Isn't getting 500 fans at most Scottish football matches an aspiration rather than a limit.......
Oh how we laughed
Glad you can laugh at the state of Scottish football.
What you blethering about , are you a resident of St Kilda.
The standard of Scottish football is utterly terrible. Even the big teams like Rangers and Celtic aren't competitive in Europe. Look at nobodies they get beat by in European competitions, nor are any really top class players interested in going there.
Long gone are the days when they were a formidable force against other European teams.
A bit over the top methinks. Sounds like a typical southerner viewpoint who think the EPL is great , wheras in reality it is pish apart from the small amount of teams owned by shiek's or Russian's. Rangers have qualified in Europe and have lost only about 2 games out of last 20 or so. Much better to see local players etc rather than expensive highly paid pirates who don't give a crap other than their 200K a year. At least in Scotland it is still a Scottish league unlike EPL which is full of imports. Methinks you dost protest too much.
FPT: TimT Posts: 4,808 8:04AM Philip_Thompson said: » show previous quotes But that's not common sense.
Yes you may want to highlight the detail of the worst case but you can't "forget about" the rest. That's not their choice to make.
If the models show things would probably be fine, but there's a worst case scenario where it's awful, then the politicians should get all that information.
If the models show things are definitely awful, and there's no positive scenario to show, then the politicians should get all that information.
If the modellers choose to disregard any scenarios that aren't catastrophic then there's no distinction between those two cases when there really should be!
What the politicians choose to do with the information is for them. But they should get the full oversight not just a cherry picked version.
In managing risks in conditions of ignorance, you can forget about the scenarios that require no action, as the default is no action. What you are concerned about is whether action needs to be taken, because a failure to take timely action is by its nature a fall back to the default of no action.
Thus, in conditions of ignorance and one or more scenarios that contain high consequence hazards* (not risks - we are avoiding numbers as we are in the zone of ignorance) that potentially would result in Never Events, you do just concentrate on those scenarios with such hazards and potential Never Event consequences.
* For those who don't know the vocabulary, a hazard is something that can cause harm, regardless of probability; and risk is a numerical calculation of probability x impact, which requires numerical values for both p and I
And yet in industry - where I have spent 30 years involved in risk management as part of exploration teams - you always include the scenarios which require no action. Indeed the whole basis of a risk matrix is that you try and reduce risks to the ALARP level by looking at what, if any, mitigations are necessary to counter potential hazards. Within in that you always include all possible hazards, even those which are already mitigated to effectively no risk to show that you have taken them into account.
By only including inputs which lead to the need for action you are forcing the decision makers to take action where it may not be necessary, or worse where the consequences of action are worse than the consequences of inaction.
Can't prove it without taking a deep dive - which I can't face with Christmas coming up - but my sense is that some people with strong anti-lockdown sentiments are being misled by a Fraser Nelson twitter thread, inc Fraser himself.
I would think the Sage/Govt process for Covid works in essence as follows: Outcomes for hospitalizations if we do nothing are projected, key variables being spread of cases and severity of disease, each of these outcomes with a probability, and this is used to decide if action is needed. If action IS needed, the mitigating impact of various measures is estimated and this is used to decide what to do. All then subject to the politics and the polls and the money.
The issue is that the scenarios saying that action isn't needed weren't presented within the evidence. This is misleading.
It's inherently wrapped into the process. Model what happens with hospitalizations if nothing is done, get a range of outcomes with probabilities, use this to decide whether to do something. If this isn't the gist of what is happening, and nothing in that Fraser Nelson stuff indicates otherwise, I'd be surprised.
That's what should happen, but that's not what is happening. The favourable through to acceptable and bad but not catastrophic range of outcomes (like the model that Nelson referred to) were deliberately excluded from the report because of the misguided belief that they didn't "inform" anything, but they do.
If you snip out of the report 95% of the range* of outcomes rather than presenting it, then a distorted image is what is being presented.
* Number plucked from air.
I think you might have the wrong end of the stick. I doubt anybody is hiding things in order to get an ill informed decision. Eg, to simplify & illustrate, they model what'll happen if nothing is done and then -
If the worst realistic outcome of this is livable with - Definite No Action. If the central outcome is not livable with - Definite Action. If it's grey area, refine and ponder, refine and ponder, until either Action or No Action wins out.
Then if it's Action, the next step is to estimate the impact on the 'unlivable with' outcome. What will bring it into 'livable' territory?
This is essentially what the process is, I bet.
No if its a grey area (which it is) then present the full information to the politicians and let them decide.
It isn't the scientists job to decide that there must be action, or must not be, its their job to present the evidence and let the politicians make that call.
The problem was they hid half of the evidence, because they didn't think that evidence was informative. That's bad science and would lead to bad politics.
Do you really think half the science that points in the other direction should be hidden out of the report?
I said I was simplifying to illustrate but I see I overdid it. I didn't mean the modelers decide, I mean the pols decide with the modeling info as an input. It's collaborative. The Sage/Govt Covid process.
And you're still not seeing what I seek to place before you. They model the 'do nothing' outcomes and out of that come the best and central and worst realistic cases. What's being hidden?
The best and central cases were hidden because they were "not informative". Only the worst case scenarios were presented.
Had all been shown, that would be valid.
can I ask, does central government bankroll the costs of whatever extra resrtictions the devolved governments want to make, or do they have to raid their own tax bases?
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most wealthy parents did not send their children to secondary moderns and do not send their children to comprehensives and certainly not comprehensives or academies which are any less than Outstanding. So the rich generally don't use comprehensives anyway while the bright but poor no longer have the opportunities grammars provided. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
a) You can tutor for IQ tests very easily. Not sure where you got it that it was difficult. There are lots of techniques.
b) In between our posts I have been chopping wood and did a rough mental calculation of how many should have got into the grammar school from my village all other things being equal (I know how many classes there were, the size of them, the fact that our village was a 3 member ward and how many councillors there were in the borough). The answer is about 25. There was 1 and he dropped out. If that doesn't give you an idea of the disparity between poor and middle class areas nothing will.
c) If you think the well off don't send their children to Comprehensives you live in a different world. I live in a well off area now. I am wealthy by most peoples measure as are most of the people I know. Nearly all use the local comprehensive, which I grant you is good, but that is not what you were saying.
d) Moving to a Grammar at sixth form is too late. The damage has been done. Many won't go who should. Many who were at the Grammar who shouldn't have been have dropped out.
Select by subject on an ongoing basis throughout the child's education.
a) You can't. IQ test results are in part based on genetics, they are difficult to tutor for unlike subject knowledge based exams.
b) And all of them would likely have gone to a sink comprehensive otherwise, at least 1 still got to a grammar.
c) If the wealthy send their kids to a comp it will only be an Outstanding comp they have bought their kids admission to by buying a house in its catchment area, meaning there are well above average house prices for that catchment area. You buy a place at an Outstanding comp or academy much like you buy a place at private school effectively or else you go to church more regularly to get a vicar's reference for a top church school.
d) Sixth form entry for A levels and top university is fine for late developers
a) you can - just allowing children to sit a few past papers so they understand how the questions work allows children to know how to answer the questions quicker allowing them more time to concentrate on more difficult questions.
Indeed and that is what is taught in junior schools in Grammar areas.
Our local junior school (quite charming in its way but run by a rather lefty head who doesn't believe in selective education, despite working in a selective authority) refuses to teach for the 11+. She is far from atypical, although it is well known which junior schools do teach the 11+ (you can't choose to go there, of course - it's down to postcode alone). The private schools all teach the 11+, of course, because they do what parents want rather than what the teachers want. Consequently, tutoring is almost universal amongst the middle classes in Trafford. You don't tend to get it so much over the border in Manchester or Cheshire, though it does exist of course - simply because most people go to the local comp. It's not an issue for so many people.
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most wealthy parents did not send their children to secondary moderns and do not send their children to comprehensives and certainly not comprehensives or academies which are any less than Outstanding. So the rich generally don't use comprehensives anyway while the bright but poor no longer have the opportunities grammars provided. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
a) You can tutor for IQ tests very easily. Not sure where you got it that it was difficult. There are lots of techniques.
b) In between our posts I have been chopping wood and did a rough mental calculation of how many should have got into the grammar school from my village all other things being equal (I know how many classes there were, the size of them, the fact that our village was a 3 member ward and how many councillors there were in the borough). The answer is about 25. There was 1 and he dropped out. If that doesn't give you an idea of the disparity between poor and middle class areas nothing will.
c) If you think the well off don't send their children to Comprehensives you live in a different world. I live in a well off area now. I am wealthy by most peoples measure as are most of the people I know. Nearly all use the local comprehensive, which I grant you is good, but that is not what you were saying.
d) Moving to a Grammar at sixth form is too late. The damage has been done. Many won't go who should. Many who were at the Grammar who shouldn't have been have dropped out.
Select by subject on an ongoing basis throughout the child's education.
a) You can't. IQ test results are in part based on genetics, they are difficult to tutor for unlike subject knowledge based exams.
b) And all of them would likely have gone to a sink comprehensive otherwise, at least 1 still got to a grammar.
c) If the wealthy send their kids to a comp it will only be an Outstanding comp they have bought their kids admission to by buying a house in its catchment area, meaning there are well above average house prices for that catchment area. You buy a place at an Outstanding comp or academy much like you buy a place at private school effectively or else you go to church more regularly to get a vicar's reference for a top church school.
d) Sixth form entry for A levels and top university is fine for late developers
a) you can - just allowing children to sit a few past papers so they understand how the questions work allows children to know how to answer the questions quicker allowing them more time to concentrate on more difficult questions.
Indeed and that is what is taught in junior schools in Grammar areas.
That's how we were taught in 1948-49. Ruthless drilling of the top 15 or so in the year on 'IQ" tests. Don't THINK that's how I ended up in a Grammar, but you never know! IIRC about 8 of us actually made it. 40 years later when Son 2 wanted to sit the 11+ there was a simpler system. Two boys, two girls to Grammar schools in Southend Borough per primary school in surrounding Essex. If your school had three 'good' boys and one 'good' and one 'nearly good' girl one of the boys lost out and one of the girls got lucky.
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
Um no there isn't - otherwise you wouldn't see the disparity you get between KS2 stats and Grammar school selection in places like Kent and Buckingshire.
All schools will have a yearly example where the intelligent child whose parents couldn't afford test tuition fails to get in.
What disparity? The key stat is how many high performers at KS2 as a percentage of intake get top grade A levels and places at Russell Group universities at grammars compared to at comprehensives
The point is, the poor oiks don't get into the grammar school to compete with the rich children. That's a feature not a bug.
Utter rubbish. Plenty of bright but poor kids go to grammars, plenty of rich but thick kids go to Stowe
Not enough though.
For a different example - the Buckinghamshire Grammar schools are now Academic Trusts which mean that when I travel from my Parents into London I see 200 or so pupils traveling from outside Bucks to Dominic Raab's (and my) old school
Those parents are paying £1000 or so a year on train fares to get their children into their preferred school while stealing the place of someone local.
Aylesbury grammar school admissions policy for example is:
'Where qualifying applications for admission exceed the number of places available, places will be allocated in the following order of priority: 5.1.1. Looked after boys and previously looked after boys . 1 2 5.1.2. Boys who are eligible for free school meals as at the application deadline. 3 5.1.3. Siblings of boys who will be on roll of Aylesbury Grammar School at the date of the 4 applicant boy's entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.4. Siblings (as defined above) of girls who will be on roll of Aylesbury High School at the date of the applicant boy's entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.5. Siblings (as defined above) of boys who have previously been on the roll of Aylesbury Grammar School. 1 A 'looked after boy' is a boy who is in the care of a local authority, or being provided with accommodation by a local authority in the exercise of their social services functions. 2 A 'previously looked after boy' is a boy who was looked after, but ceased to be so because they were adopted or became subject to a child arrangements order or special guardianship order. 3 For the purposes of this policy, entitlement to Free School Meals on 31 October in the year before entry to Year 7 is sought needs to be demonstrated. 4 A 'sibling' is a full brother (sharing both parents), half-brother (sharing one parent), adopted brother (sharing one or both parents), foster brother, or step brother (where one's parent is married to the other's parent) and the son of the cohabiting partner of the applicant boy's parent, and in all cases who permanently live at the applicant boy's home address (as defined by this policy) and are being brought up as part of the same core family unit as siblings. For the avoidance of doubt, the sons of extended family members (e.g. cousins) and friends will not be 'siblings' for the purpose of this policy, even where they permanently live at the same home address as the applicant boy. Page 3 5.1.6. Boys who have exceptional medical or social needs which can only be met at Aylesbury Grammar School, and no other school, where their application for admission is supported by written evidence from a doctor, social worker, educational welfare officer or other appropriately qualified person confirming this. 5.1.7. Boys living in the catchment area of the school as at and continuously from 31 October of the year preceding entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.8. All other boys'
That's a bog standard admissions policy - and incredibly easy to game.
Also Aylesbury isn't the schools I know about - try those in Chesham, Amersham, High Wycombe and Beaconsfield all of whom are the closest Grammar schools to none Grammar school areas.
Although it's nice to see you doing some research even though you clearly don't know the Geography well enough to see the flaw within it.
You also miss the fact that where qualifying admissions are above the intake - this is the logic we use.
That stops the local child with 89% getting in (due to him being ill on the day of the single exam that is now used) while the distant child with 90% gets in as the out of area child take the pass mark up a single point.
All of them will still prioritise those in the catchment area who pass their entrance exam first before opening places to those who pass the exam outside their catchment area until they are full
And again you miss the point.
The child with 89% no longer has a place in that Grammar school because the out of area children scored 90% and pushed the pass mark / entry mark to 90% rather than 89%.
No, I don't think that's right. In Sale, for example, Sale Grammar School sets the pass mark. Anyone who passes the pass mark from within the catchment area (which is either Sale and Altrincham or the whole of Trafford, I forget which) is offered a place. Remaining places are then made up from applicants from out of cathcment.
In practice, I believe about one third of pupils are from out of catchment (though this belies the experience of my daughter who has just started there, who appears to have met hardly anyone not from Sale or Altrincham). Now this is a bit of a nuisance for Trafford as a whole, which is woefully squeezed on secondary school places. They could address this at a stroke simply by lowering the pass mark, which would mean more pupils from within Trafford get places, which would mean fewer from outside of Trafford (no matter how well they score). But that's a separate issue: the point is no matter how well someone from outside of the catchment area does, they can't displace a sufficiently good person within the catchment. Someone who passes the pass mark - which is known in advance - and is from within catchment - will get in.
