The superior performance of private schools seems likely to be become even more obvious with the introduction of the A* grade in A levels.
In the latest study, the ISC analysed A-level results over the last three years to find out how many A*s would have been awarded.
It found that an estimated 16.5 per cent of all entries in ISC schools would have gained the A* last year, compared with 14.5 per cent a year earlier.
If the trend is repeated this year, it would result in around one-in-six A-level papers being awarded the new elite grade.
Last week, research from Ofqual, the qualifications regulator, found that around seven per cent of all A-level entries last year would have gained an A*.
But the latest study said: “If the results from ISC candidates are excluded, this figure falls, so that only five per cent of non-ISC candidates would have been awarded an A*.
“This would mean that entries from ISC pupils would have been more than three times more likely to be awarded an A* than non-ISC pupils.”
In all, some 36.5 per cent of all A*s awarded last year would have gone to pupils at ISC schools, it was claimed, even though independent schools educate just over one-in-10 sixth-formers nationally.
This is from an article in the Daily Telegraph yesterday.
Of course there will those who suggest that the dramatically superior results of the private schools is entirely due to the socio-economic background of the parents. But the work I did in The Welfare State We're In comparing the results of a top grammar school which it is extremely difficult to get into and has parents who are high up the socio-economic scale with one of the supposedly less academic private schools suggested that this is not true.
What is worrying for those who spend a small fortune on private schooling is that some of the results their children get are apparently going be ignored by Oxford University.
The disclosure – in a study by the Independent Schools Council – is likely to fuel controversy over university admissions.Leading institutions are currently split over the use of the A* amid fears that the elite grade will be dominated to such an extent by private school pupils that it risks skewing the social mix of the student body.
Oxford is refusing to employ the A* in admissions this summer, but it will be used by Cambridge and Imperial College London.
I feel it is reasonable that universities should have regard to a student's potential as well as his or her achievement so far. But this should only be up to a point.
The danger for Oxford and others is that this looks like outright desire to ignore achievement. It could cause more parents to send their children to university in the USA or elsewhere. This could, in turn, further undermine the finances and standing of British universities.
Posted by James Bartholomew • Indexed in Education
Comments (0)
TrackBack (57)
Warning: file(http://63.247.138.2/~bartholo/randomquotes.dump) [function.file]: failed to open stream: No route to host in /home/bartholo/public_html/archives/2010/06/private_schools.php on line 293
Warning: implode() [function.implode]: Invalid arguments passed in /home/bartholo/public_html/archives/2010/06/private_schools.php on line 293
