I moved to Kent as an adult and after having kids was shocked to discover the Kent grammar system.

I have 2 bright kids and don’t believe in single sex education and wanted the kids to be able to go to a local school, and receive a comprehensive education suitable for their learning level.

I discovered this isn’t easily possible in my rural area. What to do??!?!

I couldn’t bear to have single sex school, & I really dislike the grammar concept, so I surely must choose comprehensive.

BUT we live in very rural area, my closest local comprehensive school ( & we would be eligible for KCC transport as over 5 miles away) doesn’t have the correct academic level, they don’t even offer the 3 sciences at GCSE ( KCC state double sciences is good enough, but I’m expecting my kids might do science at uni level), and the other subjects don’t have the top achievers, what to do?

I refuse to tutor the kids, kids should be kids playing, not doing extra work.

But the parent guilt when they are sitting the 11+ is sooo high as all their friends have had tutoring for years and mine have only recently looked through the ‘familiarisation’ papers. Am I a bad parent to not have paid for them to be more prepared?

I visit all the nearest schools, grammar & comprehensives and actually like some of the comprehensives, but am told I won’t get in based on distance.

Both kids manage to pass.

Is there any choice other than grammar? as Grammar is selective they will get in even though the schools are further away ( & transport is available as KCC have kept a public bus open just for this route)

A comprehensive that is the closest school to the other side of my village seems to be the perfect answer, a mixed comprehensive with grammar stream.

Excellent! except there is no way to get there, public bus cuts axed this route.

After 2 years of campaigning we have now have rerouted a private bus company to include our village, finally a bus to school, expensive but a solution. My oldest is doing brilliantly now in year 9, my youngest will join in September.

Soo much stress, and it doesn’t have to be this way. If Grammar system didn’t exist, my closest school would have a representational mix of academic levels, and therefore be suitable for my kids, and most likely there would also still be a bus to the other closest school ( that my kid attends) as KCC would be not be paying for a bus route running to the grammar schools as these wouldn’t exist.

My 10 year old’s school class were split down the middle with children who have just failed the 11+ devastated. This system is damaging the confidence and mental health of our children at age 10 years…. Why are we doing this to our kids, it doesn’t have to be this way.

The 11+ system is a toxic open wound in the small town in Kent where I live. Everyone knows its indefensible, yet the system persists, concentrating privilege and resources in the grammar school as opposed to the non grammar school in the town. There is antagonism between the schools and friends and family are broken up every year. I have two kids at the grammar school so I suppose I’ve benefited from the system yet I would have much rather had a good school that everyone can access.

My twin sister and older brother, were both Grammar School stream , I was Secondary Modern stream, my siblings both attended a very heavily subsidised International Science Fortnight in London, parents of children attending only paid a very small token amount, attendance at the event was not available for Secondary Modern children.

I hated preparing for the tests so much but I passed one out of four grammar school exams. Looking back, I think my mum had bragging rights that I was attending one of those schools. They cared about exam results a lot. One of my teachers crushed my spirit about a not so outlandish career aspiration and I lost most of my motivation and passion for anything school related from that point. I was 14. I don’t think attending a grammar school improved my life or prospects.

We live in a grammar school area. It is hugely destructive – each year a few of the more academically able (and more socially advantaged) kids from Year 6 in local primary schools go to the local grammar schools, which will mean little gain for them but is a great loss to the local comprehensives and the children who attend them.

I work in a ‘comprehensive’ school which has a grammar school across the road. Students at my school achieve excellent exam results and are overwhelmingly well behaved and socially adept. They follow the same curriculum as their peers at the grammar school and sit the same exams at the end of their schooling. However many parents are distraught when their child ‘misses out’ on a grammar school place and is ‘forced to’ attend what many see as a second-rate school. Adults in the area will still discuss their peers by sorting them into those who went to the grammar and those who didn’t.

My late mother was not political but she summed it up beautifully: “people support grammar schools because they assume their children will go to them”.

The reality of living in an area which maintains a girls’ and a boys’ grammar school is just starting to sink in. We are not from Salisbury and had no reason to understand its schooling system before we moved here but it is very different to what we were both exposed to as children. We were both comprehensive educated children who went to university and gained a lot from our mixed schooling. Salisbury is dominated by CofE schools which seems inexplicable. It leaves parents who care about these things with very little choice.

