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Originally posted by machel:
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Originally posted by PinkBabe1966:
Grammar schools had been phased out in my area by the time I reached 11, but I truly believe that I had a better education at my comprenensive school that kids are having today.
I praise any kid for achieving good results at GCSE, although I think that CSE and O'level were harder as it was more dependent on academic achievements.
If I had kids now, and the 11+ was available to them, I would encourage them to take it, but would tell them it's not the end of the world if they didn't get the results they wanted, but would try by any means possible to keep them out of the state Education system, especially at senior level, if it meant cutting living costs and going private - so be it.
there are some good sec modern schools in my area, but against the grammar they look poor,
parents are now choosing which school to send their child to and it makes me laugh when they view tables and ofsted reports, these are only as good as previous results/inspections, it is the pupil and parent that make a difference,
I absolutly agree with you over the pupil and parent making a difference, I was encouraged by my mum to learn, and was always academically enclined, my brother was not so good academically, but is very technically minded and my mum has often said she wished the two tier system had been in place as I would probably ended up at grammar school and my brother at a techincal/sec mod school and had the type of education that would have been more helpful to him.
The reason I would go into the private system if I had kids is our LEA is one of the worst in the country and it seems to me it's a "one size fits all" type education now, even with the advent of academies, we do have one very high performing academy school in our LA that is completely oversubscribed. The other schools seem to just be ignored, our LEA more concerned with building new schools than improving standards in the schools already there.
I feel that the Government have let our kids down, after coming in to power with the slogan "Education, education, education", where, 12 years on are the real benefits?