New plan for airport

Sir Francis Drake wrote:

Regarding Grammar schools, comprehensive education, private and public schools it should be noted that public schools in the main follow the comprehensive model because they do not select according to ability to learn but by ability to pay and these two things are not measures of the same thing.

Also there is no study that has ever proven one way or another whether the comprehensive or selective models offer the best pedagogical outcomes. After all these years and all the debate I find that amazing. It could be done quite easily but it has never served a Government's (red or blue) interests to actually find out.

On top of that there is no evidence to suggest that mixed ability classes hold back the higher performing students which is mostly negated anyway by Comprehensives introducing sets through the subjects. This can then place a student in a class of similarly able peers subject by subject so that somebody who excels in French may be in the top set but if they are useless at Science then they go into a bottom set. This is far better than selection for everything according to some sort of IQ test and offers students a means of progression should they exceed initial assessment or a downward correction should they fail to meet expected progress.

But worst of all, and this is the clincher for me, if you tell the Grammar School students that they have passed then the others have obviously failed and the students know this all too keenly. If you are one of the 25% that has passed that's great but if you are one of the 75% that has failed that's a real kick in the teeth.

And like I said there is no evidence at all to justify it. Quite why anybody would want to tell 75% of our 11 year olds that they are failures when it doesn't need to be done at all is beyond me.

Life is full of disappointments.....Is it OK to tell the Argo players that they failed on Saturday? Pandering to the no winner/loser ideology is part of the problem that has seen a dumbing down of standards across the board from the military to the police, fire service, local authorities and all the services that they oversee etc etc etc. Yes some will be disappointed, confidence might take a knock, feelings might be hurt, but those with a bit of gumption will use a setback to attempt to improve their performance, perhaps.

Far more likely they accept the judgement and never even try. This is the real problem with Selection and it'll never go away.

The high flyers will always fly high no matter what the system. They are ahead of the curve all the way through their schooling and that includes pre-school and then the 6 years of KS1 and KS2 before there is any selection at all.

Those at the top don't succeed because of selection; they were going to succeed and were demonstrably succeeding (they wouldn't pass otherwise) before a selection examination has any effect one way or another.

You have a valid point there Frank but the fear of disappointing someone in some way, whether in the classroom, on the sports field or in the workplace and thereby toning down the once expected level of effort / performance is a problem imo.

I think all football teams should be in one single division otherwise it's not fair on players who will never get to play in the Prem...

Sir Francis Drake wrote:

Far more likely they accept the judgement and never even try. This is the real problem with Selection and it'll never go away.

Well it would go away if the parent(s) would stop telling them that anything is possible. The sooner they learn that life is not always a box of chocolates then the sooner they can adjust the mindset to try harder.
My generation (60+) think youngsters have a sense of entitlement. There will always be disappointments along the way and 11 years old is not too bad an age to start learning that fact. And if the schools are that good then what’s to stop them getting to Oxbridge anyway?
You cannot mollycoddle them forever.

Les Miserable wrote:

You have a valid point there Frank but the fear of disappointing someone in some way, whether in the classroom, on the sports field or in the workplace and thereby toning down the once expected level of effort / performance is a problem imo.

I don't agree with that either. Comprehensives dangle a carrot and reward success by virtue of being promoted to a higher set or being entered at a higher tier. This is hugely encouraging for those who want to get on.

Another problem with the selection exam is that it isn't really a level playing field simply due to child development. There was a pedagogist of some repute named Piaget. His theory was that there was no point trying to teach something to somebody until they were able to learn it. There is nothing controversial about this: you wouldn't try to teach quantum mechanics to a 4 year old. They just aren't ready for it; there has to be a progression from the educational level of that 4 year old to where they are able to learn it. (This was commonly known as "ages and stages".)

When all the 11 year olds rock up to sit their 11+ on a given date those 11 year olds will range in age by a year from youngest to oldest: those born 31st August go into one year and those on 1st September the next. This massively advantages the September Kids in comparison to the August Kids.

Again there is simply no way around this. Many of those born in August fail but if they took the exam the next year they would probably pass. This is also horrible for those on the wrong end. The 11+ is simply unfair not by deliberate design by my accident of consequence.

