K*** Mock

[Sally-Anne]

Sounds very practical. Is there any good reason why Bucks choose not to adopt a similar approach? Based on this forum, it would be widely welcomed by the local community.

To start with, probably numbers. Ermysteds gets around 350 applicants per year. It would be the work of a couple of hours to decide who is and isn't in catchment. Bucks gets 8,000 applicants, and a proportion of them are legitimate candidates who don't live within catchment.

However, a different cut for establishing the qualifying score could be:
a) In county state schools only, but that might lower the pass mark too far; (I'll probably be lynched for saying that, but I think it would be an issue for the GS Heads.)
b) In county state and Partner School candidates only;
c) In county state school candidates and all Partner School candidates, in or out of county;

The last option would take us back to pretty much where we were before the tourist buses rolled into town.

I would have thought it would be logistically possible to achieve any one of those because the papers could be divided up by test centre, with the papers for OoC testers being marked as a second tranche once the qualifying score had been established.

[Guest55]

It would be easier to move the test by one week ... I think a lot of tourists would not bother.

[ToadMum]

Sounds very practical. Is there any good reason why Bucks choose not to adopt a similar approach? Based on this forum, it would be widely welcomed by the local community.

My guess is that Bucks being a fully selective authority, the simple 'deemed selective' / 'not selective' grading has persisted from the days when everywhere had the 11+ and one just went to the nearest suitable school? There must have been some mechanism for dealing with children who had taken the 11+ in one place and genuinely needed to move to another, but I think there would have been little or no 'tourism' as one now experiences it.

[Stroller]

It would be easier to move the test by one week ... I think a lot of tourists would not bother.

Also sounds very sensible. A delayed start to correcting scripts would be counterbalanced by having fewer scripts to correct.

Have they considered that or are there objections to that approach too?

[Tolstoy]

It would be easier to move the test by one week ... I think a lot of tourists would not bother.

Not only would it help with the tourist issue but also it gives the DC a little more time to settle back into school before taking the test.

[nervousmom]

children from lower income families now have the Pupil Premium, so all children now have access to GS education.

That's a bit of a naive statement - do you think the GS are doing enough for PP children?

Are you saying your son has done GCSEs already??

I'm not naive at all - PP is a step in the right direction. It's better than nothing.

[Guest55]

There is a very long way to go to give less well-off children the same chance of a GS education as a better-off child of the same ability.