Enough places?

Eleven Plus (11+) in Buckinghamshire (Bucks)

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Sally-Anne
Posts: 9235
Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 8:10 pm
Location: Buckinghamshire

Post by Sally-Anne »

Hi Mike
Mike wrote:53% of the places are offered to children who live in Bucks and who achieve the qualification mark.
Sorry, but that is completely incorrect! If you read back through this thread you will realise that the figure of 53% is the number of children living in Bucks who are allocated their first preference school, whether that is a Grammar or an Upper School.

Of 2136 places, 1716 (80%) are allocated to children living in Bucks. 364 (17%) places went to children living out of county and 3% of places were vacant. (All figures are from March 2009).

Regarding your other statement, the total cohort this year was 7305 (1207 children opted out). The Bucks resident cohort was 5264. The number who qualified before any appeals are included was 2241, or 30.7%. Guest55's statement is entirely accurate.

Last year there were 331 successful appeals. We don't yet know the figure for 2009, but if it is the same, the overall "qualification rate" increases to 35.2%.

Of course Bucks appeals are based on individual circumstances! I thought that after so many years on the Forum you might have glanced at Etienne's Appeal Q&As by now, especially as you seem so keen to discuss the system in Bucks?

For the record I cannot recall a single successful Bucks appeal where it was not crystal clear that the child had a huge weight of academic evidence to support their case, and was entirely deserving of a GS place. Even top grade students can and do fail the 11+ for no good reason.

Sally-Anne
WP
Posts: 1331
Joined: Thu Jan 03, 2008 9:26 am
Location: Watford, Herts

Post by WP »

Dad40 wrote:The upshot of all this is that we can't know what the real numbers are without factoring in the successul appeals. Until then, the best numbers to use are those of previous years where the numbers are final (my link in an earlier post).
In your figures, I was struck by the number qualifying being the same (2537) in each year. One might expect that if the figures were based on test scores -- they could adjust the standardization to ensure that exactly that many got 121 or more. But it seems surprising if this is after selection appeals, unless the appeals are working to a fixed quota. What is the source for those numbers?
zee
Posts: 360
Joined: Thu Mar 05, 2009 10:43 am

Post by zee »

WP wrote:[ I was struck by the number qualifying being the same (2537) in each year.
But in that table the total number of Bucks children (state and prep) who qualify does vary, then OOC are added in (different numbers each year that is listed) to make the number up to 2537 each time.

So presumably the definition of who "qualifies" OOC depends how many places are left over after allocating places to all Bucks qualifiers?
WP
Posts: 1331
Joined: Thu Jan 03, 2008 9:26 am
Location: Watford, Herts

Post by WP »

zee wrote:But in that table the total number of Bucks children (state and prep) who qualify does vary, then OOC are added in (different numbers each year that is listed) to make the number up to 2537 each time.

So presumably the definition of who "qualifies" OOC depends how many places are left over after allocating places to all Bucks qualifiers?
I don't think so. I think it's a staged process:
  1. Each child is assigned a standardized mark, with no distinction between Bucks/OOC children.
  2. Selection appeals are heard, again taking no account of residence.
  3. Places are allocated applying the iterative process to parents' preferences and the schools' criteria. The important distinction here is between in/out of (catchment) Area, not county (though almost all OOC children are also OA).
  4. Bucks children not given a place in the iterative process are assigned a place at the nearest appropriate Bucks school with places still available.
Sally-Anne
Posts: 9235
Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 8:10 pm
Location: Buckinghamshire

Post by Sally-Anne »

WP wrote:I don't think so. I think it's a staged process:
  1. Each child is assigned a standardized mark, with no distinction between Bucks/OOC children.
  2. Selection appeals are heard, again taking no account of residence.
  3. Places are allocated applying the iterative process to parents' preferences and the schools' criteria. The important distinction here is between in/out of (catchment) Area, not county (though almost all OOC children are also OA).
  4. Bucks children not given a place in the iterative process are assigned a place at the nearest appropriate Bucks school with places still available.
Absolutely correct WP. :D
zee
Posts: 360
Joined: Thu Mar 05, 2009 10:43 am

Post by zee »

Sally-Anne wrote:Absolutely correct WP. :D
So what's the answer to WP's original question?