Now if this resulted in an educational system that was demonstrably and proveably better then you could begin to make a justification for it: "well that's unlucky but the greater good is served" and so on. However as I said that case cannot be made: there is no robust evidence that stands up to scrutiny to support it. None. If there was you could be sure that the pro-selection people, and they are many and vociferous, would be pointing to it all the time - and quite rightly too. Just ask yourself when did anybody actually come out with any support for the dogma?

Is it right that we label 75% of our kids failures just for the sake of an unproven notion?

It is also worth noting that this is not just a left v right issue.

Admittedly Comprehensives are rather more popular on the left than the right but there's plenty of Tories who prefer Comprehensives too.

Another problem for Selection is that it only really works in areas with high population levels. I'm not sure how many schools Plymouth had back in the Selection days. I'll guess 30 with 10 for kids that passed and 20 for those who did not. Plymouth being a largeish city had enough kids to support that number of schools and those schools offered a hierarchy with each side of the divide. If the system was to work it was going to work as well in Plymouth as it would anywhere.

What about Cornwall though? How many schools could Cornwall support? I guess each town had a Grammar school (I know that St Austell did, for instance) so the kids that live there are fine after that you have travel issues for everybody. Devon is the same apart from Torbay, Exeter and Barnstaple. There's no way that Ivybridge, Tavistock, Okehampton etc could each support a network of schools but they can and do support one each. Kids are already bussed in to those places from the surrounding villages but would you want to travel from Ivybridge to Okehampton every day just to attend a secondary modern? I suspect not. I also suspect you might be more keen to make that journey every day to end up at a grammar school.

I'll say it again: there is no robust evidence that proves that selection gets better results so why create loads of problems and insurmountable injustices to implement it?

Surely a rather more sensible approach to the whole issue would be look at other countries to see what they do and then implement their policies here rather than to keep hammering away at our system and trying to make it work?

To that end I'll suggest Finland as a place we could copy. It is culturally similar to us for a start and their system has very high outcome levels and has had them for years.

There is a completely different emphasis on early schooling and no selection.

* daycare for all pre-school kids
* free school meals
* structured play instead of "lessons" for under 7s
* 9 years of comprehensive education starting at 7
* no setting, streaming or selection of any kind
* all schools serving their local community
* free bus travel for those who need it
* choice between academic (grammar?) and vocational (sec modern?) education at 16
* classes usually have no more than 20 pupils

Now this may all seem like lefty wishy-washy nonsense or some sort of socialist Utopia but the fact is it works and Finland has one of the best performing education systems in the world according to pretty much every study ever published and has had similar levels of success for years and years.

And their kids seem to succeed without the inspiration of having their hopes, dreams and ambitions crushed by an arbitrary exam sat at age 11.

Why we keep re-hashing the same old same old like we have for decades or keep having the same old tired Comprehensive v Selection debate is beyond me. The proof is there as to what works best should we care to look and we could implement a similar model should we decide to.

Graiser wrote:

TJOA wrote:

Graiser wrote:

Homeslice wrote:

Graiser wrote:

Sir Francis Drake wrote:

Czarcasm wrote:

They get away with it because despite the exorbitant prices, trains are still (largely) full. You can charge what you like, to a degree, if demand is still there. And it is.

They get away with it because people keep voting Tory.

Nobody else wants to see the rail network privatised any more.

Labour had 13 years in power to do something about it and did sod all

You do realise that the Labour Party is under new management these days, and one of the reasons it’s under new management is because between 1997 and 2010 *cough* Labour had 13 years in power to do something about it and did sod all.

I certainly do realise that, even more worrying is Corbyn taking us back to the sixties and seventies

Happy for May to take us back to the 50's though?

At the moment I’m not happy with Politics period, I was a labour man until 1997, never voted Tory and never will, this period of politics  we seem to be surrounded by nonentities on all sides, no inspiration, no leadership, no sod all.

On that much, we can agree.

