Rumour has it that BETHs are offering below the pass mark this year, I've heard (but don't have confirmation) to local boys that are just 1 or 2 marks below.

Has anyone else heard of anything similar, why aren't they filling their spaces?

Bexley Grammar has a bulge class due to a high birth rate year, and they are the more popular choice so Bexley Council may have overestimated how many grammar places were actually needed?

Having thought about it, I could also guess that Bexley Council also planned for Beths/Bexley to squeeze an extra few local near pass kids in to free up some spaces in the non-grammar schools for the high birth rate year. Who knows!

A pass at a distance though would trump a fail wherever they might be located according to the admissions for this school. Could these children have got in in appeal as that is about for of the school and how some close to cut off do get places every year.

I'm assuming they offered places to passes at a distance first before needing to offer to local near misses which is why we are all curious for the reason.

Bexley council publishes upheld appeals every year on the secondary schools booklet, so I guess we will know one day. In the case of appeals, it would not be the school letting in the children, but the independent appeals panel.

Salsa

I think they’ve offered to all applicants and then still had spaces so have gone down to near passes and closest distance, a bit like Townley have in the past.

One boy I know did not appeal (was happy with the school he had been allocated) he just received a letter offering him a place as despite not passing, he put grammars ahead of the local comps in his CAF.

That's unusual. How far did they go last year as at September?

Salsa

If you look at last year's much reduced offer distances on 1 March (especially Townley) I think Bexley went out of their way to make more places available in their grammar schools with only Bexley taking one extra class.

Does someone have this and previous years' number of passed kids handy? I can only assume that they have not adjusted the number of kids given a pass which resulted in much longer distances being offered this year and some from further out may not have even included them on their applications as they were too far out historically.

I believe they have reduced % passed this year as normally they pass 30% but due to high volume of children taking the exam this year only 28% have been passed. How do I know? My DD falls in 28.9% and marginally missed selective score by 0.17 mark and her score was rounded down! So unfair! Hopefully Townley may also use the reserve list then this year? Waiting list number this year is only 50 and they have always traditionally offered from reserve list in the past. Praying for a miracle!
P.S We are appealing too but I know there is not much chance of success.

2018- 6563 sat the test and 1854 selective
2017-5931 and 1835 selective
2016-5685 and 1753 selective