John Prescott: May wants to go back to telling 11 year olds they’re failures

Love can be cruel. For an 11-year-old, break-ups can be devastating. We’d been forcibly separated. Not because we’d grown apart or even because there was someone else.

No. We parted because I wasn’t good enough to pass a test.

She’d managed to pass the 11-plus. I did not. I sent her a love letter pledging my undying love. She sent it back correcting my spelling and grammar mistakes.

****

Not only does her own Education Secretary Justine Greening privately think it’s a bad idea. But experts – people we SHOULD listen to – say they entrench social division.

The Sutton Trust claims just 3% of pupils who go to the 163 grammar schools in England are on free school meals. That’s six times less than pupils who go to non-selective schools in the same area.

And 13% of grammar pupils actually came from private schools. They are five times more likely to be privately educated than come from a disadvantaged background. Grammars actually widen the gap in attainment between rich and poor pupils.

Read the full article here.