Dear All

I hope it is ok to write this, I am new to this and just wondered if you could help.

My daughter's selection review was unsuccessful and it turns out everyone I have spoken to who was reviewed on the above date has been unsuccessful too. Soooooo, could you all check your letters for me and see if your panel date was the same as mine and if you were successful or not?

My daughter did not get a very high score (110) but there was no doubt that the school supported our appeal and rated her as highly as they could academically (1:1) and in the top 30% in the school. She had some SATS tests last October and is already performing at an above average end of year 6 level. The selection review letter said she was not suited to Grammar School which goes against all the academic evidence we provided.

I feel like if I had made up a mitigating circumstance we may have got her in. Very frustrated at this process if I'm honest and not entirely sure if it is worth taking it to the next stage or, based on her relatively low score just leaving it there. The only excuse we have is that she had a shocker on the day.

Thanks for your thoughts.

Please be very careful when drawing conclusions from what must be a very small sample. That panel might have reviewed as many as 30 - 40 cases in their session, and possibly quite a lot more than that if they continued into an afternoon session.

Please also be aware that Review panels hear cases pretty much in the order in which they are received (unless a panel member declares an interest), and cases are not allocated to panels by score.

We were lucky to get a sucessful Review but there is no information on panel date included in the letter.

Sorry to hear you were unsuccessful. Good luck if you decide to go to appeal.

Welcome to Appeals. Sorry to hear of the unsuccessful review.

We deal with individual cases in the Appeals section, so I've moved your thread here.

My reaction would be the same as Sally-Anne's.
What size was your sample?

It depends how many '1' recommendations they made, and how many of those qualified in the test.
The panel would look to see whether the recommendations appear to have been realistic or over-optimistic.

But the top 30% of one school isn't necessarily the same as the top 30% elsewhere.
Is this an average performing school?
Did 30% of the year group qualify in the test?

Did the headteacher predict 111-120 and GDS for the end of Y6?

I doubt it. Convincing evidence from an independent source would have been required.

You've nothing to lose by trying an appeal.

Be sure to read the Bucks sticky:
viewtopic.php?f=12&t=53659
(Although it is still dated "2018", we are not aware of any significant changes for 2019.)

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Etienne

I can't help unfortunately. We didn't get any extra information when we got the successful selection review letter. So we have no idea of when our son's review panel was.
A friend's son scored 117 and was unsuccessful and was told in the letter that his English score wasn't strong enough (stronger in maths). Another friend had (in my opinion) the best extenuating circumstances but her daughter still didn't get through.

I'm sorry I can't help.

Good luck if you decide to appeal.

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this

We had an unsuccessful review heard on that day too. I'm hoping it is just a coincidence, very sad I know you feel.

So sorry
But i don't think you can read anything into this because the successful reviews haven't been told the SRP date. That means the only people who do know the dates were the unsuccessful reviews. I think the panels hear many reviews so there will be lots of unsuccessful reviews for every date.

Very sorry for you.

Lucky us, our son got a successful selection review. He scored 119 at the 11+ and had the full support from his school (1:1). I don't know how many kids got a successful selection review but I understand that the last 11+ exam (sept. 2018) in Bucks was a real "slaughter": many kids who were supposed to pass failed.

That's interesting, my child also narrowly missed the pass mark (expected to pass easily) but was successful at review. How did you hear this?

Every year there are children who are expected to pass who don't. In Bucks the pass score is set so that the top 30% or so pass, so if the test is harder it will require a lower raw score to pass. Of course different tyoes of tests will suit different children better so the change this year may have thrown up some surprises but not because it was harder (or easier for that matter).