Altrincham grammar school for boys/girls applications

[Catseye]

I think last year it was 342 (so not massively different than the catchment pass score of 334)

The raw mark difference between 334 and 342 can be deceptively large due to the bell curve distribution of standardised marks.

There is a clustering of marks around the 50th centile(300 standardised marks) but as one moves further to right of the curve the negative gradient becomes more pronounced such that 10 standardised marks requires much more than 10 raw marks.

Does that make sense? or am I having another senior moment, I've had 3 already today

[Iofthetiger]

Hi everyone. From reading the forums I have been informed that a typical pass mark is 334 for those in catchment area and around 442 for out of catchment area. I believe that for AGSB the results for out of catchment area are further differentiated by straight line distance from the school. The Mother lives 2 miles from the school and the Father lives 18 miles from the school(straight-line). Meaning an average of about 10 miles. Can someone advise on what they would expect the pass mark to be based on the information I have given and the likelihood of achieving this. I am aware that successful entry is difficult to achieve living in the catchment area but would like an idea of the likely increased difficulty due to living well outside the catchment.

Thanks

[Mandy21]

I don't think anyone can tell you. The out of catchment pass mark changes year on year (your post is wrong in that the latest mark was 342 not 442) so its not massively different to the in-catchment pass mark. Distance only comes into play out of catchment when there is a tie-break.

So, the relevance of the 342 is that anyone out of catchment who got 342 was offered a place - regardless of how far away they lived. Could be 3 miles, could be 20 miles. Distance would have been a deciding factor if for instance they had offered places to everyone who scored 343, but then had 4 places left and there were 6 boys who had all scored 342. The 4 boys living closest to the school would then be offered those places.

No-one can tell you anything other than that really - the higher the score, the better chance of an out of catchment place but that's all anyone can really advise.

[ToadMum]

Hi everyone. From reading the forums I have been informed that a typical pass mark is 334 for those in catchment area and around 442 for out of catchment area. I believe that for AGSB the results for out of catchment area are further differentiated by straight line distance from the school. The Mother lives 2 miles from the school and the Father lives 18 miles from the school(straight-line). Meaning an average of about 10 miles. Can someone advise on what they would expect the pass mark to be based on the information I have given and the likelihood of achieving this. I am aware that successful entry is difficult to achieve living in the catchment area but would like an idea of the likely increased difficulty due to living well outside the catchment.

Thanks

The distance, if relevant, would not be an average of the home-to-school distances of the parents' respective houses, but the distance from whichever 'home' the child officially lives at. Usually this depends on where s/he spends the most 'nights before a schoolday', but where this is equal (one week with one parent, the next with the other, for instance) then the address from which child benefit is claimed - or would be claimed, if the parent was eligible, is the one which the admitting authority would use. So if one parent lives very much closer to the school than the other, making arrangements for children officially to live with that parent would be advantageous - but might not be what actually suits the children best.

[Mandy21]

...but where this is equal (one week with one parent, the next with the other, for instance) then the address from which child benefit is claimed - or would be claimed, if the parent was eligible, is the one which the admitting authority would use..

I don't think that's true of this particular school Toadmum, the admissions policy says where care is shared, the school will use an average of the 2 addresses to calculate the distance to school for admissions purposes.

[Tinkers]

I think this gets around the issues of families 'splitting up' and one parent with the child moving into catchment to get a place then 'getting back together again' once a place has been allocated.

Perhaps this school has had particular issues with this in the past. It's not something I've heard of before. The closest is a pair of schools near us, one boys' one girls'. The distance used is actually the combined total of the distance to both, so those with both boys and girls are treated the same.