Edit: of course, that's just here! Things may differ elsewhere.
That is the way it is in Lincolnshire as well. Kids in the Catchment area get first choice so long as they passed. Indeed where I am there is a choice of 3 different Grammars. Only once those places have been filled does anyone from outside the catchment area get a chance.
Yes, there is a choice of grammars here too.
Though as I was saying elsewhere, I would rather that the pass rate was lower so kids from Trafford didn't get pushed out by kids from Manchester and Cheshire East. Competition is fierce here: there are thousands and thousands of out-of-authority kids within travel to school distance of Trafford schools. Parents from Manchester and Cheshire East: if you want a grammar school education, live in a selective authority!
I'm surprised his fame didn't endure a little better and that I've only just heard of him; he seems a remarkable character. Do older (his last National ride was before I was born) posters remember him? I found quite a nice write up about him in the New European (not sure why their link calls it Brexit news?!)
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
Um no there isn't - otherwise you wouldn't see the disparity you get between KS2 stats and Grammar school selection in places like Kent and Buckingshire.
All schools will have a yearly example where the intelligent child whose parents couldn't afford test tuition fails to get in.
What disparity? The key stat is how many high performers at KS2 as a percentage of intake get top grade A levels and places at Russell Group universities at grammars compared to at comprehensives
The point is, the poor oiks don't get into the grammar school to compete with the rich children. That's a feature not a bug.
Utter rubbish. Plenty of bright but poor kids go to grammars, plenty of rich but thick kids go to Stowe
Not enough though.
For a different example - the Buckinghamshire Grammar schools are now Academic Trusts which mean that when I travel from my Parents into London I see 200 or so pupils traveling from outside Bucks to Dominic Raab's (and my) old school
Those parents are paying £1000 or so a year on train fares to get their children into their preferred school while stealing the place of someone local.
Aylesbury grammar school admissions policy for example is:
'Where qualifying applications for admission exceed the number of places available, places will be allocated in the following order of priority: 5.1.1. Looked after boys and previously looked after boys . 1 2 5.1.2. Boys who are eligible for free school meals as at the application deadline. 3 5.1.3. Siblings of boys who will be on roll of Aylesbury Grammar School at the date of the 4 applicant boy's entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.4. Siblings (as defined above) of girls who will be on roll of Aylesbury High School at the date of the applicant boy's entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.5. Siblings (as defined above) of boys who have previously been on the roll of Aylesbury Grammar School. 1 A 'looked after boy' is a boy who is in the care of a local authority, or being provided with accommodation by a local authority in the exercise of their social services functions. 2 A 'previously looked after boy' is a boy who was looked after, but ceased to be so because they were adopted or became subject to a child arrangements order or special guardianship order. 3 For the purposes of this policy, entitlement to Free School Meals on 31 October in the year before entry to Year 7 is sought needs to be demonstrated. 4 A 'sibling' is a full brother (sharing both parents), half-brother (sharing one parent), adopted brother (sharing one or both parents), foster brother, or step brother (where one's parent is married to the other's parent) and the son of the cohabiting partner of the applicant boy's parent, and in all cases who permanently live at the applicant boy's home address (as defined by this policy) and are being brought up as part of the same core family unit as siblings. For the avoidance of doubt, the sons of extended family members (e.g. cousins) and friends will not be 'siblings' for the purpose of this policy, even where they permanently live at the same home address as the applicant boy. Page 3 5.1.6. Boys who have exceptional medical or social needs which can only be met at Aylesbury Grammar School, and no other school, where their application for admission is supported by written evidence from a doctor, social worker, educational welfare officer or other appropriately qualified person confirming this. 5.1.7. Boys living in the catchment area of the school as at and continuously from 31 October of the year preceding entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.8. All other boys'
That's a bog standard admissions policy - and incredibly easy to game.
Also Aylesbury isn't the schools I know about - try those in Chesham, Amersham, High Wycombe and Beaconsfield all of whom are the closest Grammar schools to none Grammar school areas.
Although it's nice to see you doing some research even though you clearly don't know the Geography well enough to see the flaw within it.
You also miss the fact that where qualifying admissions are above the intake - this is the logic we use.
That stops the local child with 89% getting in (due to him being ill on the day of the single exam that is now used) while the distant child with 90% gets in as the out of area child take the pass mark up a single point.
All of them will still prioritise those in the catchment area who pass their entrance exam first before opening places to those who pass the exam outside their catchment area until they are full
And again you miss the point.
The child with 89% no longer has a place in that Grammar school because the out of area children scored 90% and pushed the pass mark / entry mark to 90% rather than 89%.
No, I don't think that's right. In Sale, for example, Sale Grammar School sets the pass mark. Anyone who passes the pass mark from within the catchment area (which is either Sale and Altrincham or the whole of Trafford, I forget which) is offered a place. Remaining places are then made up from applicants from out of cathcment.
In practice, I believe about one third of pupils are from out of catchment (though this belies the experience of my daughter who has just started there, who appears to have met hardly anyone not from Sale or Altrincham). Now this is a bit of a nuisance for Trafford as a whole, which is woefully squeezed on secondary school places. They could address this at a stroke simply by lowering the pass mark, which would mean more pupils from within Trafford get places, which would mean fewer from outside of Trafford (no matter how well they score). But that's a separate issue: the point is no matter how well someone from outside of the catchment area does, they can't displace a sufficiently good person within the catchment. Someone who passes the pass mark - which is known in advance - and is from within catchment - will get in.
Edit: of course, that's just here! Things may differ elsewhere.
But you miss the point - Sale set the pass mark so it can select children from outside the catchment area rather setting the pass mark at the point where the school is filled by local children with few from outside the catchment area.
Set the score at 90% and you get 140 local children, 60 from outside the area Set the score at 88% and you get 200 local children and none from outside the area.
And these catchment areas are as you say the whole borough so there is zero justification for out of area children given that the catchment area will include both rich and poor areas.
OK, we're probably in agreement. Note though that the pass mark is set in advance, I think - so they don't know how many local children they will get. Their risk is that they set it too low and have too many places to fill. Though they could, of course, set their requirements thus: 1) Children from within catchment who pass (say) 90%. 2) Children from within catchment who pass (say) 88%. ... and so on down to a nominal level, followed by children from outside the catchment. And only then children from outside catchment who get over 90% - which in practice they never get to, if the school is sufficiently popular (which you would expect it to be).
Which is why I said it's better to work on a moving pass mark and allow the results to determine the pass mark at the point it's the appropriate percentage of local children (say 90-95%).
FPT: TimT Posts: 4,808 8:04AM Philip_Thompson said: » show previous quotes But that's not common sense.
Yes you may want to highlight the detail of the worst case but you can't "forget about" the rest. That's not their choice to make.
If the models show things would probably be fine, but there's a worst case scenario where it's awful, then the politicians should get all that information.
If the models show things are definitely awful, and there's no positive scenario to show, then the politicians should get all that information.
If the modellers choose to disregard any scenarios that aren't catastrophic then there's no distinction between those two cases when there really should be!
What the politicians choose to do with the information is for them. But they should get the full oversight not just a cherry picked version.
In managing risks in conditions of ignorance, you can forget about the scenarios that require no action, as the default is no action. What you are concerned about is whether action needs to be taken, because a failure to take timely action is by its nature a fall back to the default of no action.
Thus, in conditions of ignorance and one or more scenarios that contain high consequence hazards* (not risks - we are avoiding numbers as we are in the zone of ignorance) that potentially would result in Never Events, you do just concentrate on those scenarios with such hazards and potential Never Event consequences.
* For those who don't know the vocabulary, a hazard is something that can cause harm, regardless of probability; and risk is a numerical calculation of probability x impact, which requires numerical values for both p and I
And yet in industry - where I have spent 30 years involved in risk management as part of exploration teams - you always include the scenarios which require no action. Indeed the whole basis of a risk matrix is that you try and reduce risks to the ALARP level by looking at what, if any, mitigations are necessary to counter potential hazards. Within in that you always include all possible hazards, even those which are already mitigated to effectively no risk to show that you have taken them into account.
By only including inputs which lead to the need for action you are forcing the decision makers to take action where it may not be necessary, or worse where the consequences of action are worse than the consequences of inaction.
Can't prove it without taking a deep dive - which I can't face with Christmas coming up - but my sense is that some people with strong anti-lockdown sentiments are being misled by a Fraser Nelson twitter thread, inc Fraser himself.
I would think the Sage/Govt process for Covid works in essence as follows: Outcomes for hospitalizations if we do nothing are projected, key variables being spread of cases and severity of disease, each of these outcomes with a probability, and this is used to decide if action is needed. If action IS needed, the mitigating impact of various measures is estimated and this is used to decide what to do. All then subject to the politics and the polls and the money.
Well you'd expect that to be the case. But the implication is that the bit about the 'probability of each case' is either missing or not based on the evidence we have. I don't know if that's actually the case.
I've read the Fraser Nelson twitter thread and I sense it's cross purposes between expert and layman. In essence I think the process goes like this - They model what happens with no action. If the worst realistic outcome is livable with it drives a decision of no action. Otherwise it's refine and focus on what best to do.
On Omi the problem is the uncertainty - ie big spread between best case and worst case - combined with the speed it's moving. Meaning if they don't act while still in the semi dark, by the time the lights come on it will be to illuminate a horror show.
But fwiw I still think no lockdown or if there is one it'll be 4 weeks max.
I think it will not happen or it will happen.
What an air-head.
Oh look, boisterous heckler seeks to annoy clear thinking progressive and put him off his stride. But to absolutely no avail on this occasion.
FPT: TimT Posts: 4,808 8:04AM Philip_Thompson said: » show previous quotes But that's not common sense.
Yes you may want to highlight the detail of the worst case but you can't "forget about" the rest. That's not their choice to make.
If the models show things would probably be fine, but there's a worst case scenario where it's awful, then the politicians should get all that information.
If the models show things are definitely awful, and there's no positive scenario to show, then the politicians should get all that information.
If the modellers choose to disregard any scenarios that aren't catastrophic then there's no distinction between those two cases when there really should be!
What the politicians choose to do with the information is for them. But they should get the full oversight not just a cherry picked version.
In managing risks in conditions of ignorance, you can forget about the scenarios that require no action, as the default is no action. What you are concerned about is whether action needs to be taken, because a failure to take timely action is by its nature a fall back to the default of no action.
Thus, in conditions of ignorance and one or more scenarios that contain high consequence hazards* (not risks - we are avoiding numbers as we are in the zone of ignorance) that potentially would result in Never Events, you do just concentrate on those scenarios with such hazards and potential Never Event consequences.
* For those who don't know the vocabulary, a hazard is something that can cause harm, regardless of probability; and risk is a numerical calculation of probability x impact, which requires numerical values for both p and I
And yet in industry - where I have spent 30 years involved in risk management as part of exploration teams - you always include the scenarios which require no action. Indeed the whole basis of a risk matrix is that you try and reduce risks to the ALARP level by looking at what, if any, mitigations are necessary to counter potential hazards. Within in that you always include all possible hazards, even those which are already mitigated to effectively no risk to show that you have taken them into account.
By only including inputs which lead to the need for action you are forcing the decision makers to take action where it may not be necessary, or worse where the consequences of action are worse than the consequences of inaction.
Can't prove it without taking a deep dive - which I can't face with Christmas coming up - but my sense is that some people with strong anti-lockdown sentiments are being misled by a Fraser Nelson twitter thread, inc Fraser himself.
I would think the Sage/Govt process for Covid works in essence as follows: Outcomes for hospitalizations if we do nothing are projected, key variables being spread of cases and severity of disease, each of these outcomes with a probability, and this is used to decide if action is needed. If action IS needed, the mitigating impact of various measures is estimated and this is used to decide what to do. All then subject to the politics and the polls and the money.
The issue is that the scenarios saying that action isn't needed weren't presented within the evidence. This is misleading.
It's inherently wrapped into the process. Model what happens with hospitalizations if nothing is done, get a range of outcomes with probabilities, use this to decide whether to do something. If this isn't the gist of what is happening, and nothing in that Fraser Nelson stuff indicates otherwise, I'd be surprised.
That's what should happen, but that's not what is happening. The favourable through to acceptable and bad but not catastrophic range of outcomes (like the model that Nelson referred to) were deliberately excluded from the report because of the misguided belief that they didn't "inform" anything, but they do.
If you snip out of the report 95% of the range* of outcomes rather than presenting it, then a distorted image is what is being presented.
* Number plucked from air.
I think you might have the wrong end of the stick. I doubt anybody is hiding things in order to get an ill informed decision. Eg, to simplify & illustrate, they model what'll happen if nothing is done and then -
If the worst realistic outcome of this is livable with - Definite No Action. If the central outcome is not livable with - Definite Action. If it's grey area, refine and ponder, refine and ponder, until either Action or No Action wins out.
Then if it's Action, the next step is to estimate the impact on the 'unlivable with' outcome. What will bring it into 'livable' territory?
This is essentially what the process is, I bet.
No if its a grey area (which it is) then present the full information to the politicians and let them decide.
It isn't the scientists job to decide that there must be action, or must not be, its their job to present the evidence and let the politicians make that call.
The problem was they hid half of the evidence, because they didn't think that evidence was informative. That's bad science and would lead to bad politics.
Do you really think half the science that points in the other direction should be hidden out of the report?
I said I was simplifying to illustrate but I see I overdid it. I didn't mean the modelers decide, I mean the pols decide with the modeling info as an input. It's collaborative. The Sage/Govt Covid process.
And you're still not seeing what I seek to place before you. They model the 'do nothing' outcomes and out of that come the best and central and worst realistic cases. What's being hidden?
The best and central cases were hidden because they were "not informative". Only the worst case scenarios were presented.
Had all been shown, that would be valid.
can I ask, does central government bankroll the costs of whatever extra resrtictions the devolved governments want to make, or do they have to raid their own tax bases?
In this case, both ('own tax base' in the sense of income from Barnett allocations plus whatever else it raises). It's possible that the £66m already allocated by Scotland will now come out of the now allocated funding from London under Barnett, however.
I see the great Truss Australia deal is paying off...........
The post-Brexit trade deal signed with Australia last week will see British agriculture, forestry and fishing take a £94m hit, the Government’s own impact assessment shows. There is also an expected £225m hit to the semi-processed food sector, which includes tinned products, as part of a “reallocation of resources within the economy”. The impact assessment refers to Australia as a “large, competitive producer of agricultural products”, making clear the “potential for the deal to result in lower output for some agricultural sectors [in the UK] as a result”.
