h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Now even the Tories agree that grammar schools are a bad idea:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6676447.stm

There is no doubt whatsoever that I would have gone to a grammar were I brought up in Kent instead of Swansea: i went to a comp and came top of my year in the A-Level grades. However, I can see no justification for socially segregating eleven year olds on the basis of an IQ test. Moreover, those people most in favour of selective education, the Right, also tend to be support arguments that genes and not environment govern success in academic and other areas of life. And what about the 80% who don't get into a grammar? Should we be labelling kids as failures right from the age of eleven?

I hope this regressive idea eventually dies the death it deserves.

I'm not going to comment on whether Grammars are a good idea or not - but I will just correct the 'written off at 11' thing (for the third or fourth time since this story broke). Just because you failed your 11+ didn't mean you would spend the rest of your school career at a Comp - the system did recognise that some people were later developers - hence the 13+ system. Those that failed the 11+ could take the 13+ which consisted of a written exam and a face to face interview.

I know because my Mother failed her 11+ and was then put forward for the 13+, which she passed and then transfered to the local Grammar school.

I think grammer schools are a good idea. I don't feel a failure because I went to a comp (although admittedly I did get my O levels at a private school) and I don't feel J is a failure because he is too.

I think it's a good idea to teach kids to their abilities, although places where there are lots of grammer schools - ie Lincolnshire - then seem to let the comps go to waste. Ok, so exam results will be lower, but they should still be able to improve the kids to be as good as they can get.

A friend of mine has a child who is so good at various subjects (or works so hard at them) that he has to be 'handicapped' regularly to allow other children the chance to come first sometimes. He's also been told off for getting right answers in maths because he's worked it out a different way from the the teacher. This is not good for either the clever kid, or the others who can never naturally come first.

I think the alternative to Grammar schools is much worse than the schools ever were. Schooling by postcode is surely more elitist than schooling by ability.

I failed my 11+ and went to a secondary school .... didn't stop me getting to Uni. My daughter has just passed her 11+ and will be going to Grammar school in September - and I'm delighted she'll have the opportunity because if it were up to my postcode ..... well I don't know what we'd do because I couldn't afford to up sticks and move to a 'desirable' area within a good school catchment area.

"Mr Willetts said last week that academic selection does not help social mobility.

He argued that middle class parents could coach a less gifted child to do better in an exam at aged 11 than a bright child from a less well-off background."

From the article linked above. I had a chat with a teacher about this some time ago, and it was pointed out that those children who had to work really hard to pass the exam then were often disapointed when they didn't do so well at the school, or had to keep working that hard, just to keep up. So it's true that those with the means could get their child into grammer school, and still not really be good enough.

Even these stupid SAT things are rubbish. J got average grades because he has problems writing, and he'd rather not answer questions if there is a lot of writing, but after half a term at his new school he got moved up in most of his subjects.

Exams are rubbish - there should be some way to grade kids on effort and attainment through the year. Of course, J would still be bottom because his effort is miniscule, but we're hoping that will change with a change of school. If it ever happens...

"Schooling by postcode"

What's that?

I don't like the idea of private sponsors either - I don't want my kid being educated by a marketing company.

Schooling by postcode is what happens in areas of England if the news is to be believed..... The housing within the catchment area of a good school increases in price. Meaning if you live in an area where the local school has a bad reputation ... tough - unless you can afford inflated prices to live near the school of your choice.

Ah yes, I see what you mean. My local comp is on special measures, so most of the kids round my way are at a failing school. So a postcode lottery for all those kids, as it happened between chosing schools and places announced, and wasn't in the press until places had been sent out.

I didn't get J into the school that I really wanted (although I could have as his dad is in that catchment area), but did manage to get him into the next best.

Well second best is better than nothing - goodluck with that. In Northern Ireland where I live the selection is still made by 11+, and while I agree it's not ideal for loads of reasons, I don't see an acceptable alternative.

