Test for comprehensives
Sir: Mr Todd (Letters, 15 November) chal- enges my interpretation of the GCE results f Professor Pedley's sample of uncreamed omprehensive schools. His arguments are nconvincing for the following reasons.
1. Professor Pedley's sample was made up f schools 'which did not lose more than 10 cent of the children residing in their tchment area to local grammar or inde- dent schools'. Non-maintained schools ccounted for 7.3 per cent. of the children hose GCE results were compared with ofessor Pedley's sample in Dr Boyson,'s nicle. Because of this and because Professor dley's schools were the product of a organisation of maintained schools only it reasonable to exclude non-maintained noels from the comparison.
2. When cse grade one passes are eluded in the national figures the percentage f children in.maintained schools obtaining ve or more '0' levels rises to between 18 nd 18.5 per cent, still appreciably lower than euncrearned comprehensive's figure of 20.1 cent.
3. Professor Pedley excluded from his rvey all schools, old or new, which had n reorganised for less than seven years, . not long enough `to have taken at least e year group of children through a full ondary course'. The reason for excluding m is merely that comprehensive. schools less than seven years standing necessarily fleet the standards of the selective as well s the comprehensive system. But supposing, t to satisfy Mr Todd, we compare Profess r Pedley's schools with all maintained ools excluding comprehensives. Professor ey's schools still have the better '0' level ults while the two sets of 'A' level results Me equal.
4- To assume that schools which failed to nd to Professor Pedley's questionnaire were ashamed of their results is to express a prejudice, not an argument.
In short, Mr Todd's challenge fails. His own conclusion that 'the comprehensive per- formance is impressively bad' cannot be reconciled with any of the evidence he cites. Certainly Professor Pedley's figures are sug- gestive rather than definitive. But let us at least be clear what it is they suggest. I would like to add that I am not, I hope, in the least complacent about comprehensive schools. I believe comprehensive reorganisation is a small and hesitant but necessary step towards better education, no more, no less.
Michael Armstrong 3 Stone Villas, Camberwell Grove, London sE5
Previous page