Cheaper food, is a bad thing now?
I can give you a stack of reasons why cheap food is a bad thing. Even the parts of the industry which used to be hooked to white label crap have accepted that the cheapest possible price is not good - look at how Iceland have completely reformed themselves after Horsegate.
But with this deal - how is it cheaper? Helping to crash parts of our domestic industry in favour of a flood of cheap products from the other side of the world does not lead to long-term cheaper food.
Isn't getting 500 fans at most Scottish football matches an aspiration rather than a limit.......
Oh how we laughed
Glad you can laugh at the state of Scottish football.
What you blethering about , are you a resident of St Kilda.
The standard of Scottish football is utterly terrible. Even the big teams like Rangers and Celtic aren't competitive in Europe. Look at nobodies they get beat by in European competitions, nor are any really top class players interested in going there.
Long gone are the days when they were a formidable force against other European teams.
A bit over the top methinks. Sounds like a typical southerner viewpoint who think the EPL is great , wheras in reality it is pish apart from the small amount of teams owned by shiek's or Russian's. Rangers have qualified in Europe and have lost only about 2 games out of last 20 or so. Much better to see local players etc rather than expensive highly paid pirates who don't give a crap other than their 200K a year. At least in Scotland it is still a Scottish league unlike EPL which is full of imports. Methinks you dost protest too much.
Checks Rangers squad....bugger all Scots in there.... Checks Celtic squad....not many more...
Isn't getting 500 fans at most Scottish football matches an aspiration rather than a limit.......
Oh how we laughed
Glad you can laugh at the state of Scottish football.
What you blethering about , are you a resident of St Kilda.
The standard of Scottish football is utterly terrible. Even the big teams like Rangers and Celtic aren't competitive in Europe. Look at nobodies they get beat by in European competitions, nor are any really top class players interested in going there.
Long gone are the days when they were a formidable force against other European teams.
A bit over the top methinks. Sounds like a typical southerner viewpoint who think the EPL is great , wheras in reality it is pish apart from the small amount of teams owned by shiek's or Russian's. Rangers have qualified in Europe and have lost only about 2 games out of last 20 or so. Much better to see local players etc rather than expensive highly paid pirates who don't give a crap other than their 200K a year. At least in Scotland it is still a Scottish league unlike EPL which is full of imports. Methinks you dost protest too much.
More to the point ... it wasn't like this in the 1960s.
Celtic & Rangers were comparable (maybe better than) the best of the English league. The Scotland football team regular beat the England one.
The Scottish FA have seriously under-performed for 4 decades.
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most wealthy parents did not send their children to secondary moderns and do not send their children to comprehensives and certainly not comprehensives or academies which are any less than Outstanding. So the rich generally don't use comprehensives anyway while the bright but poor no longer have the opportunities grammars provided. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
a) You can tutor for IQ tests very easily. Not sure where you got it that it was difficult. There are lots of techniques.
b) In between our posts I have been chopping wood and did a rough mental calculation of how many should have got into the grammar school from my village all other things being equal (I know how many classes there were, the size of them, the fact that our village was a 3 member ward and how many councillors there were in the borough). The answer is about 25. There was 1 and he dropped out. If that doesn't give you an idea of the disparity between poor and middle class areas nothing will.
c) If you think the well off don't send their children to Comprehensives you live in a different world. I live in a well off area now. I am wealthy by most peoples measure as are most of the people I know. Nearly all use the local comprehensive, which I grant you is good, but that is not what you were saying.
d) Moving to a Grammar at sixth form is too late. The damage has been done. Many won't go who should. Many who were at the Grammar who shouldn't have been have dropped out.
Select by subject on an ongoing basis throughout the child's education.
a) You can't. IQ test results are in part based on genetics, they are difficult to tutor for unlike subject knowledge based exams.
b) And all of them would likely have gone to a sink comprehensive otherwise, at least 1 still got to a grammar.
c) If the wealthy send their kids to a comp it will only be an Outstanding comp they have bought their kids admission to by buying a house in its catchment area, meaning there are well above average house prices for that catchment area. You buy a place at an Outstanding comp or academy much like you buy a place at private school effectively or else you go to church more regularly to get a vicar's reference for a top church school.
d) Sixth form entry for A levels and top university is fine for late developers
a) you can - just allowing children to sit a few past papers so they understand how the questions work allows children to know how to answer the questions quicker allowing them more time to concentrate on more difficult questions.
You can understand the format of the questions but it is harder to prepare for the specific questions that will come up as they are logic and reasoning based, not subject knowledge based which are more tests of memory
As someone who has got 3 of 4 children into local grammars and sent the other private, I can confirm HYUFD doesn't know what he's talking about here, as well as constantly missing the point.
Tutoring makes a massive difference to ability to tackle the 11+. You see it all the time with kids that got tutored and then struggle to keep up once they're in.
FPT: TimT Posts: 4,808 8:04AM Philip_Thompson said: » show previous quotes But that's not common sense.
Yes you may want to highlight the detail of the worst case but you can't "forget about" the rest. That's not their choice to make.
If the models show things would probably be fine, but there's a worst case scenario where it's awful, then the politicians should get all that information.
If the models show things are definitely awful, and there's no positive scenario to show, then the politicians should get all that information.
If the modellers choose to disregard any scenarios that aren't catastrophic then there's no distinction between those two cases when there really should be!
What the politicians choose to do with the information is for them. But they should get the full oversight not just a cherry picked version.
In managing risks in conditions of ignorance, you can forget about the scenarios that require no action, as the default is no action. What you are concerned about is whether action needs to be taken, because a failure to take timely action is by its nature a fall back to the default of no action.
Thus, in conditions of ignorance and one or more scenarios that contain high consequence hazards* (not risks - we are avoiding numbers as we are in the zone of ignorance) that potentially would result in Never Events, you do just concentrate on those scenarios with such hazards and potential Never Event consequences.
* For those who don't know the vocabulary, a hazard is something that can cause harm, regardless of probability; and risk is a numerical calculation of probability x impact, which requires numerical values for both p and I
And yet in industry - where I have spent 30 years involved in risk management as part of exploration teams - you always include the scenarios which require no action. Indeed the whole basis of a risk matrix is that you try and reduce risks to the ALARP level by looking at what, if any, mitigations are necessary to counter potential hazards. Within in that you always include all possible hazards, even those which are already mitigated to effectively no risk to show that you have taken them into account.
By only including inputs which lead to the need for action you are forcing the decision makers to take action where it may not be necessary, or worse where the consequences of action are worse than the consequences of inaction.
Can't prove it without taking a deep dive - which I can't face with Christmas coming up - but my sense is that some people with strong anti-lockdown sentiments are being misled by a Fraser Nelson twitter thread, inc Fraser himself.
I would think the Sage/Govt process for Covid works in essence as follows: Outcomes for hospitalizations if we do nothing are projected, key variables being spread of cases and severity of disease, each of these outcomes with a probability, and this is used to decide if action is needed. If action IS needed, the mitigating impact of various measures is estimated and this is used to decide what to do. All then subject to the politics and the polls and the money.
Well you'd expect that to be the case. But the implication is that the bit about the 'probability of each case' is either missing or not based on the evidence we have. I don't know if that's actually the case.
I've read the Fraser Nelson twitter thread and I sense it's cross purposes between expert and layman. In essence I think the process goes like this - They model what happens with no action. If the worst realistic outcome is livable with it drives a decision of no action. Otherwise it's refine and focus on what best to do.
On Omi the problem is the uncertainty - ie big spread between best case and worst case - combined with the speed it's moving. Meaning if they don't act while still in the semi dark, by the time the lights come on it will be to illuminate a horror show.
But fwiw I still think no lockdown or if there is one it'll be 4 weeks max.
It is incorrect to say they modelled the best and worst outcome of a “no change” decision. The model produced a range of outcomes associated with a “no change” decision. But they were a range of outcome based on provided inputs (no reduction in severity etc). They didn’t have the scope to explore more optimistic inputs and therefor more optimistic and quite plausible outcomes.
Ministers were essentially presented with the case for restrictions with their hands tied as there had no ability (through competing costed models) to weigh up the competing downsides of imposing highly costly preventative measures for an unquantified risk which might not materialise. This is very different to seeing worst case models and only putting in place plans for expensive mitigation once data on the inputs could be confirmed in the real world.
I'm surprised his fame didn't endure a little better and that I've only just heard of him; he seems a remarkable character. Do older (his last National ride was before I was born) posters remember him? I found quite a nice write up about him in the New European (not sure why their link calls it Brexit news?!)
On topic, when the ratings go this negative then there is usually no comeback.
I suspect Boris Johnson will be safe until May's elections, the last time they were held it was a tie between Labour and the Tories, Any Lab lead in NESV should lead to Tory losses, the bigger the lead, the more losses.
I suspect the Lib Dems may also help create a carnage for the blue meanies.
Plenty of morons go to private school and have a lot more success than they deserve, see Boris Johnson
In fairness that is also true of comprehensive school children as well. Look at Liz Truss.
Liz Truss would be our first ever PM solely educated at a comprehensive school for her secondary education, however she would then have to beat the grammar and private school educated Starmer. Historically, the odds would favour Starmer
So would sanity...
Edit - incidentally does anyone know if Corbyn was a day boy or a boarder at Adam's Grammar?
What's your issue with Truss?
Bluntly, she always comes across as a tad unbalanced. Able, but not shrewd. Determined, but also rather reckless. Passionate, but not always nuanced.
Ha, well put. I was trying to articulate my reservations about her, and that is exactly it. Of course, I could well be misjudging her. I hope I am. I have, in fairness, seen relatively little of her.
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
Um no there isn't - otherwise you wouldn't see the disparity you get between KS2 stats and Grammar school selection in places like Kent and Buckingshire.
All schools will have a yearly example where the intelligent child whose parents couldn't afford test tuition fails to get in.
What disparity? The key stat is how many high performers at KS2 as a percentage of intake get top grade A levels and places at Russell Group universities at grammars compared to at comprehensives
The point is, the poor oiks don't get into the grammar school to compete with the rich children. That's a feature not a bug.
Utter rubbish. Plenty of bright but poor kids go to grammars, plenty of rich but thick kids go to Stowe
Not enough though.
For a different example - the Buckinghamshire Grammar schools are now Academic Trusts which mean that when I travel from my Parents into London I see 200 or so pupils traveling from outside Bucks to Dominic Raab's (and my) old school
Those parents are paying £1000 or so a year on train fares to get their children into their preferred school while stealing the place of someone local.
Aylesbury grammar school admissions policy for example is:
'Where qualifying applications for admission exceed the number of places available, places will be allocated in the following order of priority: 5.1.1. Looked after boys and previously looked after boys . 1 2 5.1.2. Boys who are eligible for free school meals as at the application deadline. 3 5.1.3. Siblings of boys who will be on roll of Aylesbury Grammar School at the date of the 4 applicant boy's entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.4. Siblings (as defined above) of girls who will be on roll of Aylesbury High School at the date of the applicant boy's entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.5. Siblings (as defined above) of boys who have previously been on the roll of Aylesbury Grammar School. 1 A 'looked after boy' is a boy who is in the care of a local authority, or being provided with accommodation by a local authority in the exercise of their social services functions. 2 A 'previously looked after boy' is a boy who was looked after, but ceased to be so because they were adopted or became subject to a child arrangements order or special guardianship order. 3 For the purposes of this policy, entitlement to Free School Meals on 31 October in the year before entry to Year 7 is sought needs to be demonstrated. 4 A 'sibling' is a full brother (sharing both parents), half-brother (sharing one parent), adopted brother (sharing one or both parents), foster brother, or step brother (where one's parent is married to the other's parent) and the son of the cohabiting partner of the applicant boy's parent, and in all cases who permanently live at the applicant boy's home address (as defined by this policy) and are being brought up as part of the same core family unit as siblings. For the avoidance of doubt, the sons of extended family members (e.g. cousins) and friends will not be 'siblings' for the purpose of this policy, even where they permanently live at the same home address as the applicant boy. Page 3 5.1.6. Boys who have exceptional medical or social needs which can only be met at Aylesbury Grammar School, and no other school, where their application for admission is supported by written evidence from a doctor, social worker, educational welfare officer or other appropriately qualified person confirming this. 5.1.7. Boys living in the catchment area of the school as at and continuously from 31 October of the year preceding entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.8. All other boys'
That's a bog standard admissions policy - and incredibly easy to game.
Also Aylesbury isn't the schools I know about - try those in Chesham, Amersham, High Wycombe and Beaconsfield all of whom are the closest Grammar schools to none Grammar school areas.
Although it's nice to see you doing some research even though you clearly don't know the Geography well enough to see the flaw within it.
You also miss the fact that where qualifying admissions are above the intake - this is the logic we use.
That stops the local child with 89% getting in (due to him being ill on the day of the single exam that is now used) while the distant child with 90% gets in as the out of area child take the pass mark up a single point.
All of them will still prioritise those in the catchment area who pass their entrance exam first before opening places to those who pass the exam outside their catchment area until they are full
And again you miss the point.
The child with 89% no longer has a place in that Grammar school because the out of area children scored 90% and pushed the pass mark / entry mark to 90% rather than 89%.
No, I don't think that's right. In Sale, for example, Sale Grammar School sets the pass mark. Anyone who passes the pass mark from within the catchment area (which is either Sale and Altrincham or the whole of Trafford, I forget which) is offered a place. Remaining places are then made up from applicants from out of cathcment.
In practice, I believe about one third of pupils are from out of catchment (though this belies the experience of my daughter who has just started there, who appears to have met hardly anyone not from Sale or Altrincham). Now this is a bit of a nuisance for Trafford as a whole, which is woefully squeezed on secondary school places. They could address this at a stroke simply by lowering the pass mark, which would mean more pupils from within Trafford get places, which would mean fewer from outside of Trafford (no matter how well they score). But that's a separate issue: the point is no matter how well someone from outside of the catchment area does, they can't displace a sufficiently good person within the catchment. Someone who passes the pass mark - which is known in advance - and is from within catchment - will get in.
Edit: of course, that's just here! Things may differ elsewhere.
That is the way it is in Lincolnshire as well. Kids in the Catchment area get first choice so long as they passed. Indeed where I am there is a choice of 3 different Grammars. Only once those places have been filled does anyone from outside the catchment area get a chance.
Yes, there is a choice of grammars here too.
Though as I was saying elsewhere, I would rather that the pass rate was lower so kids from Trafford didn't get pushed out by kids from Manchester and Cheshire East. Competition is fierce here: there are thousands and thousands of out-of-authority kids within travel to school distance of Trafford schools. Parents from Manchester and Cheshire East: if you want a grammar school education, live in a selective authority!
