate those with high levels of prior attainment (or measured ability) at a given age from other pupils.

More a case of glass half full or glass half empty than clear statistical conclusion.

We’re really pleased that Kryton Jnr got into our first choice boys grammer school, which coincidentally is closest to home and also linked with his Rugby club and RAF cadets.

did a lot of research, visits and meetings aka due diligence before selecting schools from all the various sources.

Jesus mate, do you think you could be a bit more middle class? I'm not sure it's quite obvious enough 😉

My eldest got into her first choice too, which is a bog standard Welsh secondary school. The only thing of note is that her primary school is far to the West of us and the high school to which they feed is even further West so it'd be a massive ball-ache to even get there. So we chose the Eastern school because it's pretty close and rideable, and almost the entire school is going to the other one. So she's going to have a new set of friends bar one kid who is actually the nicest one of her friends anyway.

In all fairness he has just used the system he is presented with and has achieved the best result for his own kids, nothing wrong with that. But...education shouldn't be selective and definately shouldn't be able to be gamed if you can afford tutors etc.( not saying OP did.) Grammar school are both.

More a case of glass half full or glass half empty than clear statistical conclusion.

If half the kids went to grammars which they dont a very small proportion do and do beterr, the rest, which are the majority do worse.

In all fairness he has just used the system he is presented with and has achieved the best result for his own kids, nothing wrong with that. But…education shouldn’t be selective and definately shouldn’t be able to be gamed if you can afford tutors etc.( not saying OP did.) Grammar school are both.

This.

I don't have a problem with parents doing the best for their kids and gaming the system if needs be to get them into the best schools. I got mine into a different school in my area by going through the appeals process; by tables it's the third out of four in performance but it was the right one for us for other reasons than exams of Value Add. I do think it's a shame you have to do this though.

Where I do have a problem, and I hope that now he's in the grammar you don't fall foul of this - is with parents who think you drop them at the gates at 9am on the 5th September, and pick them up 5 or 7 years later and they're educated. To get the best out of it education is a three legged stool; the kid and the teachers for sure, but the parents as well. Take one away and the stool falls over

Many of the problems at my kids' school come from poor parenting; when there's an incident of bullying the parents rail against the school 'who should deal with it', etc. These are someone's kids doing the bullying, not random kids.

I've also a friend who moved 6 years ago to get into the best school catchment area. He now works so hard to afford the house that he can't spend time with his kids, and they're doing nowhere near as well as they could have done (IMHO, they seem happy enough)

So well done, but the work ain't finished yet.

Jesus mate, do you think you could be a bit more middle class? I’m not sure it’s quite obvious enough 😉

Frankly and with my background I’m taking that as a compliment 😀

So well done, but the work ain’t finished yet

Well I’d think - hope - that any of the parents in hear know that.  “going to school” does not absolve of a responsible to coach through homework, mentor your kids through life’s issues, find extra curricular learning opportunities - but also to enjoy life .

Anyway, this morning I’ve a slight admission to make.  After reading some responses I wondered how come Jnr hadn’t taken an admission exam, so questioned Mrs K about this.  Turns out his school used to to be a Grammar school, but isn’t anymore it just has the word in its name.  Still a good boys school, it remains a faith funded school with modernised Grammar themes.

a sink comp

What a sad terminology.

Well I’d think – hope – that any of the parents in here know that.

Me too - but having helped with coaching football for a few years when my youngest took it up unfortunately I don't think the same holds in general and it's not a class / upbringing thing. I live in quite a nice area and the mums and dads that turned up in nice cars, dropped off, and then ****ed off for an extra hour in bed or to go and sit and have a coffee in the cafe up the road was terrible. You pay £50 a year subscription and get 36 hours free childcare from the unpaid coaches and volunteers seemed to be the attitude.

anagallis_arvensis

Well in the context of Kryton looking for the best school for his kid the negative impacts of grammar schools on surrounding schools will mean its more likely to look better than the competition.
The evidence is pretty established that grammars in an area mean worse outcomes for the majority.

You can't have your cake and eat it ....with a strawman
How do you judge "outcomes" anyway?
If you take 100 kids and half the top 20% according to some test go to a grammar school then obviously one possible outcome is the overall average (whichever you like) grades in a related set of tests from the other schools drops simply as a product of taking away the ones who would likely achieve higher grades?

That doesn't mean the remaining kids achieve any better or worse grade, just that the school average has gone down.

However there is a bigger picture to this ... the UK has a very low level of actual attainment all round compared to many other nations. Don't confuse that with implying I said most nations as I'm not saying that just that we are not anywhere near the top.

