Grammar schools should we bring them back?

[????]

This has come up in several recent threads and speaks very much to the whole equality debate.

I believe we should.

The results for counties (and LEAS) - Essex, Kent, Bucks, etc - that still have selection speak volumes even the results from the Secondary Moderns in selected areas are still better than 25% of comprehensives at GCSE.

In Northern Ireland which is totally selective, 72% get 5As or better at GCSE compared to 62% nationally

Until Comprehensive education, private education was in decline (and it looked terminal.)

The decline in the share of university attendance from the bottom decile of income families started within a generation of Comprehensive Education?this is even further exaggerated when you look at Oxbridge. Basically If you were born in poverty (as in the bottom 10% of income households) in the 50s and 60s you had a better chance of going to university and Oxbridge than now.

Comprehensive education has been a terrible case of lowest common denominator thinking. It has exaggerated class divide, widened the gap between rich and poor and lowered standards. House prices around those comprehensives that achieve good results are significantly higher than those that don?t further separating rich and poor. The whole experiment was a typical exercise in social engineering that I believe has decreased the overall standard of education, widened the social equality gap, been a massive boost to private education and exposed the hypocrisy of middleclass socialism ? left wing politicians wriggling their children out of the state system is a truly laughable and ultimately disgusting spectacle in hypocrisy.

All of these were put forward as criticism of comprehensive education before it was introduced back then and they largely been proven true

[*Bob*]

Did you go to a Grammar, ?????

[????]

I sense some kind of trap. BTW *Bob* you know you need to pass some exams to be in this bit of the Forum?

[*Bob*]

A trap?! Not at all.

I went to one.

My guess would be that the greatest determining factor as to whether you give them the thumbs-up or not is whether you went to one.. or not.

[????]

Yes and yes... maybe you're right, but plenty of people from a working class background aspire for more for their kids. But the evidence also suggests that comprehensives have actually been a barrier to social mobility, especially for the very poorest, and that grammar schools weren't (as much).

Edited 'cos my grammar is so good

[Bellenden Belle]

I went to a Grammar School and agree with quids that for many such schools open up real opportunities.

My school wasn't full of children who had been hothoused for the entrance exam or whose parents had deliberately moved to get them into a "good school". Instead we were a pretty mixed bunch - some well heeled, others like myself making an hour and a half journey from Tottenham to Barnet.

Grammar schools play on individual children's academic strengths and hard work - I'm not convinced that's such a terrible thing. And certainly my experience is that they gave children from all social classes the chance to succeed.

I suspect things are different twenty years on - and that the few grammar schools left are perhaps more likely to be filled with those who can afford to get a private tutor for their little darlings. But I think this scramble is more a reflection of the lack of choice available to parents at secondary school level, than a damning indictment of the grammar school system.

[rosa_klebb]

I can only really see a Grammer option being listened to in Tory strongholds, such as Kent and Bucks which the OP has noted.

[????]

Not sure if that's true Rosa. In fact I heard on the radio the other day that support for the return of grammar schools was growing across the board.

[MitchK]

It's an interesting debate. I was at a private school and would happily send my kids to one but I do worry about the kids who are bright and keen to learn but end up at poor schools where being top of the class is frowned upon rather than praised. I think Grammar schools should be reinstated but it seems unlikely as not even the Tories are proposing this.

As for equality, it is a totally bogus concept. We are not born equal - some people will always be smarter, faster, more outgoing etc. Those who are will generally end up richer and will be able to spend more on their kids. If that means private school fees, fine; if that means buying a house in the catchment area for a good school, also fine. The socialists in power who avoid sending their kids to the local comp are obviously hypocritical but I am glad to see they put their kids first.

Grammar schools would allow poorer kids a better chance of improving themselves. Yes, there will be other bad schools where life's bus drivers end up but they exist now anyway.

[daizie]

Very good ????'s .

Course we should .

Mitch that last sentence does sound quite snobby .

[rosa_klebb]

I think education authorities should first address the appalling lack of discipline in todays schools that encourages the misguided derision of pupils who are willing to pay attention and absorb what is being taught. Address the root cause, not move it to another school.

[????]

..because public school boys are so clever innit...

[jimmy two times]

Matt Monro was a bus driver.

[silverfox]

???? said: "... In fact I heard on the radio the other day that support for the return of grammar schools was growing across the board."

Part of this support may be because many parents at private/public schools are struggling to pay the fees in the economic downturn.

I agree that the comprehensive schools introduction in the 60s and 70s was social engineering that went wrong. However, grammar schools were not ideal for everyone, especially those written off in the lower streams, and there was snob value attached to them. In fact it has been argued that the narrow classical curriculum followed by grammar schools has been partly to blame for Britain's uncompetitiveness and lack of skills in the market place.

Perhaps a european model, like Germany, would be better where top class schools that teach engineering, mechanics etc exist alongside those with a more classical bent and both are valued equally.

[Ladymuck]

I think, before addressing secondary education, we need to ensure that consistently high levels of teaching are present in all our primary schools. This would ensure the best possible level playing field for all pupils irrespective of background when the time came to moving on to secondary education. After all, there is not much point in providing top notch schools (whatever they are called) which teach Latin, Greek and Hebrew only to discover that primary school leavers are unable to string a sentence together in English or struggle with basic maths for example.

