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Six things we learned from Justine Greening's grilling by MPs today

Discussion in 'Education news' started by TES_Rosaline, Sep 14, 2016.

  1. TES_Rosaline

    TES_Rosaline Administrator Staff Member

    In the past week we have learned that we have an unelected Prime Minister who is keen to press ahead with her controversial plans to introduce more grammar schools without having a mandate for this decision, so what are your initial thoughts after Justine Greening's appearance in front of the education select committee this morning?

  2. Scintillant

    Scintillant Star commenter

    The evidence is clearly against grammar schools

    As it was yesterday
  3. HelenREMfan

    HelenREMfan Star commenter

    I disagree. The evidence is there that too many sec moderns were denied the right amount of funding. Post code schools are a far worse failure in my view.
    ElPintor and delnon like this.
  4. TCSC47

    TCSC47 Star commenter

    Same old, same old! May has her own particular bee in her bonnet about education, just as Cameron, Brown, Blair, ad infinitum ad nauseam. It is the nations children who must suffer the brunt of yet more changes.
    delnon, wordsworth, vannie and 2 others like this.
  5. peter12171

    peter12171 Star commenter

    It obviously isn't "clearly" against grammars, or there wouldn't be a debate every time the subject comes up.
    ElPintor likes this.
  6. Doitforfree

    Doitforfree Star commenter

    I wouldn't flatter it with the term 'debate'. What we actually get are a lot of people saying how marvellous it was that they went o grammar school, schools which appear to have taught them no analytical or critical skills at all, to say nothing of their complete lack of understanding od statistics. Great schools, huh?
  7. Calpurnia99

    Calpurnia99 Star commenter

    Could someone direct me to a time, place or system in which children of middle-class families made similar or worse progress than working-class ones?

    Could it be that mass state education isn't the mighty tool of social mobility it's cracked up to be?
    ElPintor and peter12171 like this.
  8. Middlemarch

    Middlemarch Star commenter

    It's annoying that May uses the fact that she and Corbyn went to grammars as if that proves they promote social mobility. Both were born into middle class families.
    TCSC47 likes this.
  9. shevington

    shevington Occasional commenter

    For those who want to check the truth about Grammar Schools in past, should read the book by Colin Lacey High Town Grammar published in 1970. Its all true about the C stream in Grammar Schools.
  10. Flere-Imsaho

    Flere-Imsaho Star commenter

    And I believe hers was a comprehensive for the last three years she attended it.
  11. florian gassmann

    florian gassmann Star commenter

    Is that why she prefers grammars to comps?
  12. Scintillant

    Scintillant Star commenter

    You're wrong. There is no debate on this. The evidence is against grammar schools
    It is.

    End of.
    TCSC47, vannie and NoseyMatronType like this.
  13. HelenREMfan

    HelenREMfan Star commenter

    Your evidence for this is?

    I went to school in Blackpool. in my era Blackpool had excellent schools Collegiate, Elmslie, Layton Convent, Arnold High - all girls' schools and the main secondary modern Palatine did well as did Highfield. From all accounts it is an educational blackspot now.
  14. needabreak

    needabreak Star commenter

  15. HelenREMfan

    HelenREMfan Star commenter

    Of course as this report states to study current grammar schools it can only focus on the reduced areas where they still operate.

    It states it is proved brighter children do better at grammar schools so I shall now upset the sacred cow by saying I feel that the resources now and money spent on the children of below and well below average ability is unfair. This is what has happened over the past 30/40 years. The resources have been focussed on the less able to the detriment of the able with the all prevailing attitude of that the bright kids will "get there anyway". So until we return to a selective system based on academic, technical or vocational/practical ability and fund each tier fairly.... we will continue to fail bright children and especially bright working class children.
  16. needabreak

    needabreak Star commenter

    Personally and I doubt I am alone in this, from a political point of view in a democracy the state school system should be available for all, not a select few *many of whom were quite possibly privately educated and or tutored until the age of 11 to get into a selective school.