Or - radical idea - lets not have selective education. Binned off your life chances aged 11 by means of quotas is not the risk that any parent should want for their child. And what happens as the bright kids who just missed the cut get brighter? In a normal school ability is streamed and you can move up and down. You can't get promoted to Grammar School...
"Stay at home as much as possible" "Minimise Hogmanay socialising" "Hogmanay party cancelled in Edinburgh" "No evidence omichron is less deadly" "3 weeks no spectator sports" "No casual sports" "3 weeks only table service, 1m distancing"
No evidence Omicron is less severe?????????
Careful use of 'deadly' rather than 'severe'? Bit early for much evidence on deaths (although less severe implies fewer deaths, it is possible, albeit unlikely, that you could have fewer hospitalised but a similar death rate)
The infection mechanism seems to imply significantly lower severity as well.
That's not to say it's conclusive, but surely another bit of evidence that Omicron may not be as bad as we fear.
Yep, I'm speculating it was a cute choice of words to say something that is arguably true (even though unlikely) given the emerging evidence on severity. (If it's a quote, then "no evidence omicron less severe" would be hard to defend by now)
My booster jab text reminder said "get your life-saving booster jab..."
I am presuming that is a nudge team / behavioural insight idea.
On topic, when the ratings go this negative then there is usually no comeback.
I suspect Boris Johnson will be safe until May's elections, the last time they were held it was a tie between Labour and the Tories, Any Lab lead in NESV should lead to Tory losses, the bigger the lead, the more losses.
I suspect the Lib Dems may also help create a carnage for the blue meanies.
Haven't you just rejoined the party you are calling meanies?
Isn't getting 500 fans at most Scottish football matches an aspiration rather than a limit.......
Oh how we laughed
Glad you can laugh at the state of Scottish football.
What you blethering about , are you a resident of St Kilda.
The standard of Scottish football is utterly terrible. Even the big teams like Rangers and Celtic aren't competitive in Europe. Look at nobodies they get beat by in European competitions, nor are any really top class players interested in going there.
Long gone are the days when they were a formidable force against other European teams.
A bit over the top methinks. Sounds like a typical southerner viewpoint who think the EPL is great , wheras in reality it is pish apart from the small amount of teams owned by shiek's or Russian's. Rangers have qualified in Europe and have lost only about 2 games out of last 20 or so. Much better to see local players etc rather than expensive highly paid pirates who don't give a crap other than their 200K a year. At least in Scotland it is still a Scottish league unlike EPL which is full of imports. Methinks you dost protest too much.
Have you seen the Rangers squad lately? Celtic not much better in terms of home grown talent.
So why not make it a condition of supporting the government's plan b measures? I mean Labour could literally have claimed £2bn for businesses as their measure, the government would simply have had to agree given the scope of rebellion in their own party.
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
Um no there isn't - otherwise you wouldn't see the disparity you get between KS2 stats and Grammar school selection in places like Kent and Buckingshire.
All schools will have a yearly example where the intelligent child whose parents couldn't afford test tuition fails to get in.
What disparity? The key stat is how many high performers at KS2 as a percentage of intake get top grade A levels and places at Russell Group universities at grammars compared to at comprehensives
The point is, the poor oiks don't get into the grammar school to compete with the rich children. That's a feature not a bug.
Utter rubbish. Plenty of bright but poor kids go to grammars, plenty of rich but thick kids go to Stowe
Not enough though.
For a different example - the Buckinghamshire Grammar schools are now Academic Trusts which mean that when I travel from my Parents into London I see 200 or so pupils traveling from outside Bucks to Dominic Raab's (and my) old school
Those parents are paying £1000 or so a year on train fares to get their children into their preferred school while stealing the place of someone local.
Aylesbury grammar school admissions policy for example is:
'Where qualifying applications for admission exceed the number of places available, places will be allocated in the following order of priority: 5.1.1. Looked after boys and previously looked after boys . 1 2 5.1.2. Boys who are eligible for free school meals as at the application deadline. 3 5.1.3. Siblings of boys who will be on roll of Aylesbury Grammar School at the date of the 4 applicant boy's entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.4. Siblings (as defined above) of girls who will be on roll of Aylesbury High School at the date of the applicant boy's entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.5. Siblings (as defined above) of boys who have previously been on the roll of Aylesbury Grammar School. 1 A 'looked after boy' is a boy who is in the care of a local authority, or being provided with accommodation by a local authority in the exercise of their social services functions. 2 A 'previously looked after boy' is a boy who was looked after, but ceased to be so because they were adopted or became subject to a child arrangements order or special guardianship order. 3 For the purposes of this policy, entitlement to Free School Meals on 31 October in the year before entry to Year 7 is sought needs to be demonstrated. 4 A 'sibling' is a full brother (sharing both parents), half-brother (sharing one parent), adopted brother (sharing one or both parents), foster brother, or step brother (where one's parent is married to the other's parent) and the son of the cohabiting partner of the applicant boy's parent, and in all cases who permanently live at the applicant boy's home address (as defined by this policy) and are being brought up as part of the same core family unit as siblings. For the avoidance of doubt, the sons of extended family members (e.g. cousins) and friends will not be 'siblings' for the purpose of this policy, even where they permanently live at the same home address as the applicant boy. Page 3 5.1.6. Boys who have exceptional medical or social needs which can only be met at Aylesbury Grammar School, and no other school, where their application for admission is supported by written evidence from a doctor, social worker, educational welfare officer or other appropriately qualified person confirming this. 5.1.7. Boys living in the catchment area of the school as at and continuously from 31 October of the year preceding entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.8. All other boys'
That's a bog standard admissions policy - and incredibly easy to game.
Also Aylesbury isn't the schools I know about - try those in Chesham, Amersham, High Wycombe and Beaconsfield all of whom are the closest Grammar schools to none Grammar school areas.
Although it's nice to see you doing some research even though you clearly don't know the Geography well enough to see the flaw within it.
You also miss the fact that where qualifying admissions are above the intake - this is the logic we use.
That stops the local child with 89% getting in (due to him being ill on the day of the single exam that is now used) while the distant child with 90% gets in as the out of area child take the pass mark up a single point.
All of them will still prioritise those in the catchment area who pass their entrance exam first before opening places to those who pass the exam outside their catchment area until they are full
And again you miss the point.
The child with 89% no longer has a place in that Grammar school because the out of area children scored 90% and pushed the pass mark / entry mark to 90% rather than 89%.
No, I don't think that's right. In Sale, for example, Sale Grammar School sets the pass mark. Anyone who passes the pass mark from within the catchment area (which is either Sale and Altrincham or the whole of Trafford, I forget which) is offered a place. Remaining places are then made up from applicants from out of cathcment.
In practice, I believe about one third of pupils are from out of catchment (though this belies the experience of my daughter who has just started there, who appears to have met hardly anyone not from Sale or Altrincham). Now this is a bit of a nuisance for Trafford as a whole, which is woefully squeezed on secondary school places. They could address this at a stroke simply by lowering the pass mark, which would mean more pupils from within Trafford get places, which would mean fewer from outside of Trafford (no matter how well they score). But that's a separate issue: the point is no matter how well someone from outside of the catchment area does, they can't displace a sufficiently good person within the catchment. Someone who passes the pass mark - which is known in advance - and is from within catchment - will get in.
Edit: of course, that's just here! Things may differ elsewhere.
But you miss the point - Sale set the pass mark so it can select children from outside the catchment area rather setting the pass mark at the point where the school is filled by local children with few from outside the catchment area.
Set the score at 90% and you get 140 local children, 60 from outside the area Set the score at 88% and you get 200 local children and none from outside the area.
And these catchment areas are as you say the whole borough so there is zero justification for out of area children given that the catchment area will include both rich and poor areas.
OK, we're probably in agreement. Note though that the pass mark is set in advance, I think - so they don't know how many local children they will get. Their risk is that they set it too low and have too many places to fill. Though they could, of course, set their requirements thus: 1) Children from within catchment who pass (say) 90%. 2) Children from within catchment who pass (say) 88%. ... and so on down to a nominal level, followed by children from outside the catchment. And only then children from outside catchment who get over 90% - which in practice they never get to, if the school is sufficiently popular (which you would expect it to be).
Which is why I said it's better to work on a moving pass mark and allow the results to determine the pass mark at the point it's the appropriate percentage of local children (say 90-95%).
The trouble with that is that it blows the gaff open- that the 11+ is a rationing mechanism, rather than a way of allocating pupils to the most appropriate educational pathway.
Consider that there's lots of pressure for more grammar school places in selective areas (Kent, for example) and next to none in comprehensive areas (Hampshire or Cambridgeshire, to take two examples I'm familiar with).
If you really want to give elite opportunities (to become PM, say) to elite children, what you probably want is 1 grammar school per local authority for the top 5% or so.
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
Um no there isn't - otherwise you wouldn't see the disparity you get between KS2 stats and Grammar school selection in places like Kent and Buckingshire.
All schools will have a yearly example where the intelligent child whose parents couldn't afford test tuition fails to get in.
What disparity? The key stat is how many high performers at KS2 as a percentage of intake get top grade A levels and places at Russell Group universities at grammars compared to at comprehensives
The point is, the poor oiks don't get into the grammar school to compete with the rich children. That's a feature not a bug.
Utter rubbish. Plenty of bright but poor kids go to grammars, plenty of rich but thick kids go to Stowe
On topic, when the ratings go this negative then there is usually no comeback.
I suspect Boris Johnson will be safe until May's elections, the last time they were held it was a tie between Labour and the Tories, Any Lab lead in NESV should lead to Tory losses, the bigger the lead, the more losses.
I suspect the Lib Dems may also help create a carnage for the blue meanies.
Haven't you just rejoined the party you are calling meanies?
I've been calling them the Blue Meanies for years, as a joke at the expense of lefties who think Tories are evil and that Labour have a higher moral purpose.
One thing I'm really relieved about is little the vaccines have been politicised in the UK. It's only a few fringe loons like Piers Corbyn and Lawrence Fox that are against.
Isn't getting 500 fans at most Scottish football matches an aspiration rather than a limit.......
Oh how we laughed
Glad you can laugh at the state of Scottish football.
What you blethering about , are you a resident of St Kilda.
The standard of Scottish football is utterly terrible. Even the big teams like Rangers and Celtic aren't competitive in Europe. Look at nobodies they get beat by in European competitions, nor are any really top class players interested in going there.
Long gone are the days when they were a formidable force against other European teams.
A bit over the top methinks. Sounds like a typical southerner viewpoint who think the EPL is great , wheras in reality it is pish apart from the small amount of teams owned by shiek's or Russian's. Rangers have qualified in Europe and have lost only about 2 games out of last 20 or so. Much better to see local players etc rather than expensive highly paid pirates who don't give a crap other than their 200K a year. At least in Scotland it is still a Scottish league unlike EPL which is full of imports. Methinks you dost protest too much.
Have you seen the Rangers squad lately? Celtic not much better in terms of home grown talent.
And the imports are hardly world class....39 year old Jermaine Defoe....not exactly Henrik Larsson in his prime.
As for Europe, how many years is it since a scottish team even managed to beat the part timers from Estonia team types and qualify for the champions league properr?
So why not make it a condition of supporting the government's plan b measures? I mean Labour could literally have claimed £2bn for businesses as their measure, the government would simply have had to agree given the scope of rebellion in their own party.
Perhaps, but different issue. I merely intended to point out the laziness of so many on here in asserting that Labour has been quiet on the issue of support for businesses (and individuals who have to isolate). They haven't. It's fake news.
On topic, when the ratings go this negative then there is usually no comeback.
I suspect Boris Johnson will be safe until May's elections, the last time they were held it was a tie between Labour and the Tories, Any Lab lead in NESV should lead to Tory losses, the bigger the lead, the more losses.
I suspect the Lib Dems may also help create a carnage for the blue meanies.
Haven't you just rejoined the party you are calling meanies?
I've been calling them the Blue Meanies for years, as a joke at the expense of lefties who think Tories are evil and that Labour have a higher moral purpose.
ooh, have you rejoined the Tories Eagles? Presumably because you have a view on Boris's successor - who do you favour?
Isn't getting 500 fans at most Scottish football matches an aspiration rather than a limit.......
Oh how we laughed
Glad you can laugh at the state of Scottish football.
What you blethering about , are you a resident of St Kilda.
The standard of Scottish football is utterly terrible. Even the big teams like Rangers and Celtic aren't competitive in Europe. Look at nobodies they get beat by in European competitions, nor are any really top class players interested in going there.
Long gone are the days when they were a formidable force against other European teams.
A bit over the top methinks. Sounds like a typical southerner viewpoint who think the EPL is great , wheras in reality it is pish apart from the small amount of teams owned by shiek's or Russian's. Rangers have qualified in Europe and have lost only about 2 games out of last 20 or so. Much better to see local players etc rather than expensive highly paid pirates who don't give a crap other than their 200K a year. At least in Scotland it is still a Scottish league unlike EPL which is full of imports. Methinks you dost protest too much.
More to the point ... it wasn't like this in the 1960s.
Celtic & Rangers were comparable (maybe better than) the best of the English league. The Scotland football team regular beat the England one.
The Scottish FA have seriously under-performed for 4 decades.
Celtic and Rangers got a big boost in the late 1980s when the behaviour of Liverpool fans led to English clubs being banned from Europe. If a player wanted European football, going north of the border was a good option.
On topic, when the ratings go this negative then there is usually no comeback.
I suspect Boris Johnson will be safe until May's elections, the last time they were held it was a tie between Labour and the Tories, Any Lab lead in NESV should lead to Tory losses, the bigger the lead, the more losses.
I suspect the Lib Dems may also help create a carnage for the blue meanies.
So why not make it a condition of supporting the government's plan b measures? I mean Labour could literally have claimed £2bn for businesses as their measure, the government would simply have had to agree given the scope of rebellion in their own party.
Perhaps, but different issue. I merely intended to point out the laziness of so many on here in asserting that Labour has been quiet on the issue of support for businesses (and individuals who have to isolate). They haven't. It's fake news.
The assertion was that Labour didn't demand it. Their actions demonstrate this to be the case.
I'm surprised his fame didn't endure a little better and that I've only just heard of him; he seems a remarkable character. Do older (his last National ride was before I was born) posters remember him? I found quite a nice write up about him in the New European (not sure why their link calls it Brexit news?!)
