Grammar Schools
Discussion
RicksAlfas said:
You are right of course, and I was being facetious.
RicksAlfas said:
I don't think he can see that in other areas the most successful result a leaving pupil can have is to not be stabbed, pregnant or done for drugs. Twig will claim I've gone all Daily Mail, but sadly that's how it is in many less wealthy urban areas, but I don't think he is aware of it.
I think if you read your original claim, it doesn't come across as facetious, but factual. If you'd just made that claim and left it at that, then yes, facetious. But the fact that you stressed that you weren't being all Daily Mail but "sadly that's how it is in many less wealthy urban areas"I rather think you're backtracking now having realised just how preposterous the suggestion was.
TwigtheWonderkid said:
RicksAlfas said:
You are right of course, and I was being facetious.
RicksAlfas said:
I don't think he can see that in other areas the most successful result a leaving pupil can have is to not be stabbed, pregnant or done for drugs. Twig will claim I've gone all Daily Mail, but sadly that's how it is in many less wealthy urban areas, but I don't think he is aware of it.
I think if you read your original claim, it doesn't come across as facetious, but factual. If you'd just made that claim and left it at that, then yes, facetious. But the fact that you stressed that you weren't being all Daily Mail but "sadly that's how it is in many less wealthy urban areas"I rather think you're backtracking now having realised just how preposterous the suggestion was.
One in thirteen teenage schoolgirls is pregnant according to data across London boroughs. Not all will remain in school when the news breaks so there aren't that many bumps in the playgrounds of London but those are the numbers.
Hundreds of knives seized in 18 months at UK schools.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/may/12/hu...
Children as young as five have been caught with knives at school as police forces reveal they have seized thousands of weapons from youngsters.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/kids-young-f...
These knives are used to threaten, injure and kill staff as well as other pupils.
Headteacher Philip Lawrence's killer Learco Chindamo stabbed him in the heart outside the school gates at St George's High School in Maida Vale. After that the school experienced a marked decline and following the LA's unsuccessful attempts to turn the school around a small number of independent advisers assisted the governors and new SLT. I was one of those involved and although at the time it was a dangerous situation to be a part of it was obviously a privilege to be on the team, something easier to appreciate when looking back. My perspective won't be the same as TTWK (one good school in one good LA) for this and several similar reasons. The TV drama portrayal of this event focused almost solely on the Miss Jean Brodie aspect of Dame Marie Stubbs (Julie Walters) who left retirement to get the school back on track assisted by Sean Devlin, her former Deputy at The Douay Martyrs in Hillingdon. It wasn't particularly good or particularly accurate, though Marie and Sean certainly did an excellent job.
It wasn't going to be a one-off for that school either.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/pupil-knifed-out...
turbobloke said:
TwigtheWonderkid said:
RicksAlfas said:
You are right of course, and I was being facetious.
RicksAlfas said:
I don't think he can see that in other areas the most successful result a leaving pupil can have is to not be stabbed, pregnant or done for drugs. Twig will claim I've gone all Daily Mail, but sadly that's how it is in many less wealthy urban areas, but I don't think he is aware of it.
I think if you read your original claim, it doesn't come across as facetious, but factual. If you'd just made that claim and left it at that, then yes, facetious. But the fact that you stressed that you weren't being all Daily Mail but "sadly that's how it is in many less wealthy urban areas"I rather think you're backtracking now having realised just how preposterous the suggestion was.
One in thirteen teenage schoolgirls is pregnant according to data across London boroughs. Not all will remain in school when the news breaks so there aren't that many bumps in the playgrounds of London but those are the numbers.
Hundreds of knives seized in 18 months at UK schools.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/may/12/hu...
Children as young as five have been caught with knives at school as police forces reveal they have seized thousands of weapons from youngsters.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/kids-young-f...
These knives are used to threaten, injure and kill staff as well as other pupils.
