Thank God for Super Selectives

katel · Post by **katel** » Fri Oct 23, 2009 11:23 pm

And of course there will be no "like minded boys" at the local High School!

Since you ask, I do think that grammar school places should be awarded on proximity - it seems to me to be completely insane that a 11 year old should have to travel from Tonbridge Wells to Sittingbourne because another child got 5 marks more than him in the 11+!

inkypinkyponky · Post by **inkypinkyponky** » Fri Oct 23, 2009 11:25 pm

Despite a Kent address we, for some very strange reason, come under Bromley!

In 1965 many urban and parish districts were abolished or reassigned with new names or areas. London Borough of Bromley and LB of Bexley wanted to expand, so they gobbled up parts of Kent. Hence the name of Kent still in address, a DA or TN postcode, but part of a London borough. Made things more confusing, not less, methinks!

Oh no, wot an anorac!

Inky

long and winding road · Fri Oct 23, 2009 11:41 pm

Tracy - certainly don't mean to rub any ones nose in it - not sure how I am doing that. If the super selectives have admission criteria based on scores, then don't we all have the right to choose to go there if we meet that criteria and are offered that place.
If you were in my shoes would any of you say to your child "you've been offered a place but we can't let you take it because someone who lives closer than you but scored less deserves it more". Parents like me are not intentionally pushing local kids out - we are all looking for what is best for our own children. I'm sure that all OOC parents are sick and tired of being villified for just wanting what is best for their children. I think it is good that not all the Grammar schools are super selective and that many others have distance from school and sibling rules - but I am still incredibly thankful that a few offer purely on scores because it allows the rest of us to hope!
Sorry for going on - but someone has to put the side of us terrible OOC parents!

Bexley Mum 2 · Post by **Bexley Mum 2** » Fri Oct 23, 2009 11:50 pm

Long and Winding Road - if you're not sure how you're rubbing people's noses in it, perhaps you should re-read your original post!

Tracy · Post by **Tracy** » Sat Oct 24, 2009 12:01 am

Like others arond the country, we have just the charade called the 11+.
Unfortunately in Bexley we are surrounded by areas that years ago ditched their grammars.

Now due to the dreadful standards of some schools in some boroughs and that Greenwich Judgement, this year Bexley has been overwhelmed by ooc applicants to the point where local children, not in indies, have very little chance.

I'm not scaremongering here, I'll post the figures when they are confirmed but anyone going through this in years to come is going to have a great shock.

Bexley has lost the vast majority of it's passes to ooc applicants, how is that fair. Some Bexley passes will be out of catchment also.

Now quite frankly, I would do the same if my local schools were poor and I'm not having a go at people who are only doing the best for their kids but it's coming to the point in Bexley where the parents are going to say enough is enough.

So please be considerate to those very clever children who just missed out due to politics.

dadofkent · Post by **dadofkent** » Sat Oct 24, 2009 12:22 am

Tracy wrote:Like others arond the country, we have just the charade called the 11+.
Unfortunately in Bexley we are surrounded by areas that years ago ditched their grammars.

Now due to the dreadful standards of some schools in some boroughs and that Greenwich Judgement, this year Bexley has been overwhelmed by ooc applicants to the point where local children, not in indies, have very little chance.

I'm not scaremongering here, I'll post the figures when they are confirmed but anyone going through this in years to come is going to have a great shock.

Bexley has lost the vast majority of it's passes to ooc applicants, how is that fair. Some Bexley passes will be out of catchment also.

Now quite frankly, I would do the same if my local schools were poor and I'm not having a go at people who are only doing the best for their kids but it's coming to the point in Bexley where the parents are going to say enough is enough.

So please be considerate to those very clever children who just missed out due to politics.

Not having a go at you Tracy. But did you not enter your child for the Kent test. As far as I can see, LAWR has done nothing different to yourself, and many other Bexley residents, and more to the point he has, it seems, applied for his DS to an In County GS.

The tone of his first post could, I agree, been a bit more sensitive.

Tracy · Post by **Tracy** » Sat Oct 24, 2009 12:41 am

Dad of Kent, yes you are correct, I did enter enter my borderline child in Kent as the nvr suited her better and also we live near the boundary.

We were also targeting a school that's normally undersubscribed so we wouldn't have been taking a place from anyone yet also giving up a place here.

We also realise that by entering the whole game that there are those that are disappointed every year and that's the chance you take.

But when you realise how little chance your very bright child actually has, it soul destroying. For many of our bright kids here, the grammars don't exist.

I have never really understood the superselective issue you have in your area. I totally sympathise now.

scattydolores · Post by **scattydolores** » Sat Oct 24, 2009 1:25 am

Have to say I am with Katel and Willknot on this! Those of us living in the grammar school towns pay a huge premium on house prices etc because of that. Must be so galling to have a child pass the 11+ but then not get a place at the local grammar school because someone from 40 miles away has got a slightly higher mark. And it is not sour grapes on my part as fortunately my local grammar is TWGGS and we live less than a mile away and if my boys are grammar material then we will have TWGSB but I do have friends living in North Tonbridge/Hildenborough with bright boys but not probably not bright enough for Judd and they are so worried that they will get shipped off to Dartford/Folkestone or wherever.

WillKnot · Post by **WillKnot** » Sat Oct 24, 2009 9:14 am

As expected, my child comfortably got 420 in the 11+. But I have to say that sending him to a school with other children whose parents think their children are too 'clever' or too 'sensitive' to go to a local school, or who think that their little treasure would be 'dreadfully unhappy' in a perfectly good local school fills me with horror. I really, really worry about the social attitudes of people with that outlook and how that feeds into the way that their children view other people who they think are not as 'clever' than or as 'good' as them. Schools are not just about a narrow curriculum. They are also about the value systems of the school and the children. This 'better than thou' attitude is not one that I want my child to learn from the school or from other children around him.

The original poster lives in Bromley. To suggest by implication that the schools in Bromley are not 'suitable' for a boy who scores 411 in the 11+ is ridiculous. There are plenty of schools in Bromley where a 411 boy would be perfectly happy and to which I would be very, very happy to send my 420 child. Indeed plenty of those schools perform better or as well as Skinners in A Level results. For example, St Olaves and Darrick Wood do a lot better academically than Skinners. If the child is that academically gifted he should breeze into St Olaves. Langley Park and Ravens Wood School would also be perfectly suitable for a normal, well-adjusted, 411 boy.

jimmymack · Post by **jimmymack** » Sat Oct 24, 2009 9:43 am

I see from another post here that at the Skinners new parents evening in July one of the boys had Kuala Lumpur down as his home on the address list. So it seems that people from as far away as Malaysia are beginning to cotton on to this wide open system that people like the poster are exploiting with gay abandon. My guess is that the Malaysian boy previously boarded at a local private school and that his parents realised, probably with amazement, that all they had to do was enter their child into the 11+ and that if he happened to pass (and a lot from the private schools do score highly in the 11+) then they could get a good education free at the expense of British taxpayers. You don't even have to be a resident of the UK to be accepted for Judd or Skinners!!! What a stupid, stupid system.