I took the 11 plus over 55 years ago. II have resisted taking part in this discussion as for various reasons I am still very bitter about the so called selection system in this country and the way it destroyed opportunities for me. Like many others in the 1980’s I found myself out of work and after making over 2000 job applications and getting nowhere I decided to apply for university and try to enter the teaching profession as a mature candidate. I wanted to become a teacher many years earlier but the school had advised me that if you failed the 11 plus then you were automatically banned from professional employment. At the time I had no reason to disbelieve this statement and it was some years later I discovered it was not the case. Anyway whilst at the university interview the matter of school records was brought up and I was advised it may be worth me investigating what had been recorded about me. During my investigations into my time at school I discovered a great deal about the so called selection process. To start with the 11 plus was not a straightforward pass/ fail examination. There were a lot of other criteria taken into consideration. Much emphasis being put on belonging to the right organisations (scouts, Guides, Boys / Girls Brigade, Church Choir etc) Social and professional status of parents was also a significant factor. There was also the matter that there were only a finite number of Grammar school place available. I know when I took the examination at a local school there were around 600 people there sitting the exam. This was only one of several centres in the area so at a guess there must have been a few thousand competing for the few places available at the only two grammar schools in the area. (1 boys and 1 girls) It also became obvious in hindsight that the selection had already begun long before the 11 pus. At the primary school I went to there were massive gaps in teaching. I lost a whole years teaching in the final year at primary school as we were simply split up among the younger classes. Not even the same one every day. The 11 plus then was an academic type examination and involved a whole day taking various papers. At the time we had still not covered decimals in mathematics and were never taught how to multiply and divide pounds shillings and pence and yards feet and inches. Not so relevant now but essential in pre metric Britain. Science had not even been included on the curriculum. So don’t think if you failed the 11 plus it was down to your ability there was a lot more involved. As Polly has said had the 1944 education act been implemented as it should have been then the majority would have ended up in the Technical schools. The original proposal of the act provided the three types of school, Grammar, Technical and Secondary modern. The secondary moderns were really just a new name for the previous elementary schools and were intended to provide a basic standard of education until their pupils left at the age of 14. Unfortunately the act was never implemented properly and we ended up with the disaster of the Grammar and Secondary Modern. I can of course only speak from personal experience as I do know that in some areas the Secondary Moderns did provide a good standard of education. Despite receiving a fraction of the funding directed to Grammar schools. However, the standard of education in the secondary modern I went to was appalling. From the word go all ambition and self esteem was destroyed by being constantly told how you had failed and would have no future. Serious bullying was a regular occurrence and there was even a drug problem. Staff were just not interested and the Headmaster denied any problems. Class sizes were usually between 40 and 50 pupils. All with one teacher trying to keep order. (no teaching assistants to help in those days) Text books when we still had them were usually shared between 4 or 5 pupils making homework a nightmare. (After the 1st year textbooks disappeared and we only ever had badly duplicated worksheets.) In some classes we were even three to a desk meant for two. The headmaster at the time had commented publically in the papers that he did not think secondary modern pupils should take examinations and had he had his way nobody would have left with any qualifications at all. At the time it was still possible to leave at 15. I wanted to leave with at least something in the way of a qualification and did not leave at the end of the 4th year and stayed on until 16. What a waste of time. When we returned for the 5th year we were simply thrown in the classes with the 4th years. No progress at all and although we took the then CSE exam at the end of the year we did it with half the course missing. Not that it made that much difference as I like many found that CSE’s were not held in much regard by employers anyway. So much could have been made of education in this country if when the so called Comprehensive system was brought in the emphasis had been on raising standards rather than perpetuating the idea that all are equal and bringing the level down to the lowest common denominator. Education was not supposed to be an entity in itself it was supposed to be preparation for the real world where competition is the norm. As I say these are only my own comments based on personal experience over 50 years ago.
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