Headteacher Philip Lawrence's killer Learco Chindamo stabbed him in the heart outside the school gates at St George's High School in Maida Vale. After that the school experienced a marked decline and following the LA's unsuccessful attempts to turn the school around a small number of independent advisers assisted the governors and new SLT. I was one of those involved and although at the time it was a dangerous situation to be a part of it was obviously a privilege to be on the team, something easier to appreciate when looking back. My perspective won't be the same as TTWK (one good school in one good LA) for this and several similar reasons. The TV drama portrayal of this event focused almost solely on the Miss Jean Brodie aspect of Dame Marie Stubbs (Julie Walters) who left retirement to get the school back on track assisted by Sean Devlin, her former Deputy at The Douay Martyrs in Hillingdon. It wasn't particularly good or particularly accurate, though Marie and Sean certainly did an excellent job.
It wasn't going to be a one-off for that school either.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/pupil-knifed-out...
TwigtheWonderkid said:
turbobloke said:
TwigtheWonderkid said:
RicksAlfas said:
You are right of course, and I was being facetious.
RicksAlfas said:
I don't think he can see that in other areas the most successful result a leaving pupil can have is to not be stabbed, pregnant or done for drugs. Twig will claim I've gone all Daily Mail, but sadly that's how it is in many less wealthy urban areas, but I don't think he is aware of it.
I think if you read your original claim, it doesn't come across as facetious, but factual. If you'd just made that claim and left it at that, then yes, facetious. But the fact that you stressed that you weren't being all Daily Mail but "sadly that's how it is in many less wealthy urban areas"I rather think you're backtracking now having realised just how preposterous the suggestion was.
One in thirteen teenage schoolgirls is pregnant according to data across London boroughs. Not all will remain in school when the news breaks so there aren't that many bumps in the playgrounds of London but those are the numbers.
Hundreds of knives seized in 18 months at UK schools.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/may/12/hu...
Children as young as five have been caught with knives at school as police forces reveal they have seized thousands of weapons from youngsters.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/kids-young-f...
These knives are used to threaten, injure and kill staff as well as other pupils.
Headteacher Philip Lawrence's killer Learco Chindamo stabbed him in the heart outside the school gates at St George's High School in Maida Vale. After that the school experienced a marked decline and following the LA's unsuccessful attempts to turn the school around a small number of independent advisers assisted the governors and new SLT. I was one of those involved and although at the time it was a dangerous situation to be a part of it was obviously a privilege to be on the team, something easier to appreciate when looking back. My perspective won't be the same as TTWK (one good school in one good LA) for this and several similar reasons. The TV drama portrayal of this event focused almost solely on the Miss Jean Brodie aspect of Dame Marie Stubbs (Julie Walters) who left retirement to get the school back on track assisted by Sean Devlin, her former Deputy at The Douay Martyrs in Hillingdon. It wasn't particularly good or particularly accurate, though Marie and Sean certainly did an excellent job.
It wasn't going to be a one-off for that school either.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/pupil-knifed-out...
TwigtheWonderkid said:
Even in schools where those things are an issue, the measure of success is not avoiding them! The very basic measure of success for all schools is measured by the % of kids leaving with 5 GCSEs A-C inc English and maths.
This is part of why your take on grammar shools is flawed.Those headline figures say nothing about how well or otherwise a school educates its most able pupils. Take the kid who got a B when they ought to have got an A. Or they got an A when it should and could have been A*. To see how well a school is meeting the learning needs of its most able students, you have to look at individuals. DfE league tables and the headline figures in them don't do that. Ofsted did exactly that, and showed beyond doubt that too many non-selective schools fail their most able students badly. Your experience at 'your' non-selective school is more the exception you should be noting.
TwigtheWonderkid said:
RicksAlfas said:
You are right of course, and I was being facetious.
RicksAlfas said:
I don't think he can see that in other areas the most successful result a leaving pupil can have is to not be stabbed, pregnant or done for drugs. Twig will claim I've gone all Daily Mail, but sadly that's how it is in many less wealthy urban areas, but I don't think he is aware of it.
