CLSG offer withdrawals

[LolaD]

Selection by 11+ (ability) is one thing, selection by the sprint speed of your mother is another.

This made me laugh out loud!

[ToadMum]

Publicity is publicity. There is no such thing as bad publicity, it seems.

That has never been true and it's not true now. There's also an article in today's Telegraph. It's a deserved nightmare for CLSG.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/02 ... ved-offer/

're the 'transparency' of the system, I know that the 'offer' email said that only those who got in quick enough would actually get ve place they were apparently being offered, but could someone please take of back a step or two in the process - was this aspect made crystal clear right from the outset? Or was it just stated that offers would be sent out on the last school day before the half term holiday, responses to be made by March 6th?

[Teanosugar]

Fully agree with CLSG's "transparent system" being unfair and incorrect. They were obsessed in a paperless email only process yet at all stages yet when our DD received offer email just before half term break on the Friday and their process suddenly changed to a paper form being hand delivered to their admission office. Whilst away on short half term break we received email on Monday saying all spaces filled and she's now on WL.

What's the point of an offer holders day weeks after all spaces taken within hours? There was never any mention until offer email came out that parents had to turn up in person to hand in forms and money. Luckily our DD has other offers to consider from schools who run their process more transparently and fairly. I feel very sorry for 10-11 year old girls who worked so hard to secure an offer and had their heart set on CLSG and then have it taken away so quickly.

[Daogroupie]

Interesting that all 7 comments so far on the Telegraph article have not been in support of the parents. DG

[ToadMum]

Interesting that all 7 comments so far on the Telegraph article have not been in support of the parents. DG

Although at least one of them reads as though his understanding of the situation is that someone's DD wasn't offered a place and someone else's was.

Comments on online newspaper sites - local papers definitely worse, but the nationals certainly not immune - tend towards the (for want of a better term) scathing.

Didn't CLSG say (as reported by someone on here at the time, anyway) that mmd of the reasons they were pulling out of whichever consortium was that they were finding that more of their applicants were from the east of the London area rather than the north? In which case, I wonder how many CLSG applicants thought that they should have time to wait to hear from Forest (?offers out a day or two ago)?

Assuming that the applicant concerned is entitled to be educated at public expense, any girl genuinely left with no school offer at all will be found a place somewhere by their LEA, of course, even if they only put in their application now. And presumably there are DC who just don't get an offer from any of their indies anyway? It doesn't make the way the City have done things any better, though.

[Amber]

Interesting that all 7 comments so far on the Telegraph article have not been in support of the parents. DG

Well no, but then they are hardly supportive of the school either - it is more like 'oh poor little darlings! Bless them for being deprived of a place at school for the filthy rich'. And yes, you only need to look at the tone of comments every time someone gay is mentioned in the media to see what kind of people are moved to put comments up sometimes.

Once again, I am very glad I don't live in or around London. Though I gather that the state schools there are the best in the country.

I am also a little sad that the programme about gifted children from deprived areas isn't being discussed on this board, but that the very wealthy of London are. Nature of the beast I guess.

[loobylou]

Does anyone else love Dave Gorman and his Modem Life is Good-ish?
His "found poems" are from the comments sections and are both hilarious and deeply distressing.

[hbsseal]

They were obsessed in a paperless email only process yet at all stages yet when our DD received offer email just before half term break on the Friday and their process suddenly changed to a paper form being hand delivered to their admission office.

There was never any mention until offer email came out that parents had to turn up in person to hand in forms and money.

Those are further good points. Everything (including the offer) on emails. But acceptances cannot be on email and involves a without notice physical sprint with cash in hand.

It looks like they may have made as many as twice the offers given how many people I have come across who had offers but are now on WL. The ones who would have done the sprint are more likely to be those who did not have other offers so City are by design excluding multiple offer holders, which in turn implies that they are likely to get more from 71-140 ranks than 1-70.