This ultimately reflect on HE and the REAL levels attained. Probably the simplest is math... back when I was at school we started calculus at O level and finished at A level... Any University degree worth doing in Science/Engineering (or maths) absolutely REQUIRED calculus... it wasn't a 'nice to have' it was REQUIRED from day 1.
10 yrs ago my deceased friends daughter in France decided she wanted to go to Cambridge ... a bunch of us did some tutoring ... I got maths and physics and downloaded the past exam papers ... and I hardly needed to do anything for her the frightening part being she was an Arts BAC student. As a bit of a laugh at the time I did the French A level and easily got an A*.. (marked by another friend who is French prof at a US Uni)

Featured snippet from the web
In 2017–18, there were 458,490 international students studying at UK higher education institutions, accounting for 19.6% of the total student population in the UK. 14% of all undergraduates and 35.8% of all postgraduates were international.

I don't have the figures by degree as HESA don't publish them (or my quick search didn't find them) but experience wise and what I hear I'd expect a large proportion of the foreign students to be doing real degrees and post grads not some made up mickey mouse degree.

Bizarre.

Up here the kids just go to their catchment school, and if they work hard, they get results.

Some of us even survived Auchenharvie Academy 😉

To be fair it does go on in Scotland too, especially in the cities where the geographic choice is a lot less restricted.

How do you judge “outcomes” anyway?

Against prior attainment, the evidence is out there and pretty established.

That doesn’t mean the remaining kids achieve any better or worse grade, just that the school average has gone down.

It does, have a look at the evidence.

We had a thread on this a not long ago so I cant be bothered to get into it again.

https://fullfact.org/education/grammar-schools-and-social-mobility-whats-evidence/

But it also found that, “in areas with a high level of selection, pupils eligible for free school meals who did not attend grammar schools achieved 1.2 grades lower on average across all GCSE subjects.”

“There is repeated evidence that any appearance of advantage for those attending selective schools is outweighed by the disadvantage for those who do not”, says Professor Stephen Gorard of Durham University. “More children lose out than gain, and the attainment gaps between highest and lowest and between richest and poorest are larger”.

the UK has a very low level of actual attainment all round compared to many other nations.

Source?

And please do not state UK - Wales, NI and Scotland have VERY different education systems and ethos now.

The grammar school debate will ultimately always come down to whether you think it is acceptable or not to segregate those with high levels of prior attainment (or measured ability) at a given age from other pupils.

They're segregated into streams in comps anyway. Different school or different classrooms, it's still segregation.

They’re segregated into streams in comps anyway. Different school or different classrooms, it’s still segregation.

Only usually in maths, english and sci

LOL at people that think an Outstanding Ofsted school will be outstanding for their child.

This very much so. My daughter was failed by a school that was assessed as having a supportive non-academic side. It was up until you needed to use if for mental health purposes then they betrayed both this and their supposed Christian principles. There were others that suffered similarly in years above and below my daughter.

In the light of the above @weeksy your statement doesn't really hold up. If you only get to see the superstar pupils at open days one cannot make an informed decision.

Only usually in maths, english and sci

It's still segregation, *exactly* the same arguments apply.

If segregation for important subjects is desirable, I can't really see how you can argue segregation for all the less important stuff is.

t’s still segregation, *exactly* the same arguments apply.

Not convinced by that - they still attend the same school and hang out together and are int he same other lessons.

But it also found that, “in areas with a high level of selection, pupils eligible for free school meals who did not attend grammar schools achieved 1.2 grades lower on average across all GCSE subjects.”

Correlation rather than causation. It's not comparable, the grammar school may well have taken the brighter kids, the kids with more supportive parents etc. who are on free school meals. The kids who didn't go to the grammar may have achieved those grades anyway, the grammar kids may well have pulled up the average attainment when included in the cohort. There's plenty of bright kids on free school meals in the grammar system.

Anyway the reverse of your argument can also be made, if the brightest achieve more in a selective environment why penalise them to benefit others.

Outcomes should not be judged solely on the grade output of a school, you have to look at that and value add, either measure on it's own isn't giving a full picture.

It’s still segregation, *exactly* the same arguments apply.

Except the evidence doesnt show the negative effects of setting which areas with Grammar schools do.

Correlation rather than causation. It’s not comparable, the grammar school may well have taken the brighter kids, the kids with more supportive parents etc. who are on free school meals. The kids who didn’t go to the grammar may have achieved those grades anyway, the grammar kids may well have pulled up the average attainment when included in the cohort. There’s plenty of bright kids on free school meals in the grammar system.

You really havent read any of what I've posted or you do not understand it. There's not plenty of bright FSM kids in Grammars, they are massively under represented. As for the correlation and causation argument, if you cant do an experiment you have to look at data and the data says the same thing in all the areas with grammar schools, is that coincidence?