I think if you read your original claim, it doesn't come across as facetious, but factual. If you'd just made that claim and left it at that, then yes, facetious. But the fact that you stressed that you weren't being all Daily Mail but "sadly that's how it is in many less wealthy urban areas"I rather think you're backtracking now having realised just how preposterous the suggestion was.
Twig, I was simply illustrating the wide gap between secondary schools. Some are great, and if they were all like that everything would be fine. But sadly they are not, and in those areas I hope you can see why many kids work hard to get into the grammar school.
turbobloke said:
TwigtheWonderkid said:
And you seriously think that means schools set the bar so low that if they get kids thru schools unstabbed, not pregnant and without a drugs charge, they class that as a success.
Are you suggesting that if a pupil at risk isn't pregnant or stabbed then this hasn't averted failure? What's the opposite of failure?TwigtheWonderkid said:
Even in schools where those things are an issue, the measure of success is not avoiding them! The very basic measure of success for all schools is measured by the % of kids leaving with 5 GCSEs A-C inc English and maths.
This is part of why your take on grammar shools is flawed.Those headline figures say nothing about how well or otherwise a school educates its most able pupils. Take the kid who got a B when they ought to have got an A. Or they got an A when it should and could have been A*. To see how well a school is meeting the learning needs of its most able students, you have to look at individuals. DfE league tables and the headline figures in them don't do that. Ofsted did exactly that, and showed beyond doubt that too many non-selective schools fail their most able students badly. Your experience at 'your' non-selective school is more the exception you should be noting.
The 5 GCSEs A-C inc English and Maths, is the measure of success in all schools, but the % a school needs to achieve in order to claim success obviously varies from school to school, based on Fisher Family Trust and other relevant metrics. I'm staggered that I need to be explaining this.
Some schools may have a target of 75%, and have failed to meet target at 70%, whereas another school may have a target of 60% and be delighted to have got 65% up to standard.
TwigtheWonderkid said:
The 5 GCSEs A-C inc English and Maths, is the measure of success in all schools, but the % a school needs to achieve in order to claim success obviously varies from school to school, based on Fisher Family Trust and other relevant metrics. I'm staggered that I need to be explaining this.
Some schools may have a target of 75%, and have failed to meet target at 69%, whereas another school may have a target of 60% and be delighted to have got 65% up to standard.
Ignoring your lack of awareness that averting failure is a success, the above once again reinforces the narrow take you have on grammar schools.Some schools may have a target of 75%, and have failed to meet target at 69%, whereas another school may have a target of 60% and be delighted to have got 65% up to standard.
You don't need to explain anything about FFT D or Jesson's VA using quintiles and the rest, it's old hat - you're the one missing the point in quoting 5+A^-C inc En Ma (I prefer 'good grades' as letters are being replaced by numbers, times change).
Grammar schools will pretty much be 100% 5 or more good grades including Englisn and maths. Not all, some will be 99% etc
so it's relatively meaningless. One would also expect this of a selective school, making that metric doubly unhelpful in a selective school context. How are you going to get a target of more than 100% out of FFT D?The only way to see how well a school of any type is meeting the learning needs of its most able students is to look at individuals. League tables and headline benchmarks don't do that. When you do that, as Ofsted did, the results are damning for the average comp. The fact that you have experience of an above-average comp does nothing to change that. It's amazing that this needs to be re-explained.
TwigtheWonderkid said:
RicksAlfas said:
Blimey. I didn't know I was being cross examined!
You're not, you're being challenged, having posted nonsense. There's a difference, although not much.turbobloke said:
Grammar schools will pretty much be 100% 5 or more good grades including Englisn and maths. Not all, some will be 99% etc so it's relatively meaningless.
Plus they'll be too busy celebrating the fact that no one got stabbed, only 1 girl got pregnant (but fortunately mum whisked her off to Harley St for an abortion before the news leaked out) and although Tarquin Fortescue-Smyth got caught with cocaine, fortunately dad is chief constable so it went no further. so it's relatively meaningless. 
