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Post by sweetjessicajane on Jul 17, 2014 13:14:36 GMT
There is an illusion that parents have choice - many parents do but a significant number don't - currently where I live the council have approved planning permission for housing without making proper provision for school (through all age ranges).
So even though we moved to our current home before my youngest child was born, we were unable to get him into our local school, or the next nearest or the next. The criteria for selecting our schools was distance only - we were finally allocated a school miles from our home, further than the council's own guidelines permit, it's not on a bus route . When going to school I pass 4 schools that are nearer to my house than the one he attends - if I look at a map and measure distances (as the crow flies) to other schools there are ten schools nearer to my house than the one he attends.
At the end of the day I don't really care whether the school is run by the council, or by a trust, or by parents, or whether is chooses to call itself an Academy or a Free school - I want a good local school for my child - and I believe every child/family should have access to a good local school
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Post by cleefarqhuar on Jul 17, 2014 13:32:39 GMT
At the end of the day I don't really care whether the school is run by the council, or by a trust, or by parents, or whether is chooses to call itself an Academy or a Free school - I want a good local school for my child - and I believe every child/family should have access to a good local school I think that that is what every parent wants However,consider your predicament, and ask yourself why that situation exists. Our current educational administration has been in place for nearly 70 years now, yet parents have no choice (or very little choice) to which school their child goes. In fact many parents are in a far worse position than you - the schools they have to send their children to are abominable sink schools Councils (and the government) are no more capable of running our schools system than they are a supermarket chain Things must change to give ordinary pupils the educational chance they deserve
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Post by cleefarqhuar on Jul 17, 2014 13:42:58 GMT
Who said anything about selection by ability? So we agree they do not select by ability. Good. Now we are getting somewhere Selecting by parental attitude and degree of supportiveness is absolutely the most important thing in assuring a smoothly running school free of the disruption that makes things so difficult for any school that has to take anyone who applies. I agree. But parents that disagree with the exclusion of their child from a Free school have, in law, recourse to appeals If the parent of a pupil at a free school turns up and threatens to punch a teacher in the face because the school has disciplined their child, do you think that child's continuing presence in the Free School is assured? No. And it should not be (Do you in all honesty consider that this is an argument against Free schools?) Children go to school for an education and it is reprehensible that their education is retarded by the bad behaviour of other pupils or their parents. Evidently the Government must make provision for pupils that consistently disrupt and are excluded from mainstream schools (This is is a problem that has been around for years and has little to do with 'Free' schools. If 'Free' schools exclude disruptive pupils thenm good for them - it will focus the problem and make a solution more urgent) You have not advanced a single coherent objection to Gove's system
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Post by sweetjessicajane on Jul 17, 2014 18:52:02 GMT
Considering the situation we find ourselves, the problem faced locally is the lack of places - when I leave to take my son to school in the morning I see all the other parents in the street leaving too and we are all going to different schools, and they aren't are local one. As I said previously the local council is granting planning permission for a couple of thousand houses but failing to ensure the schools are there for the children when they are needed. The houses are built,people move in there are no local schools so they take places at schools else where in the borough then the younger sibling get preference on places so children with no older brothers/sisters but live nearer the school don't get places and end up going to places else where in the borough - so when I'm doing the school run in the morning I pass people going to my local school that live further away than I do. So we have all these children being "shipped" about the borough.
The other issue is quality - but what is it that makes a good school? Or probably a a better question is why do some children leave school literate and numerate and other don't? It is just a reflection of the school's building/teachers/methods? Or is it a reflection of the children's/parent's engagement with education?
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Post by aquatic on Jul 17, 2014 23:14:26 GMT
I do dislike free schools and academies and grammars, because they're selective, aren't they? (Sorry, the spell-check wouldn't allow me to misspell 'grammar'.)
Of course they are.
Documented, the best schools are comprehensives.
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Post by cleefarqhuar on Jul 18, 2014 7:11:09 GMT
I do dislike free schools and academies and grammars, because they're selective, aren't they? (Sorry, the spell-check wouldn't allow me to misspell 'grammar'.) Of course they are. Documented, the best schools are comprehensives. Unlike Grammar schools, the other two are not selective on ability I am against the concept of ability-selection of the Grammar mode The worst schools are also comprehensives Do you think that parents should be able to choose their child's school
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Post by cleefarqhuar on Jul 20, 2014 7:48:13 GMT
So it seems that Aqua and arrogant Jean's only objection to the 'harmful' concept of free schools and Academies is that they are allowed toi exclude disruptive pupils What an extremely odd position to take!
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Post by sweetjessicajane on Jul 20, 2014 13:10:18 GMT
When I went to school many years ago we learnt about the "Bell" Curve - and when applied to exams the curve indicated that the majority of people would get a "C" grade - they were the average, with a small percentage getting either a "B" or "D" and then smaller percentages getting "A" or "E".
So schools should be catering for the average pupil - but there must be provision for the above average and the below so they too can reach their full potential. Whether that is in the same school with extra provision or in separate institutions where pupils are selected on grounds of ability (or lack of) I don't think it matters as long as they are given every opportunity to achieve the best they can regardless of their ability.
There is however another group of pupils, those whose attitude/behavior is such that it is disruptive to the class and school and prevents willing pupils from achieving the best they can. They shouldn't be tolerated in mainstream schools.