This junior school has a very good academic record and in the last year it has become apparent to us that this is clearly based on its perceived ‘success’ in getting children through the 11+ and into the two Grammars. This school streams from it’s first year intake at 7. It is considered to be a ‘crammer for the grammar’. Children are pushed hard and I feel that, consequently, this has a knock on effect even on the infant school, not least because it causes parents to start stressing out about their child’s progress even at Reception stage! I find the whole situation uncomfortable and deeply worrying.

For example, I have frequently heard parents discuss and agree with the streaming of 5 year olds at the infant school my son attends. They believe this will allow ‘the best to progress’ and get through the 11+. Parents also highlight on the children’s faults and abilities in relation to the 11+ e.g. ‘he’s good at reading but not problem solving and he needs to improve if he’s to get through the 11+’. The other high schools are considered to be lower than the low and parents are horrified at the thought their child should attend one – one told me ‘I don’t know what I’ll do if he fails the 11+’ and her child is 6! I also feel that it filters down to teachers who feel they are under pressure to demonstrate ‘progress’ above what is required even by the arbitrary targets they work to.

I feel we suffer the double whammy of faith schools and 11+ selection in this area and it alarms me that very few people seem concerned about it. Yet, if these grammars didn’t exist, parents would undoubtedly be much happier and less stressed. It’s an awful situation to be in.”

We all know that when exam results come out the grammar schools look great, and the other schools just can’t compete. There are other small things that happen at school that are reminders that all schools are not equal. My son’s been selected to represent his school in a maths event. He’s so negative about it, because he attends a non-selective school. He’s joking about the school coming last, but it’s not a funny joke to me. The grammar schools will obviously win this contest. Kent’s system means the other schools are designed to be second. In other areas there is no unhealthy divide, no reminders that a school is less good at key subjects, or that children are second best. Selective education is toxic, it’s an unhealthy way to brand and divide children.

Northern Ireland still has an 11+ and it’s called the transfer test. Both selective and non-selective schools sit the same GCSEs and A levels. Let’s stop pretending otherwise. There is absolutely no need for the mental health crushing transfer test. Inclusiveness is the way forward.

I just found out that my postcode has been taken out of the catchment area for almost every local grammar school and that’s mad. I feel really bad for these kids to be honest. The 11+ should be for kids who don’t have mummy and daddy connections, not people who buy second homes in Kingston for an exam.

If your parents can’t afford to send you to private school without breaking themselves, and they can’t afford buying a second home, or moving into a grammar catchment area, and they can’t even afford 11+ tuition then they’re the families that need to be prioritised.

It’s actually sick how the system has been gamed over the last 10 years, and it’s so obviously a classist and racist attack. I know for a fact that so many white parents who sent their kids to grammar schools were shocked that their kids were the minority, they HATED it. They hate that these kids are coming from Hounslow and Croydon and mixing with their precious Tarquin, they hate that their special little boy is making friends with the “wrong sort” because the schools are full of kids who got in on smarts and aren’t white or middle class.

So what did the schools do? Well, first they stopped prioritising test scores, and sorted by catchment instead. Now, if you didn’t live in KT1-KT7, you had to be exceptional to get in, while local kids can be relatively mediocre and still make it. Then they tighten up their catchment area IMMENSELY

As in removed ~20 postcodes. Who can afford to live in KT1 to KT7? Which class and race of people tend to live there? Middle Britain has ruined grammar schools simply because they couldn’t stand poorer and browner kids doing well.

Now those kids who were exceptional, who might have still made it despite the odds being against them, just don’t get any chance. And I’m not really for grammar schools, but they exist and are a lifeline, so they should be used as such. I don’t think they’ll flourish as much as they have done in the past if they’re going to be filled with mediocre white kids rather than a huge range of kids from all sorts of backgrounds. It’s crazy that 4000 kids were fighting for about 100-200 spots, but this isn’t the solution

I’m just using Kingston because I’m familiar with it, but all the local grammars are doing the same thing. It’s very insidious that a system designed to help lesser privileged kids is now being manipulated to stay as a white middle class establishment. That’s just wrong.