Only usually in maths, english and sci

Nothing says "success" and "have a positive attitude" like being put in a lower maths set...

a full picture.

Yes. That is the totality of a school - exam grades, pupil attitude, pupil ability to problem solve, be flexible, social cohesion, emotional support, mental health of pupils and staff. Anything that happens between 9am-3pm, and then some, is how we should see our schools.

Yes I read what you posted and understood it, I've just drawn different conclusions that you dont like. Do you actually have any real world experience of grammar schools? There's quite a lot on pupil premium at the grammar school my wife works at so I'd dispute what you said there from her experience. The school is also in a very mixed income area, and weights its admissions so those in the immediate area will be admitted with a exam pass in preference to kids bused in from 20 miles away. Many of the pupils are from lower income families but this doesn't mean they are below average intelligence.

If you believe there is causation care to explain the mechanism behind it and why it's the fault of the grammar schools?

Data can interpreted in many ways, you can formalize a hypothesis based on your interpretation but to blindly state the data backs your view in an area as complex as this is disingenuous. If you can't show causation then you only have correlation.

The main reason our local comp is so bad is the only kids going there are the ones whose parents haven't actively tried to get them somewhere else. It's ended up as the dumping ground for kids with low aspirations. Couple that with very poor facilities and lots of politics and you've got an under performing school. It should have been closed years ago or a significant investment in staff and buildings should have been made. It's recently been turned into an academy, whether that will make any difference I don't know but it looks like the LEA have dumped it on the private sector to fix what they could not.

There’s quite a lot on pupil premium at the grammar school my wife works at so I’d dispute what you said there from her experience.

There may be quite a lot but they are still massively under represented in grammar schools.

If you believe there is causation care to explain the mechanism behind it

You could start by attracting better teachers and having a much more settled staff, you could then move on to removing role models from other schools, there's all manner of potential causal mechanisms.

Data can interpreted in many ways, you can formalize a hypothesis based on your interpretation

Its not my interpretation it was this blokes, amongst others

“There is repeated evidence that any appearance of advantage for those attending selective schools is outweighed by the disadvantage for those who do not”, says Professor Stephen Gorard of Durham University. “More children lose out than gain, and the attainment gaps between highest and lowest and between richest and poorest are larger”.

It’s recently been turned into an academy, whether that will make any difference I don’t know but it looks like the LEA have dumped it on the private sector to fix what they could not.

You really do appear to be hopelessly ill informed about education.

Hopelessly I'll informed, the school has been hovered up by a private academy group, it's now effectively being run by a business. Maybe try and engage in discussion rather than arrogantly dismissing me as not understanding.

You still haven't provided any mechanism for gramnar schools actively causing the issues you've gone on about. Rather than focus on the grammar school maybe look at why the comprehensivse are not performing. You also haven't answered my question about personal experience of grammar schools. You're clearly idealogical opposed to grammar schools and would rather see them torn down rather than address the issues prevalent in the comprehensives. All smacks a lot of whining it's not fair so let's bring the higher achievers down to a lower level, fantastic race to the bottom for all. Ideology and social engineering are what has resulted in the mess our state education is currently in.

Anyway I'm done, it's not achieving anything discussing this further, I'll let you get the last word in.

the school has been hovered up by a private academy group, it’s now effectively being run by a business.

You might want to ask why? If you informed yourself you'd maybe understand thats its very likely to be the opposite of why you suggested it happened.

You still haven’t provided any mechanism for gramnar schools actively causing the issues you’ve gone on about.

I have. You havent engaged with it.

You’re clearly idealogical opposed to grammar schools

Same as all the people showing the evidence for their negative impacts on the education of the majority like
Professor Stephen Gorard of Durham University?

We got the school we wanted, funiest thing is that we're out of catchment and despite having two upper schools almost on our doorstep neither would have us. First one we're not Catholic enough for, second one has a skewed catchment to hoover up the under-accommodated areas of the town which while we're technically within catchment, they're 4-5 times oversubscribed...

Also looked at the local girls "grammar" but it quickly became apparent that 1 my daughter didn't really like it and 2 entry is pretty much sewn up by parents able to afford 12-18 months of tutoring...

Only other option was the school my missus went to and her verdict was a firm NO!

So it's a local village school for child 1, which actually had a poor ofstead a couple of years ago and hence a "superhead" and some resources were flung at it. We really liked the place (went to two separate open evenings) little things about the culture of the school, the way the teachers interacted with parents and kids and most impressive were the actual kids, communicative, engaged, positive.
Of all the schools we went round it was the students there that were the most impressive. Recent exam results are much improved and ofstead apparently due back next year, it seems likely they will receive a better rating (if that really matters)...