Grammar Schools

Our school invited in a Labour MP to give us a talk and he was talking how Grammar Schools should be abolished because if our Grammar school was converted to a Comprehensive, we would apparently do one grade better at GCSE. What a load of rubbish.

The person giving you the talk would have had the research to back up what he/she was saying.

It is a shame none of you asked to see it rather than dismissing it as a load of rubbish - hardly indicative of an enquiring mind that one would expect to see in someone who is at a grammar school.

So perhaps the MP was right! - actually all the research that has been done shows that the most able children (ie top 2%) do much better at comprehensives. This suggests that grammar schools (not all of them, but most) just allow their pupils to coast along, achieving results above average which is to be expected of pupils of above average ability, without making more determined efforts to provide a challenging education.

If comps can get more than half their pupils passing 5 A*- C grades at GCSE despite having having less than 25% in the top quartile then they are doing a better job than grammars which can't get ALL their pupils reaching the same benchmark from all of the top quartile.

The person giving you the talk would have had the research to back up what he/she was saying.

It is a shame none of you asked to see it rather than dismissing it as a load of rubbish - hardly indicative of an enquiring mind that one would expect to see in someone who is at a grammar school.

So perhaps the MP was right! - actually all the research that has been done shows that the most able children (ie top 2%) do much better at comprehensives. This suggests that grammar schools (not all of them, but most) just allow their pupils to coast along, achieving results above average which is to be expected of pupils of above average ability, without making more determined efforts to provide a challenging education.

If comps can get more than half their pupils passing 5 A*- C grades at GCSE despite having having less than 25% in the top quartile then they are doing a better job than grammars which can't get ALL their pupils reaching the same benchmark from all of the top quartile.

So perhaps the MP was right! - actually all the research that has been done shows that the most able children (ie top 2%) do much better at comprehensives. This suggests that grammar schools (not all of them, but most) just allow their pupils to coast along, achieving results above average which is to be expected of pupils of above average ability, without making more determined efforts to provide a challenging education.

it suggests nothing of the sort.

its time you stuck to facts not supposition.

please enlighten us all on these pass figures you speak of in your last paragraph.

How can schools provide a more challenging education when the schools play no role in deciding what is included in the syllabi of the subjects, i.e. what should be in the National Curriculum. You cannot providing more help to students if you have taught all your students the notes they need to achieve top grades.

it suggests nothing of the sort.

its time you stuck to facts not supposition.

please enlighten us all on these pass figures you speak of in your last paragraph.

Furthermore, if I go to a comprehensive school now, I will still achieve what I will achieve when in a Grammar school.

Waste of time debating with someone such as yourself on this matter.

You refute anything that does not support your preconceptions.

Precisely my point - but you may in fact achieve much more in a comprehensive, especially if you come within the top 2% of the population!

You are making fatuous statements - you cannot back up what you say. I can, and I have in many threads on this forum but I am not prepared to do it for you - you can remain in ignorance if you are too lazy to do your own research.

rather convenient that...

i dont think you like being challenged. you posted some figures earlier in the thread which i countered with more recent and more in-depth ones.

Hye yawn- im in kent too. What school(s) did you go to?

That is my point - grammars in the main just restrict themselves to teaching to the exam ceiling despite having the top quartile in their schools.

They need to challenge to ensure that their students are studying subjects in more depth and breadth - providing enhanced curriculum.

Have a look at the websites for the teaching of the 'gifted' and see what they suggest - most schools, including grammars don't really challenge students enough, they are far more capable than most teachers realise. And it makes me angry that generations of students are being denied the best possible education that could be provided if there was not so much empathsis on league tables etc. When you have published performance league tables educational standards suffer because the schools teach to the means of staying at the top of the table - which does not in any way tell the whole story about the all round success of a school and especially the wonderful achievements made by those who would have been consigned to the depths of education abysses.

Precisely my point - but you may in fact achieve much more in a comprehensive, especially if you come within the top 2% of the population!

What you said is true. However, how do comprehensive schools provide more challenging education, when they teach the same syllabi, and following the same national curriculum as Grammar schools?

I am still confused, how can I achieve better results if I go to a comprehensive?