TwigtheWonderkid said:
Plus they'll be too busy celebrating the fact that no one got stabbed, only 1 girl got pregnant (but fortunately mum whisked her off to Harley St for an abortion before the news leaked out) and although Tarquin Fortescue-Smyth got caught with cocaine, fortunately dad is chief constable so it went no further.
Phew.For a minute there I'd thought your issue with grammar schools was some imaginary class war.
Some snips from an article a couple of years old that open-minded individuals may find of interest - it should be easy to locate online but I need to get on with something else.
With rates of social mobility stagnant, it’s time to admit we (Labour) got it wrong on grammar schools
Labour has been solidly against grammar schools since Harold Wilson’s government began phasing them out in 1964, but the Conservatives too have been content with the current system of comprehensives, with neither John Major nor Margaret Thatcher building more grammar schools while in office. In 2007 David Cameron reiterated his refusal to bow to calls to “bring back grammars”, and instead defined them as the “key test” of whether the Conservative Party was fit for office. He added that advocates of grammar school education were guilty of “clinging on to outdated mantras that bear no relation to the reality of life”.
Anti-grammar schools campaigner Fiona Millar (herself a former grammar school girl) summed up the attitude of those in favour of the current system when she wrote last year that “Selective education was largely abolished because middle-class parents were incensed at their children being labelled failures at 11 and forced into secondary moderns starved of the balanced intakes all schools need.”
There are two important assumptions in this sentence. The first is that school selection has been “largely abolished”. It has not. In fact the opposite holds true. The abolition of grammar schools has seen the despised “elitism” – or in other words, the recognition that some children are brighter than others – replaced with selection via the most ruthless commodity of all: cold hard cash. Access to most comprehensives today is “largely” decided by the ability of a child’s parents to pay the price of a house in a desirable catchment area. That is why premiums on houses in areas with good schools command an average price of £309,732 - 42 per cent higher than the average price of £218,114.
You do the Maths
Ms Millar is of course correct to say that many middle class parents were “incensed” by the grammar schools system. But then they were usually incensed because their children were losing out to bright working class kids. According to the Campaign for the Advancement of State Education, 66 per cent of parents wanted a grammar school education for their child, meaning many middle class parents were inevitably left disappointed when their child did not make the cut.
Were it the case that grammar schools had irreparably damaged social mobility there would be no point in having this debate. After all, the progressive ideal might just as well be defined as a state of affairs where the life chances of a child are not dictated by the bank balance of that child’s parents. That is, or at least that should be, the baseline for any social democrat or socialist worth their salt. Yet the abolition of grammar schools has had the opposite effect. The Franks Report on Oxford University, published in 1965-6, 21 years after grammar schools were opened to all according to ability, found that 40 per cent of places at Oxford went to pupils from state schools, compared to 19 per cent in 1938-9. Former President of Trinity College Michael Beloff claimed that by the early 1970s state schools supplied 70 per cent of the intake at Oxford.
Mediocrity or Worse
Today 57 per cent of places on undergraduate courses at Oxford go to applicants from the state sector - including a disproportionately high number from the remaining grammar schools - and 42 per cent of places go to applicants from independent schools. And this is after universities have been told they risk being stripped of the right to charge higher fees if they fail to attract a wide mix of students.
The attempt by Labour education minister Tony Crosland to “destroy every f
g grammar school in England, Wales and Northern Ireland” was wrong not because his intentions were nefarious – the dissolution of grammar schools was supposed to do away with what Crosland called the “extreme social division caused by physical segregation into schools of widely divergent status” – but because the result has been a disaster for bright working class kids, who are crammed into classrooms with the uninterested, the idle and those who will simply always struggle with academic subjects. Rather than ushering in equality, comprehensives have resulted in mediocrity or worse for most children and a bonanza for wealthy families who despised the 11-plus but who can now buy their way into the best schools.