How come the number of Bucks qualifiers varies from year to year, but the total number of qualifiers (after adding OOC) doesn't?
Dad40
Posts: 359
Joined: Mon Jun 04, 2007 4:40 pm
Location: Chiltern District, Bucks

Post by Dad40 »

WP and Zee,

Don't read anything into the 2537. It is the obvious thing to do (and I did it too) but I am reliably informed that one can't - it is pure coincidence.

Source for all figures is Bucks CC.
Mike
Posts: 625
Joined: Thu Jan 12, 2006 4:29 pm

Post by Mike »

Hi Sally Anne

Acknowledge comments on my interests in the Bucks system.

Your first figures on this link indicate 2136 places, 600 OOC and 400 appeals, by assumption this gives 1136 places for Bucks children who pass the selection test, which is 53%.

I appreciate that you have subsequently changed your original figures.

I interpret your recent figures to indicate that the eligible Bucks cohort as being 5264 children who sat the test and 1207 children who did not sit the test, making a total of 6471.

The 7305 figure, I again assume, is the total number of children who actually sat the test. If this is the case then we know that this figure includes OOC children of 2041.

The number of children who qualified through the selective test is 2241, which is 30.6% of the children who sat the test, but this is not 30% of the total Bucks cohort that sat the test, nor is it 30% of the eligible Bucks cohort that could have sat the test.

Of the 2241 initial qualifiers a number of these would be de-qualified (?) as being OOC children opting for schools where the school is full, or near full, with in-county qualifiers.

We still somehow have to get down to your figure of 2136 places.

You say that 331 children are offered places through the appeals process and that the majority of these are assumed to be in-county children. You then state that 83% of places are taken up by children living in Bucks which is about 1772.

We can deduce from these figures that if the in-county places are 1772 and the appeals places are 331 then the number of children who qualify through the selective test who live in Bucks is about 1441 and the number of OOC children who pass the selective test is exactly 800 and 362 of these children are offered places.

In effect 438 of the 30% of the children who achieve the qualification mark are not offered places at Bucks grammar schools, based on your figures.

As a site that has a good past record of providing informative and accurate information we always have to be careful that we do not rely on the assumptions of new forum members and provide them with the clearest picture available.

It is correct to state that Bucks do initially select the top 30% of students that takes the selective test and achieve a qualification mark of 121, but it is not correct to end the statement at this point.

The cohort does not include children who opt out of the test.

The cohort includes out-of-county children.

Over 400 children who qualify through the selection test are not offered places.

Of the 2136 places offered, 331 of these places were allocated to children who did not qualify through the selective test process.

It is not correct to imply that Bucks LEA grammar schools take the top 30% of children from Bucks LEA primary schools or from within Bucks.

Regards

Mike
Dad40
Posts: 359
Joined: Mon Jun 04, 2007 4:40 pm
Location: Chiltern District, Bucks

Post by Dad40 »

Can I make a suggestion as we are now in danger of getting completely lost in numbers......

The suggestion is that every Autumn when all kids have been placed in schools and all the figures for the previous academic year (when they sat the test/passed/didn't pass/went through various appeals/won places etc) are published by Bucks CC, we then post all the relevant stats for that year on this forum.

The numbers could be put in the format I used for previous years (in that linked post) but I suspect a few more lines need to be added.

We will also need to be clear on terminology when posting such stats. For example "Qualified" should mean (in legalese) "Accepted by Bucks CC as having a legitimate claim for a place at a Bucks grammar school arising from the recognised qualification processes including (but not limited to) passing the October test and successful selection appeals". :o

Just a thought.
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