More anecdata - busy M&S foodhall, but a LOT of large Turkey joints for "8-10" and "12-14" people marked down. The citizens of Brighton are evidently planning a smaller Christmas than M&S thought they would be.....
It boggles the mind that more than seven years after Russia annexed Crimea and fought in eastern Ukraine that so little has been done to free central and eastern Europe from a dependence on Russian gas.
The proponents of grammar schools could usefully ask themselves a simple question. Why haven't the Tories, who have been in power since 2010, done anything to bring them back - and the 2019 government hasn't even mentioned them (as far as I know)?
The answer is dead simple. They've seen the actual evidence. That evidence shows that grammar schools are a brake on social mobility, not an accelerant to it. And the kids who go to grammar schools (currently and previously) do just as well if they go to comprehensive schools. If the evidence was there that grammar schools were the answer, don't you think Cameron, May and Johnson would have agreed with you and set about restoring them?
While normally I claim no authority on anything whatsoever, on this one I know what I'm talking about, having had a career largely based on studying the complexity of educational outcomes.
So why not make it a condition of supporting the government's plan b measures? I mean Labour could literally have claimed £2bn for businesses as their measure, the government would simply have had to agree given the scope of rebellion in their own party.
Perhaps, but different issue. I merely intended to point out the laziness of so many on here in asserting that Labour has been quiet on the issue of support for businesses (and individuals who have to isolate). They haven't. It's fake news.
Indeed, but talk is cheap. They had a chance to amend the bill, or to vote against it if the support package wasn’t there.
So why not make it a condition of supporting the government's plan b measures? I mean Labour could literally have claimed £2bn for businesses as their measure, the government would simply have had to agree given the scope of rebellion in their own party.
Perhaps, but different issue. I merely intended to point out the laziness of so many on here in asserting that Labour has been quiet on the issue of support for businesses (and individuals who have to isolate). They haven't. It's fake news.
Honestly, a letter is window dressing compared to the opportunity to force the government into supporting their amendment for support cash. It was an error for Starmer to wave through the plan b measures without getting money for businesses in return and now the chancellor is able to take credit for it. Just as Boris is a bit useless, I think Labour are as well. Blair would never have let an opportunity like that go to waste. He'd have got the money and had the media dub it "Labour's Christmas Bonus" or something like that.
Isn't getting 500 fans at most Scottish football matches an aspiration rather than a limit.......
Oh how we laughed
Glad you can laugh at the state of Scottish football.
What you blethering about , are you a resident of St Kilda.
The standard of Scottish football is utterly terrible. Even the big teams like Rangers and Celtic aren't competitive in Europe. Look at nobodies they get beat by in European competitions, nor are any really top class players interested in going there.
Long gone are the days when they were a formidable force against other European teams.
A bit over the top methinks. Sounds like a typical southerner viewpoint who think the EPL is great , wheras in reality it is pish apart from the small amount of teams owned by shiek's or Russian's. Rangers have qualified in Europe and have lost only about 2 games out of last 20 or so. Much better to see local players etc rather than expensive highly paid pirates who don't give a crap other than their 200K a year. At least in Scotland it is still a Scottish league unlike EPL which is full of imports. Methinks you dost protest too much.
More to the point ... it wasn't like this in the 1960s.
Celtic & Rangers were comparable (maybe better than) the best of the English league. The Scotland football team regular beat the England one.
The Scottish FA have seriously under-performed for 4 decades.
Celtic and Rangers got a big boost in the late 1980s when the behaviour of Liverpool fans led to English clubs being banned from Europe. If a player wanted European football, going north of the border was a good option.
And Scottish football was still very competitive at the beginning of the Champions League and for a good few early seasons of that. Although of course that was also true of so many other countries like Belgium, Portugal, the Netherlands etc.
Now football has become so stupidly stratified that a handful of clubs across the entire continent, barely even enough to form a decent super league, totally dominate.
The money flowing into the Premier League and the Champions League fucked football beyond repair.
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most wealthy parents did not send their children to secondary moderns and do not send their children to comprehensives and certainly not comprehensives or academies which are any less than Outstanding. So the rich generally don't use comprehensives anyway while the bright but poor no longer have the opportunities grammars provided. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
a) You can tutor for IQ tests very easily. Not sure where you got it that it was difficult. There are lots of techniques.
b) In between our posts I have been chopping wood and did a rough mental calculation of how many should have got into the grammar school from my village all other things being equal (I know how many classes there were, the size of them, the fact that our village was a 3 member ward and how many councillors there were in the borough). The answer is about 25. There was 1 and he dropped out. If that doesn't give you an idea of the disparity between poor and middle class areas nothing will.
c) If you think the well off don't send their children to Comprehensives you live in a different world. I live in a well off area now. I am wealthy by most peoples measure as are most of the people I know. Nearly all use the local comprehensive, which I grant you is good, but that is not what you were saying.
d) Moving to a Grammar at sixth form is too late. The damage has been done. Many won't go who should. Many who were at the Grammar who shouldn't have been have dropped out.
Select by subject on an ongoing basis throughout the child's education.
a) You can't. IQ test results are in part based on genetics, they are difficult to tutor for unlike subject knowledge based exams.
b) And all of them would likely have gone to a sink comprehensive otherwise, at least 1 still got to a grammar.
c) If the wealthy send their kids to a comp it will only be an Outstanding comp they have bought their kids admission to by buying a house in its catchment area, meaning there are well above average house prices for that catchment area. You buy a place at an Outstanding comp or academy much like you buy a place at private school effectively or else you go to church more regularly to get a vicar's reference for a top church school. I notice you did not send your kids to a sink school the bright but poor have little choice but to go to!
d) Sixth form entry for A levels and top university is fine for late developers
I am absolutely minted and our kids go to the local comp (it is an academy but most secondaries in London are). Rated good not outstanding. Plenty of other parents similar to us, judging from how posh some of our kids' friends talk. House prices are high it's true but that's more because they're nice houses. But half the housing in the catchment, I'm guessing, is social housing so it's far from true that most of the kids at the school have bought their way in somehow. Proportion of minorities and with English as an additional language much higher than average; those on pupil premium broadly average. If actual GCSE grades match the predictions after my eldest's mocks I'll be very happy, but let's see in June.
61% of Americans have had two shots - that’s still more than 100m unvaccinated.
He got booed yesterday for saying he was boostered.....
Not even the Donald is as zealous as his own fan base. I expect he won't have too much problems - just say it's everyone's free choice and repeat that he'll make mandates illegal.
FPT: TimT Posts: 4,808 8:04AM Philip_Thompson said: » show previous quotes But that's not common sense.
Yes you may want to highlight the detail of the worst case but you can't "forget about" the rest. That's not their choice to make.
If the models show things would probably be fine, but there's a worst case scenario where it's awful, then the politicians should get all that information.
If the models show things are definitely awful, and there's no positive scenario to show, then the politicians should get all that information.
If the modellers choose to disregard any scenarios that aren't catastrophic then there's no distinction between those two cases when there really should be!
What the politicians choose to do with the information is for them. But they should get the full oversight not just a cherry picked version.
In managing risks in conditions of ignorance, you can forget about the scenarios that require no action, as the default is no action. What you are concerned about is whether action needs to be taken, because a failure to take timely action is by its nature a fall back to the default of no action.
Thus, in conditions of ignorance and one or more scenarios that contain high consequence hazards* (not risks - we are avoiding numbers as we are in the zone of ignorance) that potentially would result in Never Events, you do just concentrate on those scenarios with such hazards and potential Never Event consequences.
* For those who don't know the vocabulary, a hazard is something that can cause harm, regardless of probability; and risk is a numerical calculation of probability x impact, which requires numerical values for both p and I
And yet in industry - where I have spent 30 years involved in risk management as part of exploration teams - you always include the scenarios which require no action. Indeed the whole basis of a risk matrix is that you try and reduce risks to the ALARP level by looking at what, if any, mitigations are necessary to counter potential hazards. Within in that you always include all possible hazards, even those which are already mitigated to effectively no risk to show that you have taken them into account.
By only including inputs which lead to the need for action you are forcing the decision makers to take action where it may not be necessary, or worse where the consequences of action are worse than the consequences of inaction.
Can't prove it without taking a deep dive - which I can't face with Christmas coming up - but my sense is that some people with strong anti-lockdown sentiments are being misled by a Fraser Nelson twitter thread, inc Fraser himself.
I would think the Sage/Govt process for Covid works in essence as follows: Outcomes for hospitalizations if we do nothing are projected, key variables being spread of cases and severity of disease, each of these outcomes with a probability, and this is used to decide if action is needed. If action IS needed, the mitigating impact of various measures is estimated and this is used to decide what to do. All then subject to the politics and the polls and the money.
Well you'd expect that to be the case. But the implication is that the bit about the 'probability of each case' is either missing or not based on the evidence we have. I don't know if that's actually the case.
I've read the Fraser Nelson twitter thread and I sense it's cross purposes between expert and layman. In essence I think the process goes like this - They model what happens with no action. If the worst realistic outcome is livable with it drives a decision of no action. Otherwise it's refine and focus on what best to do.
On Omi the problem is the uncertainty - ie big spread between best case and worst case - combined with the speed it's moving. Meaning if they don't act while still in the semi dark, by the time the lights come on it will be to illuminate a horror show.
But fwiw I still think no lockdown or if there is one it'll be 4 weeks max.
It is incorrect to say they modelled the best and worst outcome of a “no change” decision. The model produced a range of outcomes associated with a “no change” decision. But they were a range of outcome based on provided inputs (no reduction in severity etc). They didn’t have the scope to explore more optimistic inputs and therefor more optimistic and quite plausible outcomes.
Ministers were essentially presented with the case for restrictions with their hands tied as there had no ability (through competing costed models) to weigh up the competing downsides of imposing highly costly preventative measures for an unquantified risk which might not materialise. This is very different to seeing worst case models and only putting in place plans for expensive mitigation once data on the inputs could be confirmed in the real world.
They modeled what happens with no action and generate a range of outcomes, the headline ones being best and central and worst (realistic) cases. The main problem for the decision makers is the uncertainty around the key variables of spread & severity for omi in the UK; and the biggest problem they have is how fast it's spreading. It means if they wait for clarity it might then - if it turns out on the less optimistic side - be either too late to act or be necessary to act stronger and longer than if they'd acted earlier. This is the nub of it. That Fraser Nelson thing is a sideshow.
It boggles the mind that more than seven years after Russia annexed Crimea and fought in eastern Ukraine that so little has been done to free central and eastern Europe from a dependence on Russian gas.
It’s worse than just that. Led by the Germans shutting nuclear plants down, they’ve actively increased their reliance on Russian gas in the past few years.
Wait until January, when Putin goes into Ukraine properly - while simultaneously threatening Europe with cutting the gas supply if they retaliate.
The proponents of grammar schools could usefully ask themselves a simple question. Why haven't the Tories, who have been in power since 2010, done anything to bring them back - and the 2019 government hasn't even mentioned them (as far as I know)?
The answer is dead simple. They've seen the actual evidence. That evidence shows that grammar schools are a brake on social mobility, not an accelerant to it. And the kids who go to grammar schools (currently and previously) do just as well if they go to comprehensive schools. If the evidence was there that grammar schools were the answer, don't you think Cameron, May and Johnson would have agreed with you and set about restoring them?
While normally I claim no authority on anything whatsoever, on this one I know what I'm talking about, having had a career largely based on studying the complexity of educational outcomes.
That's all very well, but it rests on the assumption that the Tory's want to do the right thing - increase social mobility. Surely the standard narrative on the baby eaters is that they haven't brought back grammar schools precisely because they know that would increase social mobility?
The proponents of grammar schools could usefully ask themselves a simple question. Why haven't the Tories, who have been in power since 2010, done anything to bring them back - and the 2019 government hasn't even mentioned them (as far as I know)?
The answer is dead simple. They've seen the actual evidence. That evidence shows that grammar schools are a brake on social mobility, not an accelerant to it. And the kids who go to grammar schools (currently and previously) do just as well if they go to comprehensive schools. If the evidence was there that grammar schools were the answer, don't you think Cameron, May and Johnson would have agreed with you and set about restoring them?
While normally I claim no authority on anything whatsoever, on this one I know what I'm talking about, having had a career largely based on studying the complexity of educational outcomes.
That's all very well, but it rests on the assumption that the Tory's want to do the right thing - increase social mobility. Surely the standard narrative on the baby eaters is that they haven't brought back grammar schools precisely because they know that would increase social mobility?
In which case, Labour should be in favour of expanding grammar schools - but they’ve managed to confuse equality of opportunity with equity of outcome, so now think everyone should go to the ‘bog-standard comprehensive’.
On topic, when the ratings go this negative then there is usually no comeback.
I suspect Boris Johnson will be safe until May's elections, the last time they were held it was a tie between Labour and the Tories, Any Lab lead in NESV should lead to Tory losses, the bigger the lead, the more losses.
I suspect the Lib Dems may also help create a carnage for the blue meanies.
Haven't you just rejoined the party you are calling meanies?
I've been calling them the Blue Meanies for years, as a joke at the expense of lefties who think Tories are evil and that Labour have a higher moral purpose.
ooh, have you rejoined the Tories Eagles? Presumably because you have a view on Boris's successor - who do you favour?
Tories Eagles sounds like the rejected pilot version of Charlie's Angels...
It boggles the mind that more than seven years after Russia annexed Crimea and fought in eastern Ukraine that so little has been done to free central and eastern Europe from a dependence on Russian gas.
It’s worse than just that. Led by the Germans shutting nuclear plants down, they’ve actively increased their reliance on Russian gas in the past few years.
Wait until January, when Putin goes into Ukraine properly - while simultaneously threatening Europe with cutting the gas supply if they retaliate.
That was probably the most bizarre reaction of the Fukushima disaster. Germany, renowned for its earthquakes and tidal waves.
On topic, when the ratings go this negative then there is usually no comeback.
I suspect Boris Johnson will be safe until May's elections, the last time they were held it was a tie between Labour and the Tories, Any Lab lead in NESV should lead to Tory losses, the bigger the lead, the more losses.
I suspect the Lib Dems may also help create a carnage for the blue meanies.
Unless something changes I think you are spot on
Yesterday's refusal to lockdown may be the change.
There's a high possibility this Omicron wave will wash over us with vaccines and prior immunity from opening in the Summer working.
Meanwhile there's a real risk that the USA, Germany and others could be in serious danger. The Netherlands are already back in lockdown.
If this wave is a damp squib, people can have Christmas and there's no January lockdown ... And if the news instead is showing how bad things are in the rest of the world, then the Government just might deserve and get some credit.