Under the Communist dictatorships of the 20th century, despite official ideology private enterprise flourished to an extent unheard of in the capitalist world. Similarly, under the UK’s comprehensive system selection is ruthlessly enforced in favour of anyone with enough cash and gumption to play the system. And like “actually existing socialism”, for many champions of comprehensives the abstract idea of equality is prized ahead of social justice. Or at least it appears that way. For what socialist would support a system where the children of the poor were condemned to bad schooling while the children of the rich were so privileged?
The catchment areas of both grammars and good comps suffer from house price rises that keep less well-off families in the catchment areas of weak schools...and just in case anyone didn't notice, Fiona Millar is Alastair Campbell's squeeze, and Guardian scribbler.
With rates of social mobility stagnant, it’s time to admit we (Labour) got it wrong on grammar schools
Labour has been solidly against grammar schools since Harold Wilson’s government began phasing them out in 1964, but the Conservatives too have been content with the current system of comprehensives, with neither John Major nor Margaret Thatcher building more grammar schools while in office. In 2007 David Cameron reiterated his refusal to bow to calls to “bring back grammars”, and instead defined them as the “key test” of whether the Conservative Party was fit for office. He added that advocates of grammar school education were guilty of “clinging on to outdated mantras that bear no relation to the reality of life”.
Anti-grammar schools campaigner Fiona Millar (herself a former grammar school girl) summed up the attitude of those in favour of the current system when she wrote last year that “Selective education was largely abolished because middle-class parents were incensed at their children being labelled failures at 11 and forced into secondary moderns starved of the balanced intakes all schools need.”
There are two important assumptions in this sentence. The first is that school selection has been “largely abolished”. It has not. In fact the opposite holds true. The abolition of grammar schools has seen the despised “elitism” – or in other words, the recognition that some children are brighter than others – replaced with selection via the most ruthless commodity of all: cold hard cash. Access to most comprehensives today is “largely” decided by the ability of a child’s parents to pay the price of a house in a desirable catchment area. That is why premiums on houses in areas with good schools command an average price of £309,732 - 42 per cent higher than the average price of £218,114.
You do the Maths
Ms Millar is of course correct to say that many middle class parents were “incensed” by the grammar schools system. But then they were usually incensed because their children were losing out to bright working class kids. According to the Campaign for the Advancement of State Education, 66 per cent of parents wanted a grammar school education for their child, meaning many middle class parents were inevitably left disappointed when their child did not make the cut.
Were it the case that grammar schools had irreparably damaged social mobility there would be no point in having this debate. After all, the progressive ideal might just as well be defined as a state of affairs where the life chances of a child are not dictated by the bank balance of that child’s parents. That is, or at least that should be, the baseline for any social democrat or socialist worth their salt. Yet the abolition of grammar schools has had the opposite effect. The Franks Report on Oxford University, published in 1965-6, 21 years after grammar schools were opened to all according to ability, found that 40 per cent of places at Oxford went to pupils from state schools, compared to 19 per cent in 1938-9. Former President of Trinity College Michael Beloff claimed that by the early 1970s state schools supplied 70 per cent of the intake at Oxford.
Mediocrity or Worse
Today 57 per cent of places on undergraduate courses at Oxford go to applicants from the state sector - including a disproportionately high number from the remaining grammar schools - and 42 per cent of places go to applicants from independent schools. And this is after universities have been told they risk being stripped of the right to charge higher fees if they fail to attract a wide mix of students.
The attempt by Labour education minister Tony Crosland to “destroy every f
g grammar school in England, Wales and Northern Ireland” was wrong not because his intentions were nefarious – the dissolution of grammar schools was supposed to do away with what Crosland called the “extreme social division caused by physical segregation into schools of widely divergent status” – but because the result has been a disaster for bright working class kids, who are crammed into classrooms with the uninterested, the idle and those who will simply always struggle with academic subjects. Rather than ushering in equality, comprehensives have resulted in mediocrity or worse for most children and a bonanza for wealthy families who despised the 11-plus but who can now buy their way into the best schools.Under the Communist dictatorships of the 20th century, despite official ideology private enterprise flourished to an extent unheard of in the capitalist world. Similarly, under the UK’s comprehensive system selection is ruthlessly enforced in favour of anyone with enough cash and gumption to play the system. And like “actually existing socialism”, for many champions of comprehensives the abstract idea of equality is prized ahead of social justice. Or at least it appears that way. For what socialist would support a system where the children of the poor were condemned to bad schooling while the children of the rich were so privileged?