Sir Francis Drake wrote:

Another problem for Selection is that it only really works in areas with high population levels. I'm not sure how many schools Plymouth had back in the Selection days. I'll guess 30 with 10 for kids that passed and 20 for those who did not. Plymouth being a largeish city had enough kids to support that number of schools and those schools offered a hierarchy with each side of the divide. If the system was to work it was going to work as well in Plymouth as it would anywhere.

What about Cornwall though? How many schools could Cornwall support? I guess each town had a Grammar school (I know that St Austell did, for instance) so the kids that live there are fine after that you have travel issues for everybody. Devon is the same apart from Torbay, Exeter and Barnstaple. There's no way that Ivybridge, Tavistock, Okehampton etc could each support a network of schools but they can and do support one each. Kids are already bussed in to those places from the surrounding villages but would you want to travel from Ivybridge to Okehampton every day just to attend a secondary modern? I suspect not. I also suspect you might be more keen to make that journey every day to end up at a grammar school.

I'll say it again: there is no robust evidence that proves that selection gets better results so why create loads of problems and insurmountable injustices to implement it?

Why the bee in your bonnet about the 11+? You make it sound like we're in the 1970's still where the 11+ was compulsory. The majority of kids in Plymouth will simply go to their local Comp anyway these days. That progression is natural.

If some parents would like to give their kids a chance of being educated at DHSB DHSG or Plymouth High by taking the 11+, what's the problem?

Sir Francis Drake wrote:

Surely a rather more sensible approach to the whole issue would be look at other countries to see what they do and then implement their policies here rather than to keep hammering away at our system and trying to make it work?

To that end I'll suggest Finland as a place we could copy. It is culturally similar to us for a start and their system has very high outcome levels and has had them for years.

There is a completely different emphasis on early schooling and no selection.

* daycare for all pre-school kids
* free school meals
* structured play instead of "lessons" for under 7s
* 9 years of comprehensive education starting at 7
* no setting, streaming or selection of any kind
* all schools serving their local community
* free bus travel for those who need it
* choice between academic (grammar?) and vocational (sec modern?) education at 16
* classes usually have no more than 20 pupils

Now this may all seem like lefty wishy-washy nonsense or some sort of socialist Utopia but the fact is it works and Finland has one of the best performing education systems in the world according to pretty much every study ever published and has had similar levels of success for years and years.

And their kids seem to succeed without the inspiration of having their hopes, dreams and ambitions crushed by an arbitrary exam sat at age 11.

Why we keep re-hashing the same old same old like we have for decades or keep having the same old tired Comprehensive v Selection debate is beyond me. The proof is there as to what works best should we care to look and we could implement a similar model should we decide to.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=baHsoEAAMZU

Czarcasm wrote:

Sir Francis Drake wrote:

Another problem for Selection is that it only really works in areas with high population levels. I'm not sure how many schools Plymouth had back in the Selection days. I'll guess 30 with 10 for kids that passed and 20 for those who did not. Plymouth being a largeish city had enough kids to support that number of schools and those schools offered a hierarchy with each side of the divide. If the system was to work it was going to work as well in Plymouth as it would anywhere.

What about Cornwall though? How many schools could Cornwall support? I guess each town had a Grammar school (I know that St Austell did, for instance) so the kids that live there are fine after that you have travel issues for everybody. Devon is the same apart from Torbay, Exeter and Barnstaple. There's no way that Ivybridge, Tavistock, Okehampton etc could each support a network of schools but they can and do support one each. Kids are already bussed in to those places from the surrounding villages but would you want to travel from Ivybridge to Okehampton every day just to attend a secondary modern? I suspect not. I also suspect you might be more keen to make that journey every day to end up at a grammar school.

I'll say it again: there is no robust evidence that proves that selection gets better results so why create loads of problems and insurmountable injustices to implement it?

Why the bee in your bonnet about the 11+? You make it sound like we're in the 1970's still where the 11+ was compulsory. The majority of kids in Plymouth will simply go to their local Comp anyway these days. That progression is natural.

If some parents would like to give their kids a chance of being educated at DHSB DHSG or Plymouth High by taking the 11+, what's the problem?

I called it the 11+ because that's what it was called when I did it. I don't actually know what it is called these days. I suspect that each school actually sets its own entry exam and so each has a unique name.