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Post by cleefarqhuar on Jul 20, 2014 13:31:32 GMT
So schools should be catering for the average pupil - but there must be provision for the above average and the below so they too can reach their full potential. Whether that is in the same school with extra provision or in separate institutions where pupils are selected on grounds of ability (or lack of) I don't think it matters as long as they are given every opportunity to achieve the best they can regardless of their ability. This is the ethos of the Comprehensive where pupils are streamed according to ability and can be transferred 'up' or 'down' at any time dependant upon their performance. There is however another group of pupils, those whose attitude/behavior is such that it is disruptive to the class and school and prevents willing pupils from achieving the best they can. They shouldn't be tolerated in mainstream schools. I agree entirely. Separate provision must be made for such pupils
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Post by aquatic on Jul 20, 2014 22:03:53 GMT
So it seems that Aqua and arrogant Jean's only objection to the 'harmful' concept of free schools and Academies is that they are allowed toi exclude disruptive pupils What an extremely odd position to take! I think I implied only that I was against selective schools. However, you may be implying that you know that Free Schools and Academies (what a joke!) have a free pass on excluding (incl not admitting? How do they know?) disruptive pupils. If this is true, it's a scandal. I dare say a lot of people who post on these boards went to selective or at least exclusive schools. They know the social consequences, for good or ill, so I don't need to elaborate..
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Post by cleefarqhuar on Jul 21, 2014 7:28:21 GMT
I think I implied only that I was against selective schools. OK. I assumed you had read Jean's posts where she averred that the new schools were selective (in the commonly understood manner of 'selection')' When she was shown that they are not selective based on ability, she happily put forward another definition of 'selective' whereby the selection is based upon excluding troublesome pupils. I showed her that any child that is excluded has recourse to appeals procedures Personally I do not know what the powers of exclusion of these new schools are, whether they are greater or the same as 'old' schools However, you may be implying that you know that Free Schools and Academies (what a joke!) have a free pass on excluding (incl not admitting? How do they know?) disruptive pupils. If this is true, it's a scandal. I so not know what the powers of exclusion are - there must be some power or there would be no appeals Agreed .......disruptive pupils. If this is true, it's a scandal. Not so. Social responsibility must be a two-way process that has consequences for those that break the contract. Childrens' education is not to contain disruptive children but to maximise the educational opportunities for all children that accept the social contract. The government must find other schools for disruptive pupils, indeed I can conceive of Free schools being created that cater for disruptive pupils alone I dare say a lot of people who post on these boards went to selective or at least exclusive schools. They know the social consequences, for good or ill, so I don't need to elaborate.. But what on earth is your objection to Free schools as the are not ability-selective?
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Post by jean on Jul 22, 2014 7:51:53 GMT
I assumed you had read Jean's posts where she averred that the new schools were selective (in the commonly understood manner of 'selection')' When she was shown that they are not selective based on ability, she happily put forward another definition of 'selective' whereby the selection is based upon excluding troublesome pupils. If you ever read my posts properly, rather than assuming I had written what you thought I'd written, you'd know that throughout many discussions on this subject I have pointed out that any school that is given permission, or gives itself permission, to choose pupils on the basis of any criteria whatsoever is at an advantage compared to one that isn't. Of course there should be provision outside the school system for severely disruptive pupils. In practice, it is a very expensive thing to do and although PRUs (Pupil Referral Units) do exist, there are not nearly enough of them. How much easier to blame the teachers in the schools where these children end up for their failure to cope? Meanwhile, any parent who can satisfy the selection criteria of a free school is laughing. Most parents don't have the choice.
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Post by Jonjel on Jul 22, 2014 11:09:03 GMT
Can anyone explain why it is so awful to select children on ability? I was, together with many others here.
Universities select on ability. Not everyone is equal and I think it is a big mistake to assume that if they are all given exactly the same education they will finish up equal. They won't.
Universities select on ability. Employers select on ability by and large.
People seem to be obsessed with trying to get everyone to breast the finishing tape in an exact line.
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Post by cleefarqhuar on Jul 22, 2014 12:49:29 GMT
Can anyone explain why it is so awful to select children on ability? I was, together with many others here. It is not awful by any means, indeed it esential that students should be selected by ability The reason I object to Grammar-type selection is that it is a one-off process at age 11 Selection and demotion/promotion to higher or lower streams should be an almost continuous process in my opinion as pupils develop at different ages This,of course is the ethos of many comprehensive schools, but overall the comprehensive system fails many of our children for a multitude of reasons, and the great disadvantage of Comprehensive sis lack of choice; if parents are unlucky enough to live in a 'sink' school area and cannot afford otherwise, then there their child will go
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Post by sweetjessicajane on Jul 22, 2014 15:18:15 GMT
My experience of a comprehensive education.
To put into context, we lived near the local grammar school, but it was changed to a comprehensive, so I was a member of the first or second cohort of pupils who attended the school on a non-selective basis. The Headmaster had been there when is was a grammar school, the staff had been there when is was a grammar school - I think in their heads they still thought of it as a grammar school, with the aim of producing "University Entrants" preferably Oxbridge.
On the very first day at the school, I was put in a class of about 30 other children, I spent all and every school day with them until the end of the 5th year. There was no moving up or moving down, we all did "O" levels. No-one had the option of doing the "easier" GCE.
I spent my maths lessons bored out of my mind, because my fellow pupils just weren't as good as me. I spent my English and French lesson struggling to keep up. I'm sure there were others in the class who had the reverse experience.
We weren't split up in to groups (or sets?) with all those pupils of a similar skill level in a subject put together, we were just mixed together in one class. I don't even know how I ended up in the class I did. I know there were better classes because better classes did German and I think Latin.
This is my experience from about 40 years ago.
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