The catchment areas of both grammars and good comps suffer from house price rises that keep less well-off families in the catchment areas of weak schools...and just in case anyone didn't notice, Fiona Millar is Alastair Campbell's squeeze, and Guardian scribbler.
Hol said:
ATG said:
Hol said:
Yes. I can add up, hence the point I made.
It still indicates nothing more concrete than a disparity of children on free meals.
It's not a metric that can be used to confirm your supposed ratio of affluent and non affluent.
Have we entered a parallel universe? It still indicates nothing more concrete than a disparity of children on free meals.
It's not a metric that can be used to confirm your supposed ratio of affluent and non affluent.
Seriously, do you really believe accessing a form of means tested social welfare isn't going to be "fairly strongly" correlated to affluence?
In a thread about education ...
Read again. My sons school is NOT filled will only affluent people.
Other people have reported the same.
If you don't like that anecdotal bit of factual truth, then tough luck. and shut the door behind you.
Edited by Hol on Monday 3rd July 09:03
We still have the option of existing grammar schools opening satellite institutions run by their Governors but at a different geographical location, something like a new grammar but not new because it's attached to an existing selective school. Like grammars themselves, this is a popular policy with parents (just) as YouGov found that opening up an extension of an existing grammar school at a new campus carries 51% approval with only 18% disapproval.
YouGov said:
People are, at first glance, pretty supportive of grammar schools. That support is undermined a little when people consider the other side of the coin – the majority of children who do not pass the exam – but grammar schools still have more supporters than detractors.
TwigtheWonderkid said:
wsurfa said:
TwigtheWonderkid said:
I'm in West London, so certainly no expert on Tower Hamlets. But perhaps you could provide me with a list of all the grammar schools in the borough. I'm guessing, from what little I do know of the area, it won't take you long.
Of course, with grammars accessible to all and providing equal opportunity, I'm sure there are just as many in Tower Hamlets as there are in the Cotswolds.
Perhaps you could keep your toys in your pram when given data relevant to the discussion. Or find it yourself, or would that be a bit too much like work.... Of course, with grammars accessible to all and providing equal opportunity, I'm sure there are just as many in Tower Hamlets as there are in the Cotswolds.
Maybe the LA with the highest number of grammars sits on the 25th percentile for free school meals provision, or maybe not.
Maybe there is a correlation between lower FSM provision areas and location of grammars that would significantly impact their FSM level vs a national average, or maybe not.
What do you think? Or do you not have an opinion as that would involve some basic research to support (or not) a stated premise.
Edited by anonymous-user on Friday 7th July 23:30
Thread resurrection.
Just referencing another thread that's started in the lounge. Despite many people on here saying passing the entrance exam has got nothing to do with private tutoring and anyone, regardless of financial background, has the same chance, it would appear that not many on the latest thread agree.
https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...
Just referencing another thread that's started in the lounge. Despite many people on here saying passing the entrance exam has got nothing to do with private tutoring and anyone, regardless of financial background, has the same chance, it would appear that not many on the latest thread agree.
https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...
Are you going to have a meltdown on that thread too, if a number of people explain that they have real life evidence that you are wrong?
As I have told you many times already, the boys at my sons grammar school are not all from affluent families, despite your insistence to the contrary.
As I have told you many times already, the boys at my sons grammar school are not all from affluent families, despite your insistence to the contrary.
