Great Marlow School

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Booklady
Posts: 522
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 10:39 pm

Great Marlow School

Post by Booklady »

Some of you will be aware that Great Marlow could not offer many of the children in its catchment this year a place - largely - it seems - because not enough of them passed the 11+ to go to WBGS. So the admission distance for the grammar massively expanded, people coming from far and wide, and not enough spaces left for local children to go to their local upper school. Kids were allocated Burnham Upper - some 20 miles away!

Well, parents at Great Marlow received this today :
Great Marlow School : School Admissions Year 7 September 2015

We are showing below the press statement that is being issued regarding an increase in our admission number into Year 7 in September 2015. This agreed increase is for one year only.

School Admissions Year 7 September 2015

The Governors of Great Marlow School are very pleased to announce that they have agreed to create an additional 25 Year 7 places in September 2015. This is in response to the overwhelming popularity of the school, and at the request of Buckinghamshire Local Authority, that they make this provision for one year only to accommodate the increased local demand for school places. Parents living in the school’s catchment will, no doubt, be delighted and relieved to hear that more places will be available and that their children might now be offered a place at Great Marlow School.

Mrs Geralyn Wilson, Headteacher, said: “I am very pleased to have been able to increase our Year 7 intake for September. This is in response to the pressure of an extraordinary number of applications from parents for the 2015-2016 academic year. The current Year 6 in the Marlow area contains a greater number of pupils than previous years or subsequent years.
“We have worked very proactively with Buckinghamshire County Council to respond to parental wishes. It is most encouraging that through collaboration and cooperation we have secured the best possible solution.”
A Buckinghamshire County Council spokesman said:
“It's our responsibility to ensure there are sufficient school places in the county, and we were very pleased to work with the Great Marlow School academy to ensure there were enough places In the Marlow area to meet the increase in demand this year. A letter will be sent out by the Local Authority on the 24 April informing parents if they have been successful in their application.”
Mrs G Wilson
Headteacher
Its not sorted what caused the issue!! :roll: :roll: But at least resolves the issue for the local kids. :) :wink:
Guest55
Posts: 16254
Joined: Mon Feb 12, 2007 2:21 pm

Re: Great Marlow School

Post by Guest55 »

That's brilliant news for local families ... it's certainly a great school.
kittymum
Posts: 925
Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2008 10:42 pm

Re: Great Marlow School

Post by kittymum »

It's brilliant news - I live in GMS catchment and have a number of friends affected - we live in an area where the cutoff happened so some were offered GMS and some got an offer 20 miles away in a failing school!

Really crossing fingers it all sorts out for everyone- always the worry that there are 25 closer - our villages have NEVER not been offered GMS before.

As I've said before this years allocation profiles SWBGS - 11 miles (last year 6) GMS 4 miles (last year I think 7 in 1st round allocations) - kids out here not got more stupid so something is wrong! There's a lot of OOC children going to be sitting in our grammars in Sept! I know WHS has offered at least as far as Harrow - madness!!

Have dd sitting in Sept so really hope sorted out by then - thought it was bad enough last year when Ds sat but this year has surpassed even that - sorry still banging the local schools for local kids drum!
Booklady
Posts: 522
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 10:39 pm

Re: Great Marlow School

Post by Booklady »

Good luck to all your friends KittyMum - I am sure they will be fine now!

The bigger gripe for me is summed up in your comment 'I am sure kids out here have not got more stupid'. Of course they have not, what's happening is that our Bucks GS's are, by stealth, being turned into more selective grammars - the standard to pass seems to be rising, and more local kids are not hitting the higher standard. Therefore people are coming from further and further away, and there are not enough spaces for the kids who do not pass locally in good schools ....... madness!!

Anyhow - I am very pleased for the children in Marlow borders - Burnham eACT is our local upper - and it did not feature on our CAF!
sunshineonarainyday1
Posts: 5
Joined: Tue Mar 03, 2015 11:15 am

Re: Great Marlow School

Post by sunshineonarainyday1 »

According to their website, St Michael's Catholic upper school were also asked by Bucks LEA to take extra children in Y7 this year, although I understand they won't be doing it this year as I don't think there is physically anywhere to accommodate any extra children at the moment.
GMS do need to change their catchment area so that it covers areas where it really is the nearest, local upper school, that would mean places to the west of Marlow and Little Marlow being in catchment for GMS and areas such as Lane End, Bolters End, Stokenchurch changing to their nearest local upper school catchment of Cressex.
At least this way places would go to local children.
berks_mum
Posts: 939
Joined: Sat Dec 28, 2013 4:52 pm