Though I suspect even if that happens, they won't be given credit anyway.
"Stay at home as much as possible" "Minimise Hogmanay socialising" "Hogmanay party cancelled in Edinburgh" "No evidence omichron is less deadly" "3 weeks no spectator sports" "No casual sports" "3 weeks only table service, 1m distancing"
No evidence Omicron is less severe?????????
Careful use of 'deadly' rather than 'severe'? Bit early for much evidence on deaths (although less severe implies fewer deaths, it is possible, albeit unlikely, that you could have fewer hospitalised but a similar death rate)
The infection mechanism seems to imply significantly lower severity as well.
That's not to say it's conclusive, but surely another bit of evidence that Omicron may not be as bad as we fear.
Yep, I'm speculating it was a cute choice of words to say something that is arguably true (even though unlikely) given the emerging evidence on severity. (If it's a quote, then "no evidence omicron less severe" would be hard to defend by now)
My booster jab text reminder said "get your life-saving booster jab..."
I am presuming that is a nudge team / behavioural insight idea.
LOLs, not sure that is subtle enough to qualify as a 'nudge'
For those interested, here is a link to the decision-making model for decision-making method use in civil aviation, that I found online:
It is right up the alley of the sort of things the nudge team did / do, where isn't necessary about being subtle, it is around the right use of language. Using the term life saving versus not, I bet has a decent impact on no-shows.
Sorry, did not realize that the 'nudge team' was an actual group. Had just thought you were using 'nudge' in the sense that Sunstein and Thaler do in their book, "Nudge"
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most wealthy parents did not send their children to secondary moderns and do not send their children to comprehensives and certainly not comprehensives or academies which are any less than Outstanding. So the rich generally don't use comprehensives anyway while the bright but poor no longer have the opportunities grammars provided. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
a) You can tutor for IQ tests very easily. Not sure where you got it that it was difficult. There are lots of techniques.
b) In between our posts I have been chopping wood and did a rough mental calculation of how many should have got into the grammar school from my village all other things being equal (I know how many classes there were, the size of them, the fact that our village was a 3 member ward and how many councillors there were in the borough). The answer is about 25. There was 1 and he dropped out. If that doesn't give you an idea of the disparity between poor and middle class areas nothing will.
c) If you think the well off don't send their children to Comprehensives you live in a different world. I live in a well off area now. I am wealthy by most peoples measure as are most of the people I know. Nearly all use the local comprehensive, which I grant you is good, but that is not what you were saying.
d) Moving to a Grammar at sixth form is too late. The damage has been done. Many won't go who should. Many who were at the Grammar who shouldn't have been have dropped out.
Select by subject on an ongoing basis throughout the child's education.
a) You can't. IQ test results are in part based on genetics, they are difficult to tutor for unlike subject knowledge based exams.
b) And all of them would likely have gone to a sink comprehensive otherwise, at least 1 still got to a grammar.
c) If the wealthy send their kids to a comp it will only be an Outstanding comp they have bought their kids admission to by buying a house in its catchment area, meaning there are well above average house prices for that catchment area. You buy a place at an Outstanding comp or academy much like you buy a place at private school effectively or else you go to church more regularly to get a vicar's reference for a top church school. I notice you did not send your kids to a sink school the bright but poor have little choice but to go to!
d) Sixth form entry for A levels and top university is fine for late developers
I am absolutely minted and our kids go to the local comp (it is an academy but most secondaries in London are). Rated good not outstanding. Plenty of other parents similar to us, judging from how posh some of our kids' friends talk. House prices are high it's true but that's more because they're nice houses. But half the housing in the catchment, I'm guessing, is social housing so it's far from true that most of the kids at the school have bought their way in somehow. Proportion of minorities and with English as an additional language much higher than average; those on pupil premium broadly average. If actual GCSE grades match the predictions after my eldest's mocks I'll be very happy, but let's see in June.
The very best of luck (although it won't be luck) to your eldest. Sounds like an excellent start in life!
Plenty of morons go to private school and have a lot more success than they deserve, see Boris Johnson
In fairness that is also true of comprehensive school children as well. Look at Liz Truss.
Liz Truss would be our first ever PM solely educated at a comprehensive school for her secondary education, however she would then have to beat the grammar and private school educated Starmer. Historically, the odds would favour Starmer
So would sanity... Edit - incidentally does anyone know if Corbyn was a day boy or a boarder at Adam's Grammar?
What's your issue with Truss?
Bluntly, she always comes across as a tad unbalanced. Able, but not shrewd. Determined, but also rather reckless. Passionate, but not always nuanced.
A tad unbalanced .... well, Liz was President of the Oxford University LibDems 🤣
A tad unbalanced....? So the same as Johnson but not quite so much.... A bit more moderate, you would say....
Some more positive indications on omicron with an Austrlian epidemiologist suggesting 10-50% of the virulence of delta, without boosters being added in.
I see Labour says it should have been announced last week. Makes you wonder why they didn’t demand it at the time
I think they are trying hard not to play politics on Covid related matters especially urgent ones regarding lockdowns. Which is a stand I don't think many people seem to grasp or care about.
“Playing politics” would be voting against the measure to embarrass Boris when they actually support the measure
Saying “we think there needs to be support for hospitality and we won’t support unless there is” isn’t playing politics (well it might be, but it is also a legitimate position to hold)
Some more positive indications on omicron with an Austrlian epidemiologist suggesting 10-50% of the virulence of delta, without boosters being added in.
The proponents of grammar schools could usefully ask themselves a simple question. Why haven't the Tories, who have been in power since 2010, done anything to bring them back - and the 2019 government hasn't even mentioned them (as far as I know)?
The answer is dead simple. They've seen the actual evidence. That evidence shows that grammar schools are a brake on social mobility, not an accelerant to it. And the kids who go to grammar schools (currently and previously) do just as well if they go to comprehensive schools. If the evidence was there that grammar schools were the answer, don't you think Cameron, May and Johnson would have agreed with you and set about restoring them?
While normally I claim no authority on anything whatsoever, on this one I know what I'm talking about, having had a career largely based on studying the complexity of educational outcomes.
That's all very well, but it rests on the assumption that the Tory's want to do the right thing - increase social mobility. Surely the standard narrative on the baby eaters is that they haven't brought back grammar schools precisely because they know that would increase social mobility?
In which case, Labour should be in favour of expanding grammar schools - but they’ve managed to confuse equality of opportunity with equity of outcome, so now think everyone should go to the ‘bog-standard comprehensive’.
As a product of a bog standard comprehensive, I must admit I can't get my head around all this
The proponents of grammar schools could usefully ask themselves a simple question. Why haven't the Tories, who have been in power since 2010, done anything to bring them back - and the 2019 government hasn't even mentioned them (as far as I know)?
The answer is dead simple. They've seen the actual evidence. That evidence shows that grammar schools are a brake on social mobility, not an accelerant to it. And the kids who go to grammar schools (currently and previously) do just as well if they go to comprehensive schools. If the evidence was there that grammar schools were the answer, don't you think Cameron, May and Johnson would have agreed with you and set about restoring them?
While normally I claim no authority on anything whatsoever, on this one I know what I'm talking about, having had a career largely based on studying the complexity of educational outcomes.
That's all very well, but it rests on the assumption that the Tory's want to do the right thing - increase social mobility. Surely the standard narrative on the baby eaters is that they haven't brought back grammar schools precisely because they know that would increase social mobility?
In which case, Labour should be in favour of expanding grammar schools - but they’ve managed to confuse equality of opportunity with equity of outcome, so now think everyone should go to the ‘bog-standard comprehensive’.
When Labour were in power the secondary schools were told to "specialise" in something to ensure there was a reason for choosing a particular secondary school.
"Stay at home as much as possible" "Minimise Hogmanay socialising" "Hogmanay party cancelled in Edinburgh" "No evidence omichron is less deadly" "3 weeks no spectator sports" "No casual sports" "3 weeks only table service, 1m distancing"
No evidence Omicron is less severe?????????
Careful use of 'deadly' rather than 'severe'? Bit early for much evidence on deaths (although less severe implies fewer deaths, it is possible, albeit unlikely, that you could have fewer hospitalised but a similar death rate)
The infection mechanism seems to imply significantly lower severity as well.
That's not to say it's conclusive, but surely another bit of evidence that Omicron may not be as bad as we fear.
Yep, I'm speculating it was a cute choice of words to say something that is arguably true (even though unlikely) given the emerging evidence on severity. (If it's a quote, then "no evidence omicron less severe" would be hard to defend by now)
My booster jab text reminder said "get your life-saving booster jab..."
I am presuming that is a nudge team / behavioural insight idea.
LOLs, not sure that is subtle enough to qualify as a 'nudge'
For those interested, here is a link to the decision-making model for decision-making method use in civil aviation, that I found online:
It is right up the alley of the sort of things the nudge team did / do, where isn't necessary about being subtle, it is around the right use of language. Using the term life saving versus not, I bet has a decent impact on no-shows.
Sorry, did not realize that the 'nudge team' was an actual group. Had just thought you were using 'nudge' in the sense that Sunstein and Thaler do in their book, "Nudge"
It was something Cameron did (to be fair I think Gordon was looking at doing this), where he had this dedicated Behavioural Insight Team located at the heart of decision making. They did loads of really interesting things that got no real credit for.
Unfortunately the guys involved have now spun it off into a consultancy and i think they do still do projects for the government, it isn't at the heart of things anymore. And May / Boris don't seem to be really that interested in what can be incredibly powerful and cost effective approach to public policy tweaks.
He is there for two purposes: 1) To Get Brexit Done. That's done. Tick. Leave the details to someone else. 2) Keep Corbyn out. Tick. done.
Following that, there's levelling up. But that's rather more complex, and somewhat tricky for a man who doesn't like detail. So Boris has said 'levelling up' many times and even appointed a minister for it. So that's done. Tick.
Some more positive indications on omicron with an Austrlian epidemiologist suggesting 10-50% of the virulence of delta, without boosters being added in.
The proponents of grammar schools could usefully ask themselves a simple question. Why haven't the Tories, who have been in power since 2010, done anything to bring them back - and the 2019 government hasn't even mentioned them (as far as I know)?
The answer is dead simple. They've seen the actual evidence. That evidence shows that grammar schools are a brake on social mobility, not an accelerant to it. And the kids who go to grammar schools (currently and previously) do just as well if they go to comprehensive schools. If the evidence was there that grammar schools were the answer, don't you think Cameron, May and Johnson would have agreed with you and set about restoring them?
While normally I claim no authority on anything whatsoever, on this one I know what I'm talking about, having had a career largely based on studying the complexity of educational outcomes.
Great post, enjoy your well-deserved pint. I suspect the other reason the Tories haven't gone for it is that actually expanding the numbers of secondary moderns isn't popular. Most parents want better schools all round, not further division into good schools and bad ones with the massive pall of worry, and quite possibly expense, cast by the 11-plus.
Plenty of morons go to private school and have a lot more success than they deserve, see Boris Johnson
So they need ex grammar school pupils like Sir Keir Starmer to remove them?
Keir Starmer is not proposing to remove private schools. The charitable status should clearly be removed, they are businesses like any other.
We need to make state schools better, not go around banning things
My alma mater isn’t a business. It makes no profit, with any surplus invested into charitable activities, shares its facilities and teachers with the local community and the nation, algae invested heavily in academy schools and has recently transferred 100 years worth of savings to support broader educational charities.
On topic, when the ratings go this negative then there is usually no comeback.
I suspect Boris Johnson will be safe until May's elections, the last time they were held it was a tie between Labour and the Tories, Any Lab lead in NESV should lead to Tory losses, the bigger the lead, the more losses.
I suspect the Lib Dems may also help create a carnage for the blue meanies.
Unless something changes I think you are spot on
Yesterday's refusal to lockdown may be the change.
There's a high possibility this Omicron wave will wash over us with vaccines and prior immunity from opening in the Summer working.
Meanwhile there's a real risk that the USA, Germany and others could be in serious danger. The Netherlands are already back in lockdown.
If this wave is a damp squib, people can have Christmas and there's no January lockdown ... And if the news instead is showing how bad things are in the rest of the world, then the Government just might deserve and get some credit.
Though I suspect even if that happens, they won't be given credit anyway.
And if the scientific consensus is right and the denialists are wrong ...
"Stay at home as much as possible" "Minimise Hogmanay socialising" "Hogmanay party cancelled in Edinburgh" "No evidence omichron is less deadly" "3 weeks no spectator sports" "No casual sports" "3 weeks only table service, 1m distancing"
No evidence Omicron is less severe?????????
Careful use of 'deadly' rather than 'severe'? Bit early for much evidence on deaths (although less severe implies fewer deaths, it is possible, albeit unlikely, that you could have fewer hospitalised but a similar death rate)
The infection mechanism seems to imply significantly lower severity as well.
That's not to say it's conclusive, but surely another bit of evidence that Omicron may not be as bad as we fear.
Yep, I'm speculating it was a cute choice of words to say something that is arguably true (even though unlikely) given the emerging evidence on severity. (If it's a quote, then "no evidence omicron less severe" would be hard to defend by now)
My booster jab text reminder said "get your life-saving booster jab..."
I am presuming that is a nudge team / behavioural insight idea.
LOLs, not sure that is subtle enough to qualify as a 'nudge'
For those interested, here is a link to the decision-making model for decision-making method use in civil aviation, that I found online:
It is right up the alley of the sort of things the nudge team did / do, where isn't necessary about being subtle, it is around the right use of language. Using the term life saving versus not, I bet has a decent impact on no-shows.
Sorry, did not realize that the 'nudge team' was an actual group. Had just thought you were using 'nudge' in the sense that Sunstein and Thaler do in their book, "Nudge"
They are more formally the Behavioural Insights Team, set up in the Cabinet Office in 2010 by Cameron, with the idea that good messaging can influence behaviour much better than legislation or confrontation.
The proponents of grammar schools could usefully ask themselves a simple question. Why haven't the Tories, who have been in power since 2010, done anything to bring them back - and the 2019 government hasn't even mentioned them (as far as I know)?
The answer is dead simple. They've seen the actual evidence. That evidence shows that grammar schools are a brake on social mobility, not an accelerant to it. And the kids who go to grammar schools (currently and previously) do just as well if they go to comprehensive schools. If the evidence was there that grammar schools were the answer, don't you think Cameron, May and Johnson would have agreed with you and set about restoring them?
While normally I claim no authority on anything whatsoever, on this one I know what I'm talking about, having had a career largely based on studying the complexity of educational outcomes.
