Exams, grammar schools, and the trouble with sorting the sheep from the goats
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Version 0 of 1. Your “Secret headteacher” deserves respect and support for calling into question the whole crazy system of judging pupils’ GCSE performance by the rigidly absurd premises of Progress 8 calibration, applied irrationally to measure schools’ achievements against each other (‘On Thursday morning, will I still have a job?’, 23 August). Like your contributor, I was a poor advertisement for my school at level 2. I failed physics O-level with (for my excellent school) a record low score that astounded my teacher; wisely, I was asked to give up chemistry a year before the exam; two years ahead of the test I was told biology was not for me (my dissecting skills were deficient); I was overwhelmed with joy at my grade D in what was then called elementary maths, albeit taking a year longer than most of my contemporaries who did it a year early and then passed advanced maths. I managed Latin at the second attempt. English, geography and history were successes, French a rather poor showing, and art was frankly dire. There were no A* grades then, so I ended up with something well below a half-decent Ebacc by virtue of too few passes in not enough subjects to go into the right “buckets” to score as more than a very mediocre prospect. Then came three A-levels which set me free; I went to university, and from there into an academic career on the strength of my only degree. I think I did alright in 40 years of teaching, making it to department head and faculty dean, but at 16 I was pretty well a write-off by today’s standard, despite having none of the disadvantages so many of the pupils in the school described are contending with. As your headteacher says, “sometimes kids need more than one go at a test”. I would go further: they deserve credit for what they are good at whatever it is, and should not be measured against an arbitrary metric which rates one talent lower than another. Second attempts should of course count (they show determination), and more than that the right to request second marking should not be decided by the exam board on the basis of whether it thinks there is a case. Perhaps the most depressing feature of the “Secret headteacher” article is its anonymity. What has happened in education so that the writer of such a factually enlightening contribution on an important subject feels the need to remain nameless?Michael LiversidgeEmeritus dean, faculty of arts, University of Bristol • Fiona Millar’s so well argued piece on selection (Got a good argument for the return of the 11-plus? Bring it on…, 23 August), juxtaposed with the sad article on the demise of the Woodlands comprehensive (Anger at ‘Hunger Games’ battle for pupils as pioneering school closes, 23 August), shows how market forces and blurred, rose-tinted views of the past still bedevil our education system. I too went to a grammar school, in 1953. The alternative was a secondary modern school with a decidedly rough reputation, and therefore my school career certainly enhanced my life chances. However, it could not disguise the facts that most of the 150 intake at my grammar school then was predominantly composed of middle-class boys and that, because many of the intake had been coached to pass the 11-plus, if you were not in the A, B or the top half of the C stream then you would come out with few or no GCEs. The one concession was to offer woodwork and metalwork given by staff who did not wear the ermine gowns a on speech day: a true badge of rank. Since 2010 in particular, children have been let down by a regime of tinkering with the education system, spending vast sums on academies and free schools and now looking backwards, whether it be selection or a sterile grammar-ridden curriculum redolent of the last century. Our children deserve better.Tony Roberts Penwortham, Lancashire • As young people collect their A-level and GCSE results this month, London’s experience shows that it is good teaching, effective leadership and funding that gets results – not fixating on structures, whether it’s grammar schools, academies or free schools. Despite high levels of deprivation, London’s children now consistently outperform their peers at key stage 2 and GCSE, and London has the highest percentage of schools in the country that are good or outstanding. This hasn’t always been the case. Schemes like the London Challenge, established by the last Labour government, played a key role in the transformation by focusing on the quality of leadership, teaching and learning, and providing much needed new funding. Thanks to the huge progress that has been made in education across London, children growing up here from poorer backgrounds are much more likely to achieve good results than anywhere else. It is essential that the funding that has made this possible is protected. If Theresa May meant anything on the steps of No 10 when she spoke of standing up for the many, not just the privileged few, she should look to London rather than selective areas where the opposite is the case.Catherine West MPLabour, Hornsey & Wood Green; secretary, all-party parliamentary group on London • Setting aside the ethical arguments against grammar schools for a moment, there are at least three critical issues that argue against their reintroduction and in favour of their abolition. First is the lack of an evidence base for the frequent claims that clever children from deprived backgrounds, or indeed any socioeconomic background, benefit from attendance at a grammar school as against a comprehensive. Certainly the parents in Solihull a few years ago took a different view when the controlling Tory group on the council proposed reintroduction, with disastrous electoral consequences for the Tories. Second, there is the issue of the fluctuating size and ability of year groups which means that, with fixed grammar school places, able children in a large year group will be denied a place whereas less able children from a smaller year group will gain a place. Similarly, less able children in a “clever” year group will be denied a place which they may well have won in a less able year group. This fundamental unfairness undermines all pro-grammar arguments. Thirdly, the number and proportion of places at grammar schools varies widely as between local authorities, which is likely to remain the case if they are reintroduced and which creates yet more inescapable systemic unfairness. Roy BoffySutton Coldfield • Once can sense the the exasperation felt by Fiona Millar in having to face yet again the same old arguments for grammar schools. Even where there is “someone whose life was apparently transformed by a grammar school”, that still does not prevent the discrimination against pupils at grammar schools from working class homes who are less likely to go on to Oxbridge and therefore detract from the school’s performance image, as I know from my personal experience. Fiona Millar hits the nail on the head when she reminds us that “no one is campaigning to bring back” the secondary modern schools. Frankly, I will only be impressed by the pressures for grammar schools when there are also petitions to bring back these schools. Dividing children at the school gate through an unreliable examination at 11-plus is simply divisive educationally, socially and between siblings.Michael MeadowcroftLeeds • Join the debate – email guardian.letters@theguardian.com |