Re: Great Marlow School

Post by berks_mum »

Booklady wrote: The bigger gripe for me is summed up in your comment 'I am sure kids out here have not got more stupid'. Of course they have not, what's happening is that our Bucks GS's are, by stealth, being turned into more selective grammars - the standard to pass seems to be rising, and more local kids are not hitting the higher standard. Therefore people are coming from further and further away, and there are not enough spaces for the kids who do not pass locally in good schools ....... madness!!
Wonder, why local kids are not hitting the higher standard? It is worrying and some questions spring to mind. Primaries not at par with other areas? Less tutoring?
kittymum
Posts: 925
Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2008 10:42 pm

Re: Great Marlow School

Post by kittymum »

berks_mum wrote:
Booklady wrote: The bigger gripe for me is summed up in your comment 'I am sure kids out here have not got more stupid'. Of course they have not, what's happening is that our Bucks GS's are, by stealth, being turned into more selective grammars - the standard to pass seems to be rising, and more local kids are not hitting the higher standard. Therefore people are coming from further and further away, and there are not enough spaces for the kids who do not pass locally in good schools ....... madness!!
Wonder, why local kids are not hitting the higher standard? It is worrying and some questions spring to mind. Primaries not at par with other areas? Less tutoring?
OOC raising the pass rate! The test is meant to be taken by all yr 6 children but thousands of over tutored kids from OOC are taking our test and raising the pass mark - the test will always select the top 30% of children taking the test, so it's none of the reasons you state purely educational tourism which is why Bucks residents are so upset! GMS a is effectively providing 2 grammar classes each yr filled with children with a clean set of level 5's because we are losing our grammars to OOC.

Sunshineonarainyday - I don't live in Lane End but I really don't think you can argue that Marlow isn't the local place for schooling for those living in the Marlow Road area of Lane End? Stokenchurch maybe but to say the villages in the Hambleden Valley aren't Marlow locals is madness! People have always gone to school in Marlow from there even back in the day when GMS was very unpopular! They have no links at all with Cressex!
kittymum
Posts: 925
Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2008 10:42 pm

Re: Great Marlow School

Post by kittymum »

berks_mum wrote:
Booklady wrote: The bigger gripe for me is summed up in your comment 'I am sure kids out here have not got more stupid'. Of course they have not, what's happening is that our Bucks GS's are, by stealth, being turned into more selective grammars - the standard to pass seems to be rising, and more local kids are not hitting the higher standard. Therefore people are coming from further and further away, and there are not enough spaces for the kids who do not pass locally in good schools ....... madness!!
Wonder, why local kids are not hitting the higher standard? It is worrying and some questions spring to mind. Primaries not at par with other areas? Less tutoring?
Also remember that they are not supposed to be super selective merely the schools for top 30% Bucks kids the OOC kids are however turning them into super selectives. Bucks kids are not 'failing to make the grade' but are instead being made to compete for their local school places against people who are spending years tutoring for HBS / QE et al.
Rob Clark
Posts: 1298
Joined: Tue Nov 25, 2008 1:59 pm

Re: Great Marlow School

Post by Rob Clark »

Just to expand on kitty mum's post, we aren't a bunch of Nimbys in Bucks :lol: – there have always been children from just over the county borders in Berkshire and Hertfordshire attending Bucks GSs and because of the shape of the county in a number of cases these might well be their nearest school. No one has any objection to that. Nor do they have any objection to people who fully intend to move into the area should their DC pass; all are welcome, it's a nice part of the world :D

It's children who are taking the Bucks 11+ as a practice who might live miles away and whose parents have no intention of sending them to school in Bucks which is the problem. This artificially raises the standard and leads to children who could quite easily cope at GS missing out on that opportunity.

Though of course it does mean that many of the Upper Schools are improving and are now offering the full range of academic GCSEs…
Guest55
Posts: 16254
Joined: Mon Feb 12, 2007 2:21 pm

Re: Great Marlow School

Post by Guest55 »

They have been improving for several years - the Upper School average is above National Averages.

However, there is a wide variation in academic performance between the best Uppers and some of the others. Some Upper schools get a huge numbers of KS2 level 5s and some get a lot of level 3s - you can probably guess which get the better results - just compare the intakes.

As Rob says no-one minds 'near locals' taking the 11+ Transfer Test; what I don't like is people applying from vast distances and then asking how to get their children to the school after the event.
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