This story, at first glance, makes me sound like a hypocrite. Why? Because my older child scraped a pass in the 11+ and went on to get a first in Maths from a very competitive entry university. Despite the fact that her village primary school consistently produces just 10-15% 11+ successes. (And that’s a high result for a primary in this county!)

However, my older daughter spent the next seven years driving herself to prove she was as good as her peers – which wasn’t good for her mental health. Her amazing Grades at GCSE and A level don’t tell the whole truth about her experience of selective education. She says she “hated” most of her school experience especially the sixth form, which she had hoped would be an improvement. All teachers were interested in, she believed, were high grades. Now 24, and into a career, she is still working out how to create a liveable work-life balance.

Another part of this story concerns my other child – the 11+ refuser. She told us, aged 9, that she wouldn’t be taking the test. She encouraged several of her friends to refuse also.

As we live near a county which is non-selective and her year had fewer students in it, she went to a comprehensive (not her catchment secondary modern). Like her sister, she worked hard, and got an excellent degree from a competitive entry university. However, she was surrounded at her university by people from selective schools, either private or state grammars. Her close friends refused to believe she had been to a comprehensive; but she didn’t tell most people because there were judgemental remarks about comprehensive schools.

Why didn’t I consider our local secondary modern school? Because the opportunities are much better at the comprehensive in the next door county – a better range of subjects, lower staff turnover, better extra-curricular offer, more consistent homework policy, and yes, better exam results. Everyone is at a true comprehensive: students aiming for Oxbridge and students aiming for apprenticeships. It’s not a perfect school by any means, but staff showed they cared about my younger daughter, no teacher ever set limits on her achievements and she had until she was 18 to prove herself (better than taking a test at age 10 – the true age of most 11+ takers)

I used to be a secondary school teacher, mostly in comprehensives, but more recently, supply teaching in secondaries and grammars in the selective county where I live. I taught English, a subject everyone takes. And this is the truth: there are bright, academically able students in every type of school and there are hard workers too. The biggest differences? Grammar school parents pay for more private tuition (GCSE and A level) and expectations are generally higher at grammars from staff, from parents and from students themselves. In other words, there is a lot of social manipulation and paying towards higher grades. If a child is perceived as “one of the brighter ones”, they’ll often achieve more on average. Then there are the more generous grammar school teacher assessments – included in coursework for various subjects at A level. Add the fact that grammars have a lower staff turnover and don’t forget that grammars are “pickier” about who gets to take certain A levels (skewing their statistics).

If I hadn’t learned all this from teaching, I could have simply observed it in my own daughters’ experiences.

The 11+ does damage even to many who pass it – because it leaves a legacy of handling any challenge through hyper-conscientiousness. It does damage to those who fail or who are too terrified to take it, because they carry with them a feeling of exclusion from an elite within their peer group.

Anxiety about the 11+ starts very early. 5 or 6 year olds hear parents say “Blue table children are seen as 11+ passes” etc

My younger daughter was never on “blue table” and she worried about that like hell. At the age of 5.

My daughters were relatively lucky but I’ve seen too many children in tears in this village and I’ve heard too many parents uphold the myth that grammars are “where they want to work hard”.

It’s a system that doesn’t select the most able children and doesn’t indicate achievement at 16,18 or beyond. It isn’t helping lower income families because too many grammar places go to children from private preps. It favours boys over girls because they score lower but there is an even number of places for boys and girls.

It’s damaging nonsense.

I live in Totnes and the 11+ is BIG round here. My son is about to start the local comprehensive secondary school, as we decided not to tutor him for the test. Yet all of his friends did the test and passed. It’s hugely sad and disappointing that the local community of schooling from 11 years and upwards is split up like this here. The grammar school is a half hour bus ride out of Totnes, so it’s not even local. The local school is left with the ones that couldn’t afford tutoring and the ones who have failed. Very very sad.

My two children were top of their class in the US. Upon arriving in the UK, they were not able to get in to a grammar school. Every school in our area had a several year long wait list. General education schools also all had wait lists. The kids were placed in schools 45 minute drive from each other and a minimum of 25 minute drive from our house. Also, they were denied education for 4 weeks as we fought with every school to get a slot and were denied at every turn. English schools do not care about children. They care about their antiquated rules. We switched to private and had to take out of our retirement savings. I can see now how England is the worst performing country of the top 7.