You seem to have missed my point completely. It isn't grammar schools that are the problem it is the effect they have on other schools. If you create grammar schools you also create secondary moderns. It is unavoidable. In fact it is essential.

In Plymouth we have a weird hotch potch of the two systems with "comprehensives" that are not comprehensive because the brightest kids that might go to them end up at DHS or whatever. That has all sorts of knock-on consequences.

You can't really discuss the issue without focussing on the 11+. That would be like talking about football with no mention of goals.

But going to one of the Comprehensives IS the natural progression. Taking the 11+ is an extra curricular option that has to be instigated by the parent. That’s all it is. An option. There are plenty of parents of kids capable of passing the 11+ that don’t persue it, believe me.

I don’t get why you want to take away that option from the parent?

As a parent of two kids, one of which went to the nearest Comp, and the other went to DHSG, I can tell you first hand that as far as the interests of the child goes ( and shorely that is what is paramount? ) bowing to pressure and letting one go to the nearest Comp was, socially and educationally the worst parental decision I’ve ever made.

"until that Jock chancellor robbed the pension schemes in 1997"

That finished Labour for me.

Czarcasm wrote:

But going to one of the Comprehensives IS the natural progression. Taking the 11+ is an extra curricular option that has to be instigated by the parent. That’s all it is. An option. There are plenty of parents of kids capable of passing the 11+ that don’t persue it, believe me.

I don’t get why you want to take away that option from the parent?

As a parent of two kids, one of which went to the nearest Comp, and the other went to DHSG, I can tell you first hand that as far as the interests of the child goes ( and shorely that is what is paramount? ) bowing to pressure and letting one go to the nearest Comp was, socially and educationally the worst parental decision I’ve ever made.

I don't want to take anything away from anybody. Simply making the point that Grammar schools cannot exist in isolation. They have a wider effect outside their direct sphere and there is no robust evidence that stands up, either way, to say which is the better system out of selection and the comprehensive model.

From your direct experience you have formed your opinion. That's fine but it is only anecdotal evidence and that isn't really evidence at all no matter how compelling and personal it is to you. You have to look at the wider picture.

It's akin to the bloke who says he left school at 16 with no qualifications, is now a millionaire and it never did him any harm. Maybe it didn't but it is only one case. For every one of them there's countless more that probably didn't become millionaires and bitterly regret not doing better.

I don't know how many kids there are in the education system. I'll guess a million. Out of that million there'll be loads that defy every obstacle put in from them and excel, there'll be some who blow every opportunity handed to them and get nothing and there'll be everything else in between. That's just the way of things. Human nature will always prevail.

My preference would be for full implementation of the Finnish model because it has been proven to work better than anything we have tried.

If we are to stop with what we have then I'd implement a properly robust study to compare selection and the comprehensive model, decide once and for all which is best based on properly analysed evidence not "I think this" or "my son did that" and implement it across the board.

At present I lean towards the comprehensive model for the reasons I've given but I am not ideologically opposed to either. I just want our kids, all of them, to be given the best education they can get.

I've tried to be balanced on this but just to be absolutely clear just as there no evidence that proves that selection>comprehensive then equally there is no evidence to suggest that comprehensive>selection in terms of academic outcome. This cuts equally both ways.

You might think one is better than the other, I might think the reverse. Neither of us really knows for sure.

An 'inconvenient' reason......

As Horst Entof and Nicole Miniou of Darmstadt University of Technology noted in their 2004 study, PISA results are higher in countries which have strict and/or highly selective immigration policies than they are in countries with more liberal immigration policies. The name of the study says it all: PISA Results: What a Difference Immigration Law Makes.

This point is underlined by the fact that Finland performs significantly better in PISA studies than neighbouring Sweden. Why? Sweden has an immigrant population that is 10 times bigger. When these socially and economically similar countries are compared, omitting first and second generation immigrant children from sample groups, the results become almost identical.

Back to Piaget and his Ages and Stages...