Both my kids went to Grammar schools and I was a Governor of one of them, yes there are some kids from the poorest backgrounds but the vast majority are from middle class families with above average incomes. When the recession bit in 2008 we had a spike of applications from students who were previously at private schools.
Eg's jobs done by fathers of my sons mates (I know a small sample)
Owner and CEO of a tech buisiness developing mobile phone station hardware - very wealthy
Corporate lawyer to Al Fayad, director on every one of his businesses
GCHQ Maths professor
GCHQ Computer wizard
3 x GP's
University Professor
Head Teacher
Nuclear power project director
Teacher
Me - Main Board Director of a housebuilder
These are all pretty well paid except for the teacher
However - of these not many actually had their kids coached/tutored to pass the entrance exams, my son had 2 sessions on exam technique cost me £60.
Eg's jobs done by fathers of my sons mates (I know a small sample)
Owner and CEO of a tech buisiness developing mobile phone station hardware - very wealthy
Corporate lawyer to Al Fayad, director on every one of his businesses
GCHQ Maths professor
GCHQ Computer wizard
3 x GP's
University Professor
Head Teacher
Nuclear power project director
Teacher
Me - Main Board Director of a housebuilder
These are all pretty well paid except for the teacher
However - of these not many actually had their kids coached/tutored to pass the entrance exams, my son had 2 sessions on exam technique cost me £60.
Edited by blueg33 on Thursday 18th October 08:59
Hol said:
As I have told you many times already, the boys at my sons grammar school are not all from affluent families, despite your insistence to the contrary.
If you can find any post of mine saying ALL are from affluent families, I'll gladly apologise. But you won't find it. I did say that the majority are from middle class families with above average income. But perhaps instead of making stuff up about what I've said, perhaps post honestly the percentage of kids of free school meals at your sons' school, and let's see how it stacks up against the average?
Me and one of my brothers went to the Grammar School - no tutoring.
All 3 of my kids also went to the Grammar School. The eldest had minimal tutoring, the 2nd one had more, and the youngest had the most. It's like an arms race and (I think) exacerbated by the fact that people want private school levels of education via the State. I know from my nephews and nieces that the cleverer kids in each primary school year group (ie the ones who have a chance of getting in to the Grammar) are getting additional tutoring earlier and earlier. It used to be Year 5, now Ive heard of one Year 2 kid getting tutoring. In a way you can see why the parents do it but it must put a lot of pressure on the child. One of my son's mates who studies maths at ICL set up a sideline providing maths tutoring to primary school kids when he was in the 6th form.
When my brother and I went there it was mainly local kids from working class backgrounds but with a fair smattering of the kids of local business owners. School trips were to Alton Towers. By last year (when my youngest finished her GCSEs) the number of working class kids going there are minimal. The quality of cars in the school car park suggest that most parents are "middle-class" or above and there's at least one if not 2 trips to the US, Europe, the Far East, or Australia every year, It's a big difference compared to when i went there, as far as I can see.
All 3 of my kids also went to the Grammar School. The eldest had minimal tutoring, the 2nd one had more, and the youngest had the most. It's like an arms race and (I think) exacerbated by the fact that people want private school levels of education via the State. I know from my nephews and nieces that the cleverer kids in each primary school year group (ie the ones who have a chance of getting in to the Grammar) are getting additional tutoring earlier and earlier. It used to be Year 5, now Ive heard of one Year 2 kid getting tutoring. In a way you can see why the parents do it but it must put a lot of pressure on the child. One of my son's mates who studies maths at ICL set up a sideline providing maths tutoring to primary school kids when he was in the 6th form.
When my brother and I went there it was mainly local kids from working class backgrounds but with a fair smattering of the kids of local business owners. School trips were to Alton Towers. By last year (when my youngest finished her GCSEs) the number of working class kids going there are minimal. The quality of cars in the school car park suggest that most parents are "middle-class" or above and there's at least one if not 2 trips to the US, Europe, the Far East, or Australia every year, It's a big difference compared to when i went there, as far as I can see.
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