Dr Challoner's Grammar School to admit girls into 6th form

[Guest55]

There were some excellent Grammar/Techs in Essex when it was fully selective.

Bucks is the highest performing LA so must be doing lots of thing right; no system is perfect.

The average for Uppers in all measures is higher than National averages.

[southbucks3]

Tri- partite means three ..

yes g55 I know that! I may be stupid but I'm not that stupid

I thought the good folks of Bucks maybe be hiding Technical Colleges(like the embarrassing child in the cellar) ? one thing I have learned on this forum is ,most posters are Selective School obsessed, I would doubt most parents of Technical Schools if they existed would have little time for this forum .

Thank-you for clearing that up anyway

The technical schools were considered more lofty than the uppers. You had to be selected for them, had to be good at maths, had to have potential to be an engineer in some field. Bucks was amongst the last to hang onto its technical schools due to the aircraft industry and electronics industry in the south and railway engineering in the north, most areas could not afford to keep tech schools running, but there was a degree of local support and sponsorship that kept the Aylesbury tech going and the railway works kept wolverton tech alive. Even in the late forties and early fifties people would cycle from the villages to the town's, then train or bus to Aylesbury because they were privileged to be chosen for the tech.

[Tolstoy]

.

Bucks seems very odd to me in terms education

now I understand it is opt out as opposed to opt in(?)( how many parents opt out?)

what are Uppers? are they the same as Modern Secondaries ?

if so,do the children in those schools do woodwork,metal work or needle work all day?

are there any proper Comprehensive Schools there? i.e have a representative intake across the ability range

is Bucks still stuck in the old and disgraceful tri-partite system of the 50-70's

I also know of people that left the old secondary moderns with a swathe of O'levels, moved to Grammar 6th form and Uni. They were streamed from their first year in and taught appropriately.

Unfortunately when they turned into Comprehensives, where I lived,both of the schools ditched the streaming for the first year meaning DC were started off at level 3s on entry and when streamed the following year having to cover at least three levels in two years just to achieve an average level 6.

This system is by no means perfect but neither is the Comprehensive. Guest55 is correct the Upper close to us achieves far better results with its cohort than the academically mixed catchment Comprehensive that we used to live by.

I also prefer the opt out system as many academically minded DC may have parents who would not enter them for the test if given a choice taking away an opportunity for the DC.

[Catseye]

Bucks is the highest performing LA

is it?

if true well done and we should all take on best practice and adopt the Bucks Education Model and pigeon-hole everyone at 10yrs old.