    But each to their own, you asked for evidence and there it is.
  17. needabreak

    needabreak Star commenter

    They manage to do well in Finland without selection of any sort, indeed without Grammar or Private schools. They are world leaders in education and as I have said on other threads I do not take such comparisons lightly; however there is a lot to be said for an equal playing field if you believe in egality rather than an elitist regime.

    If we take selection further we come to the conclusion as many have that state school teachers are simply those who failed to teach in Private schools as they not bright enough, however they have learned their limits and have stuck to them. I do not for one minute think this is true but since we are assuming intelligence is based on performance what does that say about those who work in State schools be that Grammar of Comprehensive.

    Learning by rote to simply pass exams is no longer a valid measure of intelligence, nor are IQ tests, we live in a very different world to the 50's and 60's where the workplace/UK labour market (which is what state education is catering for), no longer has a large manufacturing base (since we are no longer internationally competitive in heavy industries as wages are so high etc), so our labour market relies on those who can think for themselves, problem solve and come up with unique ideas. Teaching to test does not facilitate this (as shown in the Chinese model) and in many cases can simply be really boring both for students and teaching professionals.

    Another step further on our selective route and the rich deserve to be rich because they are by definition simply the more able etc, so on and so forth. Old hat tosh.
    lanokia and Geoff Thomas like this.
  18. HelenREMfan

    HelenREMfan Star commenter

    I don't think it is fair to say that the grammar school kids of my era weren't all that intelligent and just learned by rote! Few too were "coached" to pass the exam - the 11+ which I entirely agree wasn't an accurate method to establish the brightest. At my village primary school we didn't even do a practice paper and it was the first time any of us had been seated in the hall on the usual dining tables to take any kind of test ! I am on record in saying that teacher recommendation should have been a major part of the decision process and in addition that at any stage up to the end of KS3 there should have been easy movement between the tiers of schools.
    I have lost count of how many people I knew then and have met since who were a product of the grammar schools, who came from modest backgrounds and who went on to "good" universities and into professions. Why is there such a presumption that every child is capable of that? I do not denigrate the skill of a good hairdresser who didn't have or want to have an academic education. I really don't think that push by some of the new Labour crew to get more and more kids into universities did much good at all, with devalued degrees as in a BSC on how to navel gaze. In my view it certainly did no favours to working class kids and families as to the importance of a university education and worse still it removed the wishes of some to go and "waste their time" for 3 years with the incurred expense when they could do plumbing. Trying to raise aspiration in my school was like pulling teeth.
    ElPintor likes this.
  19. needabreak

    needabreak Star commenter

    For the record I did not say that "grammar school kids of my era weren't all that intelligent".

    Again this is being brought down to a personal level. I am not talking about individuals I am talking about what politics and state provision is for. I am also not talking about history. I am talking about an education system fit for current purpose, I thought that was clear.
  20. peter12171

    peter12171 Star commenter

    One key thing that has been overlooked is that this proposal is part of wider choice, not going back to a binary split between grammars and secondary moderns (I know there was supposed to be a third tier of technical colleges, but so few were built that it was effectively a choice between two). It is not suggested that we go back to that system, or that the current method of selection for grammar schools is rolled out nationwide; there will be more choice in a more nuanced education system.

    Interesting in this regard is a column in the New Statesman (usually seen as left-of-centre and therefore probably against grammars) which states how a new approach to selection could improve chances for all: http://www.newstatesman.com/politic...-theresa-may-can-win-argument-grammar-schools

    We should also beware of the data used in analysis. A report by the Sutton Trust in 2008 concluded that there was a "small positive" advantage at GCSE for grammars, but suggested that we should be cautious of putting this down to grammars (for example, more progress appears to have been made by pupils primary school). http://www.suttontrust.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/SuttonTrustFullReportFinal11.pdf

    Something else thatmight also skew figures is that the proprotion of non-white students is far higher in grammar schools than comprehensives (graph on page 6 of http://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN01398/SN01398.pdf). In my experience, families from non-white backgrounds, especially those from the Asian subcontinent, tend to value education higher. A higher proportion of students from that background would therefore alter the figures.

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