Tories to bring back Grammar schools

[harvey19]

Oh dear, according to the BBC this morning she (Theresa May*) is not let this Grammar school populist nonsense just quietly disappear. Still, hopefully, parliament will kill it off, send it back to the 50s where it belongs.

 

* you`d have thought she`d got more than enough on at the moment, what is wrong with the stupid woman.

 

Now, now let's show some respect for Our Elected Leader.

If you want to be familiar maybe Terrific Theresa may be acceptable.

I fully agree with a return to the grammar school system.

I may be one of the few on this forum who can speak from experience.

[Justin Smith]

Now, now let's show some respect for Our Elected Leader.

If you want to be familiar maybe Terrific Theresa may be acceptable.

I fully agree with a return to the grammar school system.

I may be one of the few on this forum who can speak from experience.

 

Even if Grammar schools give a better academic education (which is debatable) they`re arguably rather socially divisive. What is definitely not arguable or debatable is that most kids (is it 75 or 80% ? ) don`t go to Grammar schools anyway. They go to Secondary Moderns. If you ask people whether they like Secondary Moderns very few will say yes. But you can`t have one without the other.

[harvey19]

When I went to grammar school, which was a long time ago now, pupils came from all sorts of backgrounds.

The pupils were of different abilities and the brightest pupils needed the brightest and most able teachers.

We mixed with our friends who went to secondary modern schools and never felt superior or different.

I have recently spoken to friends who went to a secondary modern school and they have never felt a failure or inferior because they did not pass the 11plus examination.

Edited March 7, 2017 by harvey19

[biotechpete]

Now, now let's show some respect for Our Elected Leader.

If you want to be familiar maybe Terrific Theresa may be acceptable.

I fully agree with a return to the grammar school system.

I may be one of the few on this forum who can speak from experience.

 

I went to a grammar too...but I'm not sure my experience is all that useful in designing education policy.

 

---------- Post added 07-03-2017 at 21:46 ----------

 

Even if Grammar schools give a better academic education (which is debatable) they`re arguably rather socially divisive. What is definitely not arguable or debatable is that most kids (is it 75 or 80% ? ) don`t go to Grammar schools anyway. They go to Secondary Moderns. If you ask people whether they like Secondary Moderns very few will say yes. But you can`t have one without the other.

 

At the risk of repeating what I posted months ago, the overall system of grammar/secondary appears to be equivalent/marginally better than comprehensive in areas of comparable indices of deprivation. It is unarguable that grammar schools get better results than comprehensives, but then they ought to.

 

Schooling is socially divisive in any case. I am not convinced that the grammar system is more so. Is social integration desirable, in and of itself, in education? I'd so for what purpose?

 

---------- Post added 07-03-2017 at 22:05 ----------

 

A long time ago it seems biotech mentioned the shortcomings of graduates, my initial thoughts were that the fee system for uni and the softening of entry requirements has led to people in effect buying degrees that xamount of years ago would have not even passed Alevels.

Now after a pp mentioned the difference between himself and wife, is the shortcoming a product of the educational foundation before degrees are even reached?

If you've got a record number of students getting into uni but a similar number coming from grammar which equals a proportionally smaller number is it easier to notice the divide?

 

Would the return of grammars slim down the numbers going to uni or produce a lot of disheartened grads when the job market starts to select by whole of education pedigree.

I mean that currently both grammars and comps teach to the same qualification, but arguably grammars are more effective(due to the obvious) and you'd expect more thorough teaching in a selective school, could this lead to a contraction of the uni intake from outside grammars or would a uni expand to meet demand, gather more fees whilst possibly creating a second uni tier of sorts.

 

My comment was actually not so much a short coming of graduates but of schools. There ought to be a trickle down effect where as knowledge expands it moves from degree to a-level . For instance A-level biology ought now to include a great deal more about genetics and genomics than it did. The problem is that when Labour introduced AS levels, they stripped the 'hard' bits out of the a level syllabuses. Hence a gap is created to what is taught/can be fitted into a degree course. Consequently, we are teaching decades old subject matter to degree level students (at least in areas like genetics) which means their knowledge is not altogether useful for tech businesses developing the latest gene sequencers. In my subject there is a physical knowledge gap, between what graduates learn, and what actually happens. My experience is that other nationalities of students and graduates Have a higher level of basic knowledge.

[Justin Smith]

Schooling is socially divisive in any case. I am not convinced that the grammar system is more so. Is social integration desirable, in and of itself, in education? I'd [if] so for what purpose?.

 

I would say yes.

Where else are kids going to socially integrate ?

I wouldn`t take this too far though. I think disruptive pupils should be excluded from main stream schooling and placed in schools specially set up for them. Those schools should have exceptionally low pupil /teacher ratios, and they should spend as much money on them as is needed to educate the disruptive kids, and, more importantly, try to prevent then falling into crime.

 

At the risk of repeating what I posted months ago, the overall system of grammar/secondary appears to be equivalent/marginally better than comprehensive in areas of comparable indices of deprivation. It is unarguable that grammar schools get better results than comprehensives, but then they ought to.

 

It may be unarguable that Grammar schools produce better results for those who attend them than the average comprehensive.

But there are two points here.

 

The best comprehensives are as good as Grammar schools.

 

The other point, and a far more important one, is that the Grammar / Sec Modern system produce worse results for the majority of kids who attend the secondary moderns.

Edited March 8, 2017 by Justin Smith

[biotechpete]

I would say yes.

Where else are kids going to socially integrate ?

