High schools always at a disadvantage

Daniel Hamilton criticised Rosie Duffield’s position on grammar schools, but appears to base his own support for selective education on the school he went to rather than evidence of any benefits.

Indeed, when Education Secretary Justine Greening was challenged to provide the name of any education expert who supported grammar school expansion, she couldn’t name a single one.

Evidence is firmly on Rosie Duffield’s side. The head of global education body the OECD said selection causes inequality.

The science body, the Royal Academy, proved Kent’s school system has an overall negative effect on the number of science graduates.

Meanwhile head teachers lined up to talk about the advantages of all-ability education, and researchers showed that Kent’s results for disadvantaged pupils were among the worst in the country.

All parents are stuck with this divided system that offers advantages only to grammar schools and nothing but disadvantages to high schools.

Grammar schools can recruit better qualified teachers, they have better Ofsted ratings, and they offer the better opportunity of A-levels and university.

Mr Hamilton appears to think Kent grammar schools operate in a vacuum and have no effect on other schools. This is of course not the case.

High schools have problems recruiting teachers. They educate higher proportions of special educational needs or troubled pupils that take up teachers’ time.

They do not have a full compliment of pupils of all abilities so they struggle to offer top sets and good A-level choice.

These schools have a tough time and they are by no stretch of the imagination like the schools in all-ability areas.

Why would any parent in a two-tier system choose the lower tier? There is absolutely no advantage in our system for the 70% who attend high schools. Kent parents do not have the choice of inclusive, high-quality, all-ability schools – but many parents would prefer this.

Parents are forced to deal with the awful 11-plus, which is a relic of a bygone age. No modern education system should be stifling a child’s future ambition with a two-hour test taken at the age of 10. Mr Hamilton supports a divisive and old fashioned school system, and he picked a fight with a mother who was doing the best for her children. Joanne Bartley Kent Education Network