That's all very well, but it rests on the assumption that the Tory's want to do the right thing - increase social mobility. Surely the standard narrative on the baby eaters is that they haven't brought back grammar schools precisely because they know that would increase social mobility?
In which case, Labour should be in favour of expanding grammar schools - but they’ve managed to confuse equality of opportunity with equity of outcome, so now think everyone should go to the ‘bog-standard comprehensive’.
When Labour were in power the secondary schools were told to "specialise" in something to ensure there was a reason for choosing a particular secondary school.
Gove got rid of all that.
It was a bloody stupid idea, particularly for the large number of people living where there is really no choice of secondary school because of travel considerations.
"Stay at home as much as possible" "Minimise Hogmanay socialising" "Hogmanay party cancelled in Edinburgh" "No evidence omichron is less deadly" "3 weeks no spectator sports" "No casual sports" "3 weeks only table service, 1m distancing"
No evidence Omicron is less severe?????????
Careful use of 'deadly' rather than 'severe'? Bit early for much evidence on deaths (although less severe implies fewer deaths, it is possible, albeit unlikely, that you could have fewer hospitalised but a similar death rate)
The infection mechanism seems to imply significantly lower severity as well.
That's not to say it's conclusive, but surely another bit of evidence that Omicron may not be as bad as we fear.
Yep, I'm speculating it was a cute choice of words to say something that is arguably true (even though unlikely) given the emerging evidence on severity. (If it's a quote, then "no evidence omicron less severe" would be hard to defend by now)
My booster jab text reminder said "get your life-saving booster jab..."
I am presuming that is a nudge team / behavioural insight idea.
LOLs, not sure that is subtle enough to qualify as a 'nudge'
For those interested, here is a link to the decision-making model for decision-making method use in civil aviation, that I found online:
It is right up the alley of the sort of things the nudge team did / do, where isn't necessary about being subtle, it is around the right use of language. Using the term life saving versus not, I bet has a decent impact on no-shows.
Sorry, did not realize that the 'nudge team' was an actual group. Had just thought you were using 'nudge' in the sense that Sunstein and Thaler do in their book, "Nudge"
I always imagine they spend their time going "Smile smile say no more."
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
Um no there isn't - otherwise you wouldn't see the disparity you get between KS2 stats and Grammar school selection in places like Kent and Buckingshire.
All schools will have a yearly example where the intelligent child whose parents couldn't afford test tuition fails to get in.
What disparity? The key stat is how many high performers at KS2 as a percentage of intake get top grade A levels and places at Russell Group universities at grammars compared to at comprehensives
The point is, the poor oiks don't get into the grammar school to compete with the rich children. That's a feature not a bug.
Utter rubbish. Plenty of bright but poor kids go to grammars, plenty of rich but thick kids go to Stowe
Not enough though.
For a different example - the Buckinghamshire Grammar schools are now Academic Trusts which mean that when I travel from my Parents into London I see 200 or so pupils traveling from outside Bucks to Dominic Raab's (and my) old school
Those parents are paying £1000 or so a year on train fares to get their children into their preferred school while stealing the place of someone local.
Aylesbury grammar school admissions policy for example is:
'Where qualifying applications for admission exceed the number of places available, places will be allocated in the following order of priority: 5.1.1. Looked after boys and previously looked after boys . 1 2 5.1.2. Boys who are eligible for free school meals as at the application deadline. 3 5.1.3. Siblings of boys who will be on roll of Aylesbury Grammar School at the date of the 4 applicant boy's entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.4. Siblings (as defined above) of girls who will be on roll of Aylesbury High School at the date of the applicant boy's entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.5. Siblings (as defined above) of boys who have previously been on the roll of Aylesbury Grammar School. 1 A 'looked after boy' is a boy who is in the care of a local authority, or being provided with accommodation by a local authority in the exercise of their social services functions. 2 A 'previously looked after boy' is a boy who was looked after, but ceased to be so because they were adopted or became subject to a child arrangements order or special guardianship order. 3 For the purposes of this policy, entitlement to Free School Meals on 31 October in the year before entry to Year 7 is sought needs to be demonstrated. 4 A 'sibling' is a full brother (sharing both parents), half-brother (sharing one parent), adopted brother (sharing one or both parents), foster brother, or step brother (where one's parent is married to the other's parent) and the son of the cohabiting partner of the applicant boy's parent, and in all cases who permanently live at the applicant boy's home address (as defined by this policy) and are being brought up as part of the same core family unit as siblings. For the avoidance of doubt, the sons of extended family members (e.g. cousins) and friends will not be 'siblings' for the purpose of this policy, even where they permanently live at the same home address as the applicant boy. Page 3 5.1.6. Boys who have exceptional medical or social needs which can only be met at Aylesbury Grammar School, and no other school, where their application for admission is supported by written evidence from a doctor, social worker, educational welfare officer or other appropriately qualified person confirming this. 5.1.7. Boys living in the catchment area of the school as at and continuously from 31 October of the year preceding entry to Year 7 in September. 5.1.8. All other boys'
That's a bog standard admissions policy - and incredibly easy to game.
Also Aylesbury isn't the schools I know about - try those in Chesham, Amersham, High Wycombe and Beaconsfield all of whom are the closest Grammar schools to none Grammar school areas.
Although it's nice to see you doing some research even though you clearly don't know the Geography well enough to see the flaw within it.
You also miss the fact that where qualifying admissions are above the intake - this is the logic we use.
That stops the local child with 89% getting in (due to him being ill on the day of the single exam that is now used) while the distant child with 90% gets in as the out of area child take the pass mark up a single point.
All of them will still prioritise those in the catchment area who pass their entrance exam first before opening places to those who pass the exam outside their catchment area until they are full
And again you miss the point.
The child with 89% no longer has a place in that Grammar school because the out of area children scored 90% and pushed the pass mark / entry mark to 90% rather than 89%.
No, I don't think that's right. In Sale, for example, Sale Grammar School sets the pass mark. Anyone who passes the pass mark from within the catchment area (which is either Sale and Altrincham or the whole of Trafford, I forget which) is offered a place. Remaining places are then made up from applicants from out of cathcment.
In practice, I believe about one third of pupils are from out of catchment (though this belies the experience of my daughter who has just started there, who appears to have met hardly anyone not from Sale or Altrincham). Now this is a bit of a nuisance for Trafford as a whole, which is woefully squeezed on secondary school places. They could address this at a stroke simply by lowering the pass mark, which would mean more pupils from within Trafford get places, which would mean fewer from outside of Trafford (no matter how well they score). But that's a separate issue: the point is no matter how well someone from outside of the catchment area does, they can't displace a sufficiently good person within the catchment. Someone who passes the pass mark - which is known in advance - and is from within catchment - will get in.
Edit: of course, that's just here! Things may differ elsewhere.
That is the way it is in Lincolnshire as well. Kids in the Catchment area get first choice so long as they passed. Indeed where I am there is a choice of 3 different Grammars. Only once those places have been filled does anyone from outside the catchment area get a chance.
Yes, there is a choice of grammars here too.
Though as I was saying elsewhere, I would rather that the pass rate was lower so kids from Trafford didn't get pushed out by kids from Manchester and Cheshire East. Competition is fierce here: there are thousands and thousands of out-of-authority kids within travel to school distance of Trafford schools. Parents from Manchester and Cheshire East: if you want a grammar school education, live in a selective authority!
Or - radical idea - lets not have selective education. Binned off your life chances aged 11 by means of quotas is not the risk that any parent should want for their child. And what happens as the bright kids who just missed the cut get brighter? In a normal school ability is streamed and you can move up and down. You can't get promoted to Grammar School...
That's not absolutely true, since some grammars do have outside entry to the 6th form. Though in reality, a good 6th form college might well be a better option.
"Stay at home as much as possible" "Minimise Hogmanay socialising" "Hogmanay party cancelled in Edinburgh" "No evidence omichron is less deadly" "3 weeks no spectator sports" "No casual sports" "3 weeks only table service, 1m distancing"
No evidence Omicron is less severe?????????
Careful use of 'deadly' rather than 'severe'? Bit early for much evidence on deaths (although less severe implies fewer deaths, it is possible, albeit unlikely, that you could have fewer hospitalised but a similar death rate)
The infection mechanism seems to imply significantly lower severity as well.
That's not to say it's conclusive, but surely another bit of evidence that Omicron may not be as bad as we fear.
Yep, I'm speculating it was a cute choice of words to say something that is arguably true (even though unlikely) given the emerging evidence on severity. (If it's a quote, then "no evidence omicron less severe" would be hard to defend by now)
My booster jab text reminder said "get your life-saving booster jab..."
I am presuming that is a nudge team / behavioural insight idea.
LOLs, not sure that is subtle enough to qualify as a 'nudge'
For those interested, here is a link to the decision-making model for decision-making method use in civil aviation, that I found online:
It is right up the alley of the sort of things the nudge team did / do, where isn't necessary about being subtle, it is around the right use of language. Using the term life saving versus not, I bet has a decent impact on no-shows.
Sorry, did not realize that the 'nudge team' was an actual group. Had just thought you were using 'nudge' in the sense that Sunstein and Thaler do in their book, "Nudge"
I heard Thaler interviewed a couple of months ago. What a miserable sod.....and not very nudge about vaccines...it was basically they should be mandated across society and lock up the bastards that refuse.
On topic, when the ratings go this negative then there is usually no comeback.
I suspect Boris Johnson will be safe until May's elections, the last time they were held it was a tie between Labour and the Tories, Any Lab lead in NESV should lead to Tory losses, the bigger the lead, the more losses.
I suspect the Lib Dems may also help create a carnage for the blue meanies.
Unless something changes I think you are spot on
Yesterday's refusal to lockdown may be the change.
There's a high possibility this Omicron wave will wash over us with vaccines and prior immunity from opening in the Summer working.
Meanwhile there's a real risk that the USA, Germany and others could be in serious danger. The Netherlands are already back in lockdown.
If this wave is a damp squib, people can have Christmas and there's no January lockdown ... And if the news instead is showing how bad things are in the rest of the world, then the Government just might deserve and get some credit.
Though I suspect even if that happens, they won't be given credit anyway.
No they won't, because they have done enough to piss the people off anyway with plan B. But the flip side to your 'if' is IF the NHS does fall over they will be blamed for not doing enough. So really Johnson has a lose, or lose bigger hand.
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most wealthy parents did not send their children to secondary moderns and do not send their children to comprehensives and certainly not comprehensives or academies which are any less than Outstanding. So the rich generally don't use comprehensives anyway while the bright but poor no longer have the opportunities grammars provided. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
a) You can tutor for IQ tests very easily. Not sure where you got it that it was difficult. There are lots of techniques.
b) In between our posts I have been chopping wood and did a rough mental calculation of how many should have got into the grammar school from my village all other things being equal (I know how many classes there were, the size of them, the fact that our village was a 3 member ward and how many councillors there were in the borough). The answer is about 25. There was 1 and he dropped out. If that doesn't give you an idea of the disparity between poor and middle class areas nothing will.
c) If you think the well off don't send their children to Comprehensives you live in a different world. I live in a well off area now. I am wealthy by most peoples measure as are most of the people I know. Nearly all use the local comprehensive, which I grant you is good, but that is not what you were saying.
d) Moving to a Grammar at sixth form is too late. The damage has been done. Many won't go who should. Many who were at the Grammar who shouldn't have been have dropped out.
Select by subject on an ongoing basis throughout the child's education.
a) You can't. IQ test results are in part based on genetics, they are difficult to tutor for unlike subject knowledge based exams.
b) And all of them would likely have gone to a sink comprehensive otherwise, at least 1 still got to a grammar.
c) If the wealthy send their kids to a comp it will only be an Outstanding comp they have bought their kids admission to by buying a house in its catchment area, meaning there are well above average house prices for that catchment area. You buy a place at an Outstanding comp or academy much like you buy a place at private school effectively or else you go to church more regularly to get a vicar's reference for a top church school.
d) Sixth form entry for A levels and top university is fine for late developers
a) you can - just allowing children to sit a few past papers so they understand how the questions work allows children to know how to answer the questions quicker allowing them more time to concentrate on more difficult questions.
You can understand the format of the questions but it is harder to prepare for the specific questions that will come up as they are logic and reasoning based, not subject knowledge based which are more tests of memory
As someone who has got 3 of 4 children into local grammars and sent the other private, I can confirm HYUFD doesn't know what he's talking about here, as well as constantly missing the point.
Tutoring makes a massive difference to ability to tackle the 11+. You see it all the time with kids that got tutored and then struggle to keep up once they're in.
It may make a marginal difference to borderline candidates but if you have an iq of 130+ you will get into a grammar school with no tutoring at all even if you live on a council estate
Is anybody going to stick there neck out and predict todays UK Case numbers?
The case numbers will make headlines, but it's the London hospital numbers that will make destiny.
I wonder what the threshold for action they've set on the London hospital admissions. We expect them to continue up, but how high would they conclude was problematic?
On topic, when the ratings go this negative then there is usually no comeback.
I suspect Boris Johnson will be safe until May's elections, the last time they were held it was a tie between Labour and the Tories, Any Lab lead in NESV should lead to Tory losses, the bigger the lead, the more losses.
I suspect the Lib Dems may also help create a carnage for the blue meanies.
Unless something changes I think you are spot on
Yesterday's refusal to lockdown may be the change.
There's a high possibility this Omicron wave will wash over us with vaccines and prior immunity from opening in the Summer working.
Meanwhile there's a real risk that the USA, Germany and others could be in serious danger. The Netherlands are already back in lockdown.
If this wave is a damp squib, people can have Christmas and there's no January lockdown ... And if the news instead is showing how bad things are in the rest of the world, then the Government just might deserve and get some credit.
Though I suspect even if that happens, they won't be given credit anyway.
And if the scientific consensus is right and the denialists are wrong ...
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most wealthy parents did not send their children to secondary moderns and do not send their children to comprehensives and certainly not comprehensives or academies which are any less than Outstanding. So the rich generally don't use comprehensives anyway while the bright but poor no longer have the opportunities grammars provided. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
a) You can tutor for IQ tests very easily. Not sure where you got it that it was difficult. There are lots of techniques.
b) In between our posts I have been chopping wood and did a rough mental calculation of how many should have got into the grammar school from my village all other things being equal (I know how many classes there were, the size of them, the fact that our village was a 3 member ward and how many councillors there were in the borough). The answer is about 25. There was 1 and he dropped out. If that doesn't give you an idea of the disparity between poor and middle class areas nothing will.
c) If you think the well off don't send their children to Comprehensives you live in a different world. I live in a well off area now. I am wealthy by most peoples measure as are most of the people I know. Nearly all use the local comprehensive, which I grant you is good, but that is not what you were saying.
d) Moving to a Grammar at sixth form is too late. The damage has been done. Many won't go who should. Many who were at the Grammar who shouldn't have been have dropped out.