I wouldn`t take this too far though. I think disruptive pupils should be excluded from main stream schooling and placed in schools specially set up for them. Those schools should have exceptionally low pupil /teacher ratios, and they should spend as much money on them as is needed to educate the disruptive kids, and, more importantly, try to prevent then falling into crime.

 

What is the purpose of social integration? And does the comprehensive system achieve this in anything other than an ideological aspiration? In my view the key here is that aspirational parents want their children to mix with children of other aspirational parents. This leads to defacto social exclusion from the best comprehensives by wealth (ability to buy a house in the catchment). Mind you this also occurs in the case of secondary modern schools, but not to the same extent. This is because everyone knows, it doesn't help their children to 'integrate' with children whose parents don't give a damn about their education ie social integration limits educational attainment.

 

The other aspect of this is that I don't accept that the least able and most disruptive pupils should receive much more resource than the most able, who are being equally disadvantaged by an integrated educational model, save for the cost benefit of crime prevention.

 

It may be unarguable that Grammar schools produce better results for those who attend them than the average comprehensive.

But there are two points here.

 

The best comprehensives are as good as Grammar schools.

 

The other point, and a far more important one, is that the Grammar / Sec Modern system produce worse results for the majority of kids who attend the secondary moderns.

 

 

I guess it depends how you define 'as good as' but results wise, no they are not. Grammar schools gets 99% A-C passes at GCSE, the best comprehensives don't get near that.

 

The second point is that no they do not. Many sec modern schools out perform comprehensives, and as I posted earlier in the thread, in comparable local authorities in terms of deprivation, the combined results of grammars/sec moderns are as good as, and in fact marginally better than comprehensives.

[sgtkate]

I've said something similar before in this thread that I'm half in favour of Grammar schools, i.e. selective state schools, however, I'm only half in favour because the other half of the problem hasn't been fixed...not all children are going to be academically gifted, and not all children are going to vocationally gifted. If we view these 2 skills as of equal merit (and we should because they really are) then splitting groups into those who are good at traditional academic subjects and those who are good at vocational subjects surely allows every single child the *best* chance of achieving in an area they are good at and hopefully enjoy.

 

So much of this issue is with people who somehow think a Maths A-level is more worthy than an HND in building. Why do people think that? Because I'd wager that the problem is with them rather than with the idea of having the correct style of education for the child over some misguided classist ideology that only the 3Rs are valuable.

 

So by all means carry on with the Grammar school rollout, but for each Grammar school create a world-class vocational school too that focusses more on hands on learning for those who excel in that rather than trying to shoehorn every child into a tiny box...

[biotechpete]

I've said something similar before in this thread that I'm half in favour of Grammar schools, i.e. selective state schools, however, I'm only half in favour because the other half of the problem hasn't been fixed...not all children are going to be academically gifted, and not all children are going to vocationally gifted. If we view these 2 skills as of equal merit (and we should because they really are) then splitting groups into those who are good at traditional academic subjects and those who are good at vocational subjects surely allows every single child the *best* chance of achieving in an area they are good at and hopefully enjoy.

 

So much of this issue is with people who somehow think a Maths A-level is more worthy than an HND in building. Why do people think that? Because I'd wager that the problem is with them rather than with the idea of having the correct style of education for the child over some misguided classist ideology that only the 3Rs are valuable.

 

So by all means carry on with the Grammar school rollout, but for each Grammar school create a world-class vocational school too that focusses more on hands on learning for those who excel in that rather than trying to shoehorn every child into a tiny box...

 

I couldn't agree more. I actually cannot see the point in grammar schools, given that the education/exam system is the same in all schools. I guess the ideal thing is to have 'personalised education', but that would be prohibitively expensive. The classist ideology is writ large on both sides of the debate, but educationally it is clear that mixed ability classes are less desirable than similar ability classes. The best comprehensives stream their pupils for this exact reason.

 

The only question in my mind is whether delivering different kinds of education; vocational, technical, creative, academic/traditional (for want of a better description) requires different schools. It seems to be a more efficient way to organise it at least. Labour created a whole load of 'specialist' schools, but that doesn't seem to have achieved a good balance in terms of mixed model schooling.

[Olive]

 

I guess it depends how you define 'as good as' but results wise, no they are not. Grammar schools gets 99% A-C passes at GCSE, the best comprehensives don't get near that.

 

 

That's not really surprising though is it? And it doesn't really tell us anything about the quality of teaching in those schools. How do we know that the brighter pupils in the comprehensive schools aren't getting the same results they would be getting if they were in a grammar school? Results only mean something if you're comparing like with like.

 

I have a question that no-one ever seems to address:

 

What difference does it make to syphon off brighter kids into a separate building than keeping them in the same schools but, streaming into separate classes?

 

I can't get my head around this obsession with creating separate physical sites for different abilities.

 

Say you created a grammar school, sited it next door to the comp and sent all the clever kids there. Why not just build some new classrooms, call it the same school and teach to ability?

[sgtkate]

I couldn't agree more. I actually cannot see the point in grammar schools, given that the education/exam system is the same in all schools. I guess the ideal thing is to have 'personalised education', but that would be prohibitively expensive. The classist ideology is writ large on both sides of the debate, but educationally it is clear that mixed ability classes are less desirable than similar ability classes. The best comprehensives stream their pupils for this exact reason.

 

The only question in my mind is whether delivering different kinds of education; vocational, technical, creative, academic/traditional (for want of a better description) requires different schools. It seems to be a more efficient way to organise it at least. Labour created a whole load of 'specialist' schools, but that doesn't seem to have achieved a good balance in terms of mixed model schooling.

 

That's a good question. Why do we need different schools at all? We don't, you are completely right!