I think the Grammar school system, even as it stands, gives children like my duaghter a chance at the best education for her ability - her background and social status has no relevance to her selection - unlike the postcode system.

If these were the only two alternatives on offer I'd be inclined to agree, but they aren't. I'm a big fan of 'setting': dividing children into teaching groups per subject on the basis of ability. You can do this in any kind of school, and it scores heavily over streaming, mixed ability or the grammar system. It makes very little sense in a country where teaching resources are already at a premium to set up three schooling systems: grammar, secondary modern and technical schools (one of which my mum went to). I was crap at sports, but in a set-based system I'd have been put in a sports class where non-competitive sports were on offer such as rock climbing, something, given my frame, I would have really been rather good at.

I'm all for diversity in the schooling system, but of a kind that favours the consumer, not the provider, of education. Selection by ability favours only the provider.

Yes, in practice the only alternatives available are as I outlined ... the Grammar school system - over here at any rate - favours the working classes who don't have the money to provide a first class private education to their children - the majority of children attending will come from 'regular' homes - okay some never fulfill their potential - but many do and gain an education their parents could never buy them.

In recent years we had an Education Minister (with no formal education) who unilaterally decided that selection should go .... it's still here because no-one has yet established a suitable alternative. The supposedly last 11+ is to take place later this year, and after that ..... limbo.

Well, let's see if your education minister has any imagination, shall we?

Ha - he is now the former Education Minister - the new one will support selection and the Grammar School system - it's what sort of selection that is on the agenda now.

In which case, the answer is No.

I was listening to a guest on the Today program yesterday, who was saying that when Germany experimented with selective education that their experience was rather negative overall. It certainly provided a productive 'hothouse' environment for the very brightest kids but the rest of them ended up a lot worse off than under a comprehensive system.

I'm not a great one for creating divisions in society. Especially when there is no conceivable justification for them. Creating privilege for its own sake is not a justification. David Cameron is quite right: active setting within subjects is the most flexible approach.

Removing grammer schools will help to even the playing field a little - there will be more brighter children at comprehensive.

Setting is certainly something I'm in favour of, but there is no way of avoiding the so-called post-code lottery. The ill-educated belittle education, and pass on this lack of respect to their children. The ill-educated tend to earn less, and so live in rented accomodation on estates - the local school tends to have poor results.

I think the best way to tackle education is to reduce the size of schools. A large comprehensive will have over 2,000 pupils - this means teachers know the top 10% and the bottom 10%, the rest are a faceless mass.

Limit year sizes to 150 pupils. No more than 5 classes of 30. Teachers will then know all their pupils and when they're individuals, their teaching can reflect that.

I agree with your idea about reducing school sizes. My better half was a teacher, now an education consultant. She'd probably agree as well.

I was listening to the Today program the other day. Somebody was drawing parallels between the Cutty Sark and the Tory party. Since half the ship was away being restored, and the other half was now burned to a cinder, then exactly how much of the original still remained? Likewise for David Cameron's party, policy wise.

It then got me thinking about the problem of Theseus' Boat. You can read about it at A995682. The part of the 'scavenger' is being played by UKIP, reassembling policies to construct a facsimile of the old Tory party. So what happened to all the old discarded bits of the Labour party, such as unilateral disarmament, Clause 4, leaving the EU and renationalisation? In which secret boatyard are these being reassembled to sail (and sink) again?

Well the Liberal Perty seems to have become the party of taxation - maybe they'll pick up the rest - the Labour party was born out of them after all.

A friend of mine, Irish but educated at an English public school (USAers: read private) told me thirty years ago that the comprehensive schools couldn't work unless they were actually comprehensive. That means there must be no private ("Public") schools. The rich and powerful would never buy that, so the scheme was doomed from the start.

Plato said it all in The Republic: if you want luxuries you need servants, and to have servants you have to tell a lie: that some people are superior to others.