Select by subject on an ongoing basis throughout the child's education.
a) You can't. IQ test results are in part based on genetics, they are difficult to tutor for unlike subject knowledge based exams.
b) And all of them would likely have gone to a sink comprehensive otherwise, at least 1 still got to a grammar.
c) If the wealthy send their kids to a comp it will only be an Outstanding comp they have bought their kids admission to by buying a house in its catchment area, meaning there are well above average house prices for that catchment area. You buy a place at an Outstanding comp or academy much like you buy a place at private school effectively or else you go to church more regularly to get a vicar's reference for a top church school. I notice you did not send your kids to a sink school the bright but poor have little choice but to go to!
d) Sixth form entry for A levels and top university is fine for late developers
I am absolutely minted and our kids go to the local comp (it is an academy but most secondaries in London are). Rated good not outstanding. Plenty of other parents similar to us, judging from how posh some of our kids' friends talk. House prices are high it's true but that's more because they're nice houses. But half the housing in the catchment, I'm guessing, is social housing so it's far from true that most of the kids at the school have bought their way in somehow. Proportion of minorities and with English as an additional language much higher than average; those on pupil premium broadly average. If actual GCSE grades match the predictions after my eldest's mocks I'll be very happy, but let's see in June.
The very best of luck (although it won't be luck) to your eldest. Sounds like an excellent start in life!
Thanks OKC, that's really kind. Our eldest is extremely clever and also very motivated and hard working - a dream pupil for any school really - so in my opinion if she doesn't do well it will certainly be a reflection on the school (and on us for sending her there!) - but so far so good. 🤞
Covid is a Corbynista's dream to control everyone's lives and perfect for that close friend of Jeremy Corbyn, Mark Drakeford
I understand the precautionary principle on this variant but I think we need to take a step back and reflect a bit.
We have no solid evidence that this is going to cause us a significant issue, though there is a chance. Strong guidance to give the Government/NHS/SAGE time to react seems sensible, and people have taken that on board.
Fining people for expressing basic freedoms over a 'maybe' is too far. At this point in the pandemic there has to be some red lines which you cross only when you're 90% sure.
Some excellent post on the last thread guys. I mean really good.
Re poor Comprehensives in deprived areas I agree, but this is probably a lot more to do with the issues of the area than anything else. The answer certainly isn't going back to Secondary Moderns.
I see @HYUFD is continuing to compare stats on Grammar schools to Comprehensives and ignoring the samples are completely different because the Grammar has selected.
If you lived in a deprived area 50 years ago you could go to a grammar school if intelligent.
Now your only choice would be a comprehensive likely to be a secondary modern in all but name if you do not have wealthy parents who can send you to private school
That doesn't answer the point.
It does. Unless you live in a wealthy suburb or rural area (or go to a comprehensive or academy where admission is based on church attendance) comprehensives are often just renamed secondary moderns effectively.
@MikeSmithson is correct. It doesn't answer the point. As usual you just raise another point and don't address the point raised. It is a moving target.
Re your point on living in a poor area and being able to go to a grammar, this is very naïve. What actually happens is the middle class and well off in surrounding areas get tutored for the test and fill the spaces. The bright kids in the poor areas don't and they still don't get in by and large.
I lived in a relatively poor large village with 2 primary schools. Only one boy got into the boys grammar school and no girls to the girls grammar school. And that boy dropped out. I have no memory of even taking a test let alone getting tutored. After O levels a whole bunch of replaced those that had dropped out. The system is crap at selection and selecting at 11 is far too soon.
There are limits on how much you can tutor for 11+ and 13+ tests which are designed to test raw iq not subject knowledge as such. Indeed very often even a few bright kids from council estates got into grammar schools even without tutors and then onto Oxbridge or other top universities and professional careers. That path is not open to them to the same extent now if they live in a deprived area and just get sent to the local very average, if that, comp.
If you were well off and had a kid who was not so bright and would not pass the 11 or 13+ you could still send them private however and still do. Most wealthy parents did not send their children to secondary moderns and do not send their children to comprehensives and certainly not comprehensives or academies which are any less than Outstanding. So the rich generally don't use comprehensives anyway while the bright but poor no longer have the opportunities grammars provided. Most grammars of course also have entries at sixth form level too
a) You can tutor for IQ tests very easily. Not sure where you got it that it was difficult. There are lots of techniques.
b) In between our posts I have been chopping wood and did a rough mental calculation of how many should have got into the grammar school from my village all other things being equal (I know how many classes there were, the size of them, the fact that our village was a 3 member ward and how many councillors there were in the borough). The answer is about 25. There was 1 and he dropped out. If that doesn't give you an idea of the disparity between poor and middle class areas nothing will.
c) If you think the well off don't send their children to Comprehensives you live in a different world. I live in a well off area now. I am wealthy by most peoples measure as are most of the people I know. Nearly all use the local comprehensive, which I grant you is good, but that is not what you were saying.
d) Moving to a Grammar at sixth form is too late. The damage has been done. Many won't go who should. Many who were at the Grammar who shouldn't have been have dropped out.
Select by subject on an ongoing basis throughout the child's education.
a) You can't. IQ test results are in part based on genetics, they are difficult to tutor for unlike subject knowledge based exams.
b) And all of them would likely have gone to a sink comprehensive otherwise, at least 1 still got to a grammar.
c) If the wealthy send their kids to a comp it will only be an Outstanding comp they have bought their kids admission to by buying a house in its catchment area, meaning there are well above average house prices for that catchment area. You buy a place at an Outstanding comp or academy much like you buy a place at private school effectively or else you go to church more regularly to get a vicar's reference for a top church school. I notice you did not send your kids to a sink school the bright but poor have little choice but to go to!
d) Sixth form entry for A levels and top university is fine for late developers
I am absolutely minted and our kids go to the local comp (it is an academy but most secondaries in London are). Rated good not outstanding. Plenty of other parents similar to us, judging from how posh some of our kids' friends talk. House prices are high it's true but that's more because they're nice houses. But half the housing in the catchment, I'm guessing, is social housing so it's far from true that most of the kids at the school have bought their way in somehow. Proportion of minorities and with English as an additional language much higher than average; those on pupil premium broadly average. If actual GCSE grades match the predictions after my eldest's mocks I'll be very happy, but let's see in June.
So still a good school not a crap school even then. If however you live on a council estate and your local comp is inadequate or requires improvement you would have no choice but to attend it even if you were bright enough to get into a grammar school.
Middle class parents however would move to the catchment area of a Good or Outstanding school even if more expensive. Or else start going to church more regularly to gets their children into an Outstanding church school
It boggles the mind that more than seven years after Russia annexed Crimea and fought in eastern Ukraine that so little has been done to free central and eastern Europe from a dependence on Russian gas.
It’s worse than just that. Led by the Germans shutting nuclear plants down, they’ve actively increased their reliance on Russian gas in the past few years.
Wait until January, when Putin goes into Ukraine properly - while simultaneously threatening Europe with cutting the gas supply if they retaliate.
That was probably the most bizarre reaction of the Fukushima disaster. Germany, renowned for its earthquakes and tidal waves.
Yes, I don't know why Angela Merkel gets such a good press. She made more than her fair share of completely dumb errors. That one was a corker.
Is anybody going to stick there neck out and predict todays UK Case numbers?
100k.
120k. Tuesdays are always bad as there is a big backlog from the weekend
I thought Wednesdays were the bad ones for cases?
On which basis, I'll go for 88k cases today.
I'm thinking about 98,000 cases today UK wide. mostly because schools are out, so that should mean less of the Lateral flow tests yesterday, in comparisons to previous weeks.
Comments
Rangers have qualified in Europe and have lost only about 2 games out of last 20 or so. Much better to see local players etc rather than expensive highly paid pirates who don't give a crap other than their 200K a year. At least in Scotland it is still a Scottish league unlike EPL which is full of imports.
Methinks you dost protest too much.
~16p/kwh
https://www.theice.com/products/910/UK-Natural-Gas-Futures/data?marketId=5188708
Things are gonna hurt, come April/May.
40 years later when Son 2 wanted to sit the 11+ there was a simpler system. Two boys, two girls to Grammar schools in Southend Borough per primary school in surrounding Essex. If your school had three 'good' boys and one 'good' and one 'nearly good' girl one of the boys lost out and one of the girls got lucky.
And most middle-class parents are very happy to game the system for their children.
Though as I was saying elsewhere, I would rather that the pass rate was lower so kids from Trafford didn't get pushed out by kids from Manchester and Cheshire East. Competition is fierce here: there are thousands and thousands of out-of-authority kids within travel to school distance of Trafford schools. Parents from Manchester and Cheshire East: if you want a grammar school education, live in a selective authority!
But with this deal - how is it cheaper? Helping to crash parts of our domestic industry in favour of a flood of cheap products from the other side of the world does not lead to long-term cheaper food.
Flintoff will always be a legend for staggering along Downing St, having clearly not been near a bed for at least 24 hours.
Sarah Palin says she’ll get Covid vaccine ‘over my dead body’
Former vice-presidential candidate also falsely claimed that those who would refuse a vaccine outnumbered those taking them
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/dec/21/sarah-palin-covid-vaccine-coronavirus
Celtic & Rangers were comparable (maybe better than) the best of the English league. The Scotland football team regular beat the England one.
The Scottish FA have seriously under-performed for 4 decades.
https://twitter.com/RachelReevesMP/status/1471406699525414918
Tutoring makes a massive difference to ability to tackle the 11+. You see it all the time with kids that got tutored and then struggle to keep up once they're in.
Ministers were essentially presented with the case for restrictions with their hands tied as there had no ability (through competing costed models) to weigh up the competing downsides of imposing highly costly preventative measures for an unquantified risk which might not materialise. This is very different to seeing worst case models and only putting in place plans for expensive mitigation once data on the inputs could be confirmed in the real world.
For a growing number of MPs and ministers it is not apparent what he is in office to do, beyond the purpose of simply being there
https://on.ft.com/3Eo6dx6
That is the only purpose...
And wondering if it is worth owt?
I suspect Boris Johnson will be safe until May's elections, the last time they were held it was a tie between Labour and the Tories, Any Lab lead in NESV should lead to Tory losses, the bigger the lead, the more losses.
I suspect the Lib Dems may also help create a carnage for the blue meanies.
Of course, I could well be misjudging her. I hope I am. I have, in fairness, seen relatively little of her.
Sometimes other people make you think that thousands of years of knowledge, reason and logic has all been for naught.
61% of Americans have had two shots - that’s still more than 100m unvaccinated.
Consider that there's lots of pressure for more grammar school places in selective areas (Kent, for example) and next to none in comprehensive areas (Hampshire or Cambridgeshire, to take two examples I'm familiar with).
If you really want to give elite opportunities (to become PM, say) to elite children, what you probably want is 1 grammar school per local authority for the top 5% or so.
Good luck selling that to the voters.
As for Europe, how many years is it since a scottish team even managed to beat the part timers from Estonia team types and qualify for the champions league properr?
https://energy.guylipman.com/sm/electracker
Ouch.
The proponents of grammar schools could usefully ask themselves a simple question. Why haven't the Tories, who have been in power since 2010, done anything to bring them back - and the 2019 government hasn't even mentioned them (as far as I know)?
The answer is dead simple. They've seen the actual evidence. That evidence shows that grammar schools are a brake on social mobility, not an accelerant to it. And the kids who go to grammar schools (currently and previously) do just as well if they go to comprehensive schools. If the evidence was there that grammar schools were the answer, don't you think Cameron, May and Johnson would have agreed with you and set about restoring them?
While normally I claim no authority on anything whatsoever, on this one I know what I'm talking about, having had a career largely based on studying the complexity of educational outcomes.
Now football has become so stupidly stratified that a handful of clubs across the entire continent, barely even enough to form a decent super league, totally dominate.
The money flowing into the Premier League and the Champions League fucked football beyond repair.
Wait until January, when Putin goes into Ukraine properly - while simultaneously threatening Europe with cutting the gas supply if they retaliate.
There's a high possibility this Omicron wave will wash over us with vaccines and prior immunity from opening in the Summer working.
Meanwhile there's a real risk that the USA, Germany and others could be in serious danger. The Netherlands are already back in lockdown.
If this wave is a damp squib, people can have Christmas and there's no January lockdown ... And if the news instead is showing how bad things are in the rest of the world, then the Government just might deserve and get some credit.
Though I suspect even if that happens, they won't be given credit anyway.
Saying “we think there needs to be support for hospitality and we won’t support unless there is” isn’t playing politics (well it might be, but it is also a legitimate position to hold)
Gove got rid of all that.
Unfortunately the guys involved have now spun it off into a consultancy and i think they do still do projects for the government, it isn't at the heart of things anymore. And May / Boris don't seem to be really that interested in what can be incredibly powerful and cost effective approach to public policy tweaks.
1) To Get Brexit Done. That's done. Tick. Leave the details to someone else.
2) Keep Corbyn out. Tick. done.
Following that, there's levelling up. But that's rather more complex, and somewhat tricky for a man who doesn't like detail. So Boris has said 'levelling up' many times and even appointed a minister for it. So that's done. Tick.
I'd say he's done all he needs to.
I suspect the other reason the Tories haven't gone for it is that actually expanding the numbers of secondary moderns isn't popular. Most parents want better schools all round, not further division into good schools and bad ones with the massive pall of worry, and quite possibly expense, cast by the 11-plus.
On which basis, I'll go for 88k cases today.
Though in reality, a good 6th form college might well be a better option.
I wonder what the threshold for action they've set on the London hospital admissions. We expect them to continue up, but how high would they conclude was problematic?
We have no solid evidence that this is going to cause us a significant issue, though there is a chance. Strong guidance to give the Government/NHS/SAGE time to react seems sensible, and people have taken that on board.
Fining people for expressing basic freedoms over a 'maybe' is too far. At this point in the pandemic there has to be some red lines which you cross only when you're 90% sure.
Middle class parents however would move to the catchment area of a Good or Outstanding school even if more expensive. Or else start going to church more regularly to gets their children into an Outstanding church school
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/dec/21/head-of-police-association-suspended-over-sexual-touching-allegations
A moving, modern reimagining of the nativity scene occurring round here as three wise men from hermes, yodel and amazon all arrive simultaneously.