It is normal for kids to end Key Stage 1 at about Level 3, KS2 at Level 5, KS3 at Level 7 if they are to do well at GCSE. If they fall behind that they will struggle. If you are not L7 in Y9 you will not get A*, if you are not L5 in Y6 you will not make the Y9 target and so on. Well you might but it will be exceptional if you do.

It is widely accepted that kids will develop by about 1.5 levels (as defined by the National Curriculum) per Key Stage (after KS1) with a stall between KS2 and KS3 the shock of changing schools takes effect.

I'd hazard a guess that every DHS kid ends Y7 at least at Level 6. Most of them probably start at Level 6 as a minimum before they even get there because they won't pass their entry exam if they aren't. Simple natural progression, you can't stop kids from learning all you can do is direct them so they learn the right things, will see them hit Level 7 at least by the time they finish Y9 (end of KS3). If they are Level 8 in Y9 they are nailed on to get at least A grade (as was) at GCSE. If they want to do well at A Level they probably need to get at least a B. They might struggle through on a C at GCSE but it's dodgy. They probably need C grades at A level to do well at University.

The thing is that same kid who is Level 6/7 in Y6 who has passed the DHS exam is very likely to do pretty much the same at the end of KS3 and then GCSEs and A Level in a Comprehensive.

The die is cast way before selection, or not, kicks in.

If I recall properly the national average Level at end of Year 6 is Level 5. That's average - a midpoint. For every Level 7 there will be a Level 3.

By design the students at DHS are probably in the top 5% of the academic results before they even get there. It really isn't rocket science to see why they do so well. The real question we ought to be asking is why they don't do even better.

PatDunne wrote:

An 'inconvenient' reason......

As Horst Entof and Nicole Miniou of Darmstadt University of Technology noted in their 2004 study, PISA results are higher in countries which have strict and/or highly selective immigration policies than they are in countries with more liberal immigration policies. The name of the study says it all: PISA Results: What a Difference Immigration Law Makes.

This point is underlined by the fact that Finland performs significantly better in PISA studies than neighbouring Sweden. Why? Sweden has an immigrant population that is 10 times bigger. When these socially and economically similar countries are compared, omitting first and second generation immigrant children from sample groups, the results become almost identical.

Denmark does just about as well as Finland with a very similar system and without looking I'd guess Sweden out-performs us too. There's no doubt about this. Their systems work better than ours.

NZ also performs very highly as does Australia. They are all vaguely similar culturally to us. Singapore does very well but is culturally very different.

'Denmark does just about as well as Finland with a very similar system'

The total populations of both Denmark and Finland is less than the population of London.

The number of immigrants in London is greater than the number of immigrants in the entire countries of Denmark and Finland, like I say, an 'inconvenient ' reason....

I don't think population size comes into it.

Immigration might but most immigrants travel as adults. Obviously they'll have kids... I wouldn't say that was inconvenient but more like a fact of life.

Most of success in life is not down to education but a desire to succeed.

Rickler wrote:

Most of success in life is not down to education but a desire to succeed.

Well, there's a whole teenage late night after the pub discussion, right there. Break out the spliffs but don't inhale, or at least don't get caught. And if you do, lie and deceive. I suspect my idea of success in life is quite different to some on here.
For the whole notion of success to exist, some have to fail.
As "classical education" is the only thing on offer from the state, that offering should always be egalitarian at the point of delivery in any civilised society. Separating so clearly at the age of eleven has always been too early in my mind. I don't have a problem in late teens with separation occurring as it does with university or out into the job market
"Success" is often who you know, not what you know. It's also in large part down to confidence, which is rather different than desire, and a whole subject in itself.
Eventually we then boil down to the real problem. What degree of reward is allocated to those that succeed or fail. For those that advocate a law of the jungle, be careful for what you wish for. Of course,  the myth of the "free market" doesn't exist in labour as it doesn't in many things, as things are continually manipulated by those in a position to do so.
There's a big problem looming in how money and lifestyle, as a system of reward, are dished out. Far too many "educated" folk with plenty of desire for too few "jobs" of any note. Perhaps we should ask how the Windsors succeed so well on a regular basis. through the generations, a real mystery LOL. Many humans are always trying to rig the future for their own kids as opposed to their neighbours.