Comprehensivisation

Question 1

Comprehensive schools

Answer 1

Local schools which do not select pupils on the basis of academic ability: they are mixed ability school.
- Encouraged by the labour party after 1964 and through the 1970s and took the place of grammar and secondary modern schools in most areas of the country.

Question 2

Education secretary 1964-1970, Crosland

Answer 2

• Wanted every child to get a ‘grammar school experience’.
• Comprehensives accommodated for a range of ability students.
• Many of theses schools had sixth forms and therefore opened up possibilities to studying beyond 16.

Question 3

Positive evaluations of the comprehensivisation of schools.

Answer 3

• Principle had longevity and is still the norm in most education authorities in the UK today.
• More flexible approach to ‘selection’ than the tripartite system so late development is better catered for or having strengths in different areas.

Question 4

Negative evaluations of the comprehensivisation of schools

Answer 4

• Moved from selection into one school. Uses systems of setting, streaming and banding.
• Comprehensives in middle class areas translated into strong academic results.

Question 5

New right critique of comprehensive schools

Answer 5

• Journalist Neil argued that comprehensive schools didn’t provide the meritocratic path that grammar schools did.
• In the post world war period, prime ministers from less well off backgrounds, like Thatcher, could succeed with grammar schools. Now in the 2000s, only the very rich reach the top who attend the top private schools.

Question 6

Criticism of the ‘one size fits all’ approach of comprehensive schools.

Answer 6

• Ignores the fact that all children are different.

Question 7

Critique of New right sociologist Neil’s perspective on comprehensive schools.

Answer 7

• While there is some evidence supporting Neil’s claims, there is a much wider range of social backgrounds getting into uni, acquiring professional qualifications and getting into higher earning professions as a result of comprehensivisation.
• This is true of minority-ethnic and female students as well as working class ones.

Question 8

Criticism of Crosland’s every child getting a ‘grammar school education’

Answer 8

• It might not have been what every child needed
• Schools were facilitating some pupils who wanted to go on to do further study.
• As students left comprehensives schools they may have went into the workplace with only very little knowledge that is useful to them.