One thing that people never talk about is the subtle inequality between grammar schools and the schools that surround them. Grammar school selection is social selection. The kids that pass the Kent Test are mostly tutored and middle class, or have great parental support. This goes without saying because to try for a grammar school you need to care about education and have a certain confidence.

The schools surrounding grammars are not only lacking the bright kids, they contain more than typical SEND kids, more than typical disadvantaged kids, more than typical kids with parents who don’t prioritise education. It drives me mad that our new PM talks about creating new grammar schools, without seeing that she will be creating more schools that are placed in a tough spot with a harder than average balance of pupils.

I’m a governor in a Kent non-selective and I know that the most dedicated teachers and school leaders are in schools like mine. I send my own children to a non-selective, because the teachers and leaders work super hard to get great outcomes for the children. The grammar schools select pupils who will get top grades, they rest on their laurels, they can get away with being lazy. The non-selective schools work to sort great behaviour policies, the best safeguarding systems, the best learning structures, and do a fantastic job. There is a certain passion and commitment to the teachers in schools like mine, its more likely to be a vocation not a job. Our non-selective school in a deprived coastal town has sent kids to Oxbridge most years, proving that grammars are unnecessary.

Non-selective schools are regularly fantastic, but none of this excuses the councils and governments who let our children be divided at the tender age of ten. All for no real purpose, and in a manner that creates a horrendous social divide. The 11+ is a bad system that mostly seems to continue to give middle class parents an easy life.

I was always absolutely average when it comes to academic achievement- not bottom of the class but definitely not gifted or brilliant. I was lucky enough to get into the local girls’ grammar school probably based on a mixture of luck and my parents being able to afford tuition for me when I asked for it. Everyone from our primary who got a place had a tutor (many for several years) and there were a few very able students- certainly more capable than I was- who did not pass. I remember being terrified of the local comprehensive, which was in special measures and had a reputation for being full of bullies. I don’t think the grammar school offered any kind of social mobility for working class kids at all. It just kept the ‘nice’ middle class kids away from the ‘riff-raff ‘.

Having worked as a teacher in a number of tough comprehensive schools over the years, I am so grateful for my education. I got to learn in a calm environment, I had teachers who expected me to get the best grades and taught me exactly how to do that without having to waste time dealing with poor behaviour, I did not have to worry much about bullying or attend alongside peers whose challenging and resulting mental health challenges had a serious impact on their behaviour at school. There was a good atmosphere because the students I attended with valued their education and wanted to succeed. We very rarely had teachers leave or were taught by supply teachers.

In the comprehensive school where I used to work, I often saw students of a similar profile as me- shy, anxious, middle ability, parents who do not necessarily push them- disengaging with their education or dropping out of school entirely out of anxiety. I think the most able tend to find a way to succeed anyway, it’s the middle and lower ability that need the best teachers, the extra academic support and opportunities on offer at a grammar school.

My son was expected to walk through the 11+ and get entry to the local King Edward school. In the end he didn’t do well enough but was offered a place as a fee paying pupil. Although he had been to a private school since infants, the fees were beyond my reach…;.so I had to tell him I couldn’t afford it . Luckily he had liked what he saw of the local comprehensive so he was not unhappy. Although that school then went through problems and ended in special measures, he got good results …the only ‘failure’ being that the school wanted him to try for Oxford…he was rejected at the first hurdle….Oxford don’t take pupils from schools like that! He ( and I) both feel what he lost in terms on academic rigor his time at the comprehensive gave him a much better education for life than a private school would have. ..something that I know will stand him in good stead as her pursues a possible career in politics. But that is only because I did not talk in terms of ‘success’ or ‘failure.’ Parents attitudes can cause many problems for the children. Although I am a successful product of the grammar school system, I feel it is too elitist, and adds division in an ordinary divided society.

My daughter went to a local all girls grammar school and after the first couple of years became extremely unhappy. Her confidence plummeted and all her teachers seemed to care about was how she would achieve an A!

