KES Birmingham

[isymum]

The head of KEHS gave a talk to parents' at my daughter's school about a month ago. This was raised then at the meeting, on how the boys's school have the IB in practise at present. It was pointed out at the meeting, that IB will not be put in place and they will continue with A levels.

[no_ball]

Back to some light preparation after the Stratford and KECH exams, some injection of pace needed after switching off. Am I right in thinking that the indies for Solihull/Warwick/KES and suchlike are subjectively easier in terms of content and time pressures? Bums on seats mentality there??

[KenR]

No really, If anything I would say the content was probably harder but less time pressure

For example this was one of the maths questions in the Solihull exam a few years ago:-

T is a town on the shore of a large lake, and various boats and hovercraft stop at T in their journeys around the lake. The total distance round the lake is 180 kilometres.

At 10:00am a boat starts from T and travels clockwise round the lake at a speed of 15kph. At the same time a hovercroft starts from T and travels round the lake in the opposite direction at 60kpm.

(1) How far has the boat travelled by the time the hovercraft gets back to T?

(2) When do the hovercraft and the boat meet each other?

(3) How far has each vessel travelled when they meet?

[no_ball]

Those are for the more gifted, the questions in sections a and b were almost laughable...

[JaneEyre]

no-ball and KenR,
you seem to know a lot about indies in and around Birmingham... Besides KES, there is no other private schools only for boys around here (Brum, Solihull, Walsall, Coventry, Wolverhampton), is it?

[no_ball]

There is also Warwick for boys ( great facility), bromsgrove (mixed though), princethorpe. Enough choice, have to decide if you want 'mediocre' a level or IB rigorous route.

[mike1880]

Although the exams are slightly different and may suit some children better than the KEGS test, I wouldn't have thought they were any easier. I would reckon KES is about as hard to get into as Camp Hill - there's a lot of overlap in terms of who is successful at both. I considered Solihull for our daughter this year, if I remember correctly their MidYIS scores equate to about top 7% so they're certainly no pushover either - probably very similar to the KE grammars in terms of degree of difficulty.

Mike

[fm]

Sorry to disagree with you, Mike, but all my personal experience suggests that is it easier to pass KES than Camp Hill and Five Ways. Indeed I have had several pupils over the years who have made KES but not the other two, including 3 boys who made the first cut at KES and did not have to rely on borderline interviews, whereas I have had literally no pupils who made Five Ways or Camp Hill fail to make KES even when they have done no preparation whatsoever.

While there are only 120+ places, they are obliged to over offer to a huge degree in order to have a chance of filling places.

The exam, however, is hard enough, with the scholarship questions on the maths paper fairly taxing. Some boys may also struggle to throw together a good essay, especially if they are at a state school which does not do a lot of essaywriting.

It seems harder to get into KEHS, however, than KES. This is partly to do with numbers, there being only 78 places at the girls. I also believe that the girls' school sets a lot more store on English, so being a strong candidate in maths and verbal reasoning may not be sufficient to win a girl a place at the school (as it can be for boys). I certainly have had grammar school girls not make KEHS on several occasions.

This, of course, is just my experience but I always treat KES as the backup and not the other way round.

[JaneEyre]

There is also Warwick for boys ( great facility), bromsgrove (mixed though), princethorpe.

So Warwick for boys is not mixed... and Bromsgrove and Princethorpe are mixed...
Thanks for all these schools names I had not yet heard about...

Have to decide if you want 'mediocre' a level or IB rigorous route.

I see that the presentation about IB at KES open day has really completely subjugated you!!

The only remark I could do on that matter is that we had only the judgment on a person totally FOR the IB... We would need the points advanced by a speaker advocating for the A levels versus IB...

I am not against the IB... nor the A level... Both have their pros and cons...

I do really understand and appreciate the broadness of the IB... but I am not sure many will go to study in the States (one point advanced by this brilliant speaker) and I do think not every pupil stops English at GCSE level, even if they want to persue a career in science (My daughter has just finished her A level last year and she had 'philosophy and ethics' as the fourth subject in AS, besides her maths-further maths, bio and chem.. So she still wrote essays and learnt to balance her arguments after hr GCSEs.. And many schools (at least the Grammars) oblige their pupils to sit the 'General Studies' A level)

In a nutshell, I felt his speach VERY interesting but a bit biased... Well, he had to 'sell the exam' in a way!

[no_ball]

Horses for courses as I said. I think the take up will only increase in the next few years.