School has created more work for themselves, probably got a less selective cohort, and has come across as unprofessional.

[Choco]

Don't you think that most London schools have to over offer by 100%? When people apply to 5 or 6 schools, but can only accept one, then the majority will be significantly over-offering in order to fill. I think that people don't quite get this - they know schools are competitive and hard to get into, so think schools must be carefully offering the right number of places and use the WL for the rest. They all need to over offer - even v good schools like City might not be top choice for 5/6 of the 800 applying - especially when you bear in mind the school is not in a heavily residential area, so for many children who do apply, there are other great schools which are nearer. This isn't to say that City doesn't have lots of first choice children applying - well over 70, but certainly not 800.

Loads of the people on this thread refer to their other offers and that what City has done, has swung them towards one of their several other offers - in reality, many or most of them would have ended up declining City anyway.

What Citys actions will have done is to ensure that most people who paid up really wanted the school. They might not be the top 70 in ability - but the top 70 were never all going to accept places anyway. I'd bet they made well over double the offers - all of them, candidates of a very good level who could achieve well in the school - so the school don't mind if they aren't the top 70, because they know they won't get the top 70 anyway.

Even the most absolute highest prestige schools don't get all of their top applicants to say yes - there are always at least 3 or 4 equally good schools and even if you apply to all of them, as some do, candidates need to decline some of them.

City really won't be fretting that some of their students will be ranked no.s 120 or 160 or whatever.......this is far better than using that waiting list and finding you go to no.500 or no.700 to fill your places. And a school in the geographical location it is,nowhere even those on the WL often don't want it unless their other nearer places don't offer to them, may well need to go far down.

I think much of the protesting is rather aceademic and clutching at pearls. I would like to know how many who did have City as their decided first choice have missed out. I suspect that the vast majority of those with exploding offers would not have accepted City now or in 3 weeks. So it's actually the fact that they now can't choose something they didn't want anyway, which is upsetting most people. It's like wanting to be able to reserve places on 8 holidays without committing to any, and then deciding a short while before the holiday which you will pay up for, leaving the holiday company of the other 7 without customers and places much more tricky to sell at that point. The independent school system could work with people holding an extra place, but not with 4 or 5 or more.

And again, when people say that other schools manage just fine, I think you would find that they actually don't. They just don't say so, because keeping the sense that the school is heavily over subscribed and filled with the very top applicants is very important for all schools images. At this point, some schools will be worrying that few have accepted and others that perhaps too many have accepted. Come 5 March, quite a few will find they are still not nearly full and get on the phones to find that when they call the top 20 on the WL, some have accepted grammar places, many have accepted other independents and paid their deposits and some say that it's a real shame, because they regretfully accepted another and are now sticking with the alternative, or that another offered a scholarship....they might fill 3 places from those first 20. So they go down the list and down the list. This is the reality for many schools.
It's a funny thing, because parents apply to academic schools, wanting their kids to be educated with other clever children. Yet when schools do things to try and ensure they don't have to use the WL for too many places, which will actually make the school less academic, parents moan about the alternative system, without realising for many schools what the real consequence is for the ability range of their child's cohort.

I would say that this is an example of the school looking out for itself, in terms of having certainty and an able cohort. Existing and about to be parents will be happy about this and actually expect no less than the school to be proactive in protecting its future. No doubt they will be already considering how to manage it all for next year - next year the system might be a bit different, or not - it's right that the schools consider if the current system actually works for them, given the circumstances they find themselves in - and it's right that they adjust it if needed. The school will be aware of the possibility of places being full in even less time next year if they use the same system again. They will be considering how to manage that and if anything needs changing. Parents just need to remain very alert to what the system actually is and respond accordingly. As ever, it's buyer beware.

[tiffinboys]

You make good points for school, but totally ignore the children and their parents. What was the point in giving 6th March deadline? School should honestly say that first come first from the selection list. Don't call it offer of place.