Without going into details she left with very few GCSE’s but has over the years found her way and worked hard to achieve a 2:1 in her degree. She ironically now works in an educational child mental health setting and most of the referrals to her work place are from grammar schools.

My son, even though he got into a grammar school refused to go and is very happy and achieving well at the local comprehensive school.

As a teacher myself I believe that creating confidence in young people is paramount and the grammar system is divisive , creates even more inequalities in society not to mention the feelings of failure, the competition from both children and parents etc etc…..I could go on!!

I am a single mum living in Kent who has 2 daughters and who has been a teacher at a grammar school. The 11+ system permeates everything. It starts when your children are around 7 and slowly builds so you can’t escape it. It’s crushing and intense. Constant conversation of tutoring; the best tutors; the costs; the thoughts about what are you going to do if your child doesn’t pass grow bigger and bigger and by the time year 5 arrives the conversation is everywhere.

Being a single mum meant I couldn’t afford tutoring. It meant I had to listen to constant chat, that I was excluded from. The stress it caused me was horrible and sometimes I found myself not socialising with friends, who were all paying for tutoring for their children. Some even from year 2. I couldn’t join this race. I knew my kids were bright and very able and more importantly loved learning. But, still no guarantee they would pass. Anything can happen on the day.

One of the biggest problems is the disparity between the behaviour at grammars and non selective schools. And the impact this has on learning. This for me was the biggest concern. The choices if they don’t pass were poor – really poor, and the thought of my quiet, kind and reserved children been eaten alive and not being able to access learning was a huge concern. Not just for me, but for them too. The conversation is on the playground too. The girls were very aware of what was coming and what their choices were. They were just 10 years old. The pressure on their shoulders is insane. Tears been shed about what would happen. Sleepless nights. It’s inhumane.

Living in Kent and listening to our young people it is apparent that there is segregation. There is an us and them culture. Tribes are formed and there are feelings of difference and a sense of being less than if you don’t pass. You feel a failure.

I didn’t pass. I am a 50 year old woman and it is still with me today. That feeling of having failed has never left me. I didn’t want my girls to carry that feeling.

I enjoyed being a teacher at a grammar school, but I do not agree with it. However, I chose to work in one because I wanted to teach and not spend the majority of my time managing behaviour. However, the elitism is palpable and unhealthy. Grammar schools breed inherent inequality, and non selective schools breed a strong sense of failure. It is backward thinking.

I remember, at the age of 10, being asked by a supply teacher whether I were sitting the 11+, meant as a compliment I think, but sounding rather snobby at the same time. That was the first time I’d heard of it.

I never did sit the 11+ nor study it’s material, and the only ‘pressures’ I faced at that age was sitting the advanced SAT paper for Maths. The headteacher suggested to me to approach the paper out of curiosity rather than expecting to attain a higher grade and I remember whilst sitting it being really stretched and figuring things out during the paper which led to me running out of time. The paper itself showed me there was much more to the subject, it wasn’t about the grade for the headmaster, nor the preparation for the paper, he knew I could have been trained to pass it, for him, and me it was about discovery, an experiment, which led to a persistent pursuit of mathematical concepts that remained with me into adulthood.

Coming from a working class background, my dad was of the belief that I go to the local school and if I do well, it’s mostly down to my own gifts of memory, creativity and logic, enhanced by teacher stimulating any desire to learn as most teachers tend to do.

So that’s exactly what happened, the school I attended was in the bottom percentiles in league tables for the area, but I did well in terms of grade attainment. I’m socially more aware of the difficulties that peers face, but those issues never hampered my own ability to learn. What I’ve found later in life though is that it is the middle classes’ attitudes to comprehensives that prejudice decisions about me and my abilities and there are simply ideological disagreements on these matters and I’m usually outnumbered. For me social mobility has come at a cost, it’s one of a certain kind of loneliness being surrounded by people who know nothing of the struggles and distractions that poorer people face.

There are some that wish to solve this by preventing people like me climb the social ladder, to retain a justification for why some ‘deserve’ things others do not.

This is just a mask for not wanting to accept that talents and skills permeate all social stratas and aren’t distributed just to the rich. What is siphoned off by the rich are the resources and this leads to a segregation that ultimately harms the collective shared capital of education.