Bucks appeal at 119 - help on next steps and timings

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Etienne
Posts: 8978
Joined: Mon Dec 12, 2005 6:26 pm

Re: Bucks appeal at 119.95 - help on next steps and timings

Post by Etienne »

Sorry to hear about the review. The main reason it was refused was the academic evidence. Although the SRP point out that the head was unaware of any extenuating circumstances, I doubt this would have mattered with a score of 119.75 if the academic case had been stronger.
Mummingsince2006 wrote:We are appealing for the place as there is a mistake in the panel notes and mistakes in the review of the evidence.
I'm afraid there can be an element of luck here. One appeal panel might accept that this alone shows the process could not have been FCO. Another (stricter) panel might require any errors to be so serious that they clearly would have affected the SRP decision.

It would probably be worth trying to improve your chances by deploying one or two other FCO arguments as suggested in the Bucks sticky:
https://www.elevenplusexams.co.uk/forum ... 12&t=57343" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
We've also been given some further context from the school around the GL data from Summer 2018, which I think could show that the numbers were taken out of context, but I wanted to get your advise on this. Below is the data that the school provided from GL Tests in Summer 2018.
In Non VR (Which is the portion of the 11+ my son had a terrible blip on scoring 103) his score was 118. This placed him in the 89th percentile
In English, his SAS mark was 128, which placed him in the 9th stanine and the 97th percentile
In Maths, his SAS mark was 111 scoring, in the 77th percentile.
The school provided the stanine data and the percentiles when they looked back on his scores.
Based on these results, this would give him an overall percentile score of 87% and would place him in the top 15% of ability. Therefore, proving that he is well in the top 30% of ability and should have qualified for a grammar school place.
Unfortunately this would not be comparing like with like. CATs are nationally standardised. The Bucks 11+ is not.
https://www.elevenplusexams.co.uk/appea ... cation#b57" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The other problem you have is that the SRP did not find the jump from EXS in both Y4 & Y5 to 111-120 at the end of Y6 credible.
What might help would be a letter from the headteacher insisting that there has been rapid progress in Y6, and that he stands by his predictions of a standard equivalent to 111-120 ("significantly above expected level").
Unless the head is willing to write two letters (one now, and another one later), I suggest leaving it until close to the appeal because the panel might well appreciate information that is as up to date as possible. It also gives your son a bit more time to satisfy the school that there has been recent rapid progress!
Etienne
Mummingsince2006
Posts: 7
Joined: Tue Apr 10, 2018 10:06 pm

Re: Bucks appeal at 119 - help on next steps and timings

Post by Mummingsince2006 »

Thank you so much - this is really useful, particularly the notes around B57. This seems like it's going to be an incredibly hard one to call. The head has written a letter but I think I can convince him to write another, closer to the time - so I will get to the work on that.

The mistake by the SRP is that they did not apply enough weighting to the fact that I was in hospital on the day of the test and my son had to be taken to school by a neighbour. The clerk's notes record that I was in hospital the day before. We hope this error highlights that the Selection Review process did not review the case carefully enough and that such extenuating circumstances can clearly explain a 1 mark shortfall in performance. The medical evidence states that my ilness was severe, extraordinary and would have impacted normal family life significantly. We are hoping that the panel agree that it would not be objective to think otherwise.
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