Certainly our current comprehensive system is failing our pupils and there is an urgent need for reform. However, whilst I do not dispute that grammar schools have their positives (and there is evidence to suggest that they do improve social mobility), I would be wary of returning to the old tri-partite system per se whereby the public's general perception was that grammar schools were the best schools and by implication therefore anyone who attended anything but would be considered as having failed.

[mockney piers]

Sounding horribly reminiscent of smacking threads, I went to a comprehensive and it never did me any harm.

[HAL9000]

Dispatches: Kids don't count - tonight at 8:00pm on Channel 4. This two-part edition sounds relevant to this thread although it "asks why one in five British kids leave primary school without the basic maths skills required by the national curriculum."

[Ladymuck]

HAL9000 Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Dispatches: Kids don't count - tonight at 8:00pm

> on Channel 4. This two-part edition sounds

> relevant to this thread although it "asks why one

> in five British kids leave primary school without

> the basic maths skills required by the national

> curriculum."

Damn! Just seen this...thanks HAL9000.

*dashes off to front room*

[HAL9000]

Well, that was a shocking eye-opener: what chance do the kids stand when their teachers can't pass the eight-year-olds' math tests?

[Ladymuck]

HAL9000 Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Well, that was a shocking eye-opener: what chance

> do the kids stand when their teachers can't pass

> the eight-year-olds' math tests?

Certainly was...and they don't!

[david_carnell]

Unsurprisingly I disagree with ????.

I went to a grammar school in Surrey. It has amazing exam results and is one of the top 20 state schools in the country. I enjoyed my time there a great deal. However, I would like to abolish them.

Essentially I believe them to be extraordinarily unfair.

With a two-tier system of education that condemns children to either an excellent grammar school or a "ordinary" (and that covers a multitude of sins) secondary modern (or whatever outdated term one wishes to use) the pressure to gain a place at these elite schools becomes immense.

Currently, and I speak from experience (although it's got even worse in the last ten years), this manifests itself in either the hot-housing of 10 year old children forced to endure night after night of endless test papers and coached to exhaustion by a private tutor (for those who can afford one) and also a rise in house prices for those areas that still possess grammars. I suppose the latter may be eradicated should they become widespread. The former issue remains.

My biggest concern is that a child's life is effectively being decided at 10 or 11 years of age. Should they fail this one entrance exam, second chances do not exist. What happens to those bright children who miss out? Are they condemned to the "social failure" that is the comprehensive? It is a situation that makes me feel distinctly uneasy.

When I was at primary school I remember the heartache suffered by friends and their parents when they failed the entrance exams I was lucky enough to pass. It is a feeling that an 11 year old should not go through.

My solution to the problem described by the OP (on the assumption that his hypothesis on the state of British education is accurate) is one similar to that suggested by Toby Young. I would like to see what Young calls "comprehensive grammars". This is a accepts-all-comers school that then utilises streaming in each subject to both push those at the top of their subject and give a helping hand to those who need it. By not specialising in "classical" education it allows those who excel at creative or non-traditional subjects to also be exposed to the best the education system can offer.

Finally it also allows for proper social integration by not discriminating against those who cannot afford private tutors or expensive houses in catchment areas.

Surely this is a more preferable solution than harking back to system that had it's heyday in the 1950s and 60s.

[SteveT]

mockney piers wrote:- I went to a comprehensive and it never did me any harm.

How interesting, do you not feel there may be gaps in your education, or logic?

More to the point about your comprehensive, to take a positive view, did it do you any good?

Grammar schools did well because of their strict codes of conduct and the discipline of the staff and children.

This could be brought to any school with the right quality of staff,

and correct back-up (not necessarily caning though something with bite would help enormously)

so they can remove control of the schools from the pupils.

[????]

As an aside - sorry chair - Take the Maths Test from the dispatches website, teachers averaged 45% (I manged 11 out of 14 so 60% then >:D)

DC good I was hoping for some counter arguments from yourself, I will come back later

[womanofdulwich]

I went to a girls grammer school for 18 months. I went from being top of the class at my state junior school, to a struggler; although after the first year, all the private school entrants that had basically repeated half a year started to be at a similar level to me. It was fiercely competitive though and I did not really like it. We moved to the Isle of Wight to a new comprehensive mixed school and it was nice to be near the top again. I mixed with lots of people, but I always felt it was hard on the students who were cleverer in some subjects than in others- they would rather stay with their CSE friends than move to an o level class to be with those of us that were doing all o levels. In that way it failed. But I really don't think the grammer school system was that much better.

Surely the main problem is the ethos in schools? my experience of state schools in London is that the teachers are not interested in the confidence and individual abilities, only the statistics /targets.

Some children do well in fiercely competitive environments,but not for me. I know I would like there to be flexibility where you are not :pass/ fail at 11. The whole of your future mapped out for you. It must be better to be mixed overall with some streaming and bigger class sizes for more able students. How does Harris school at Crystal Palace do so well? I do not know, but I suspect it is very strong leadership and management.But that is their academic results- I don't know that the students leave school confident, which I think is as important. We want children to make the most of what they have and to find their talents and be confident. Writing off your academic future at 11 is not good

[The Chair]

???? Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> As an aside - sorry chair - Take the Maths Test

> from the dispatches website, teachers averaged 45%

> (I manged 11 out of 14 so 60% then >:D)

The Chair's results are not available for publication.