Bishop Donal McKeown of theNorthern Ireland Commission for Catholic Education and former headmaster of St Malacy’s College, Belfast appeared on The Sunday Politics Show on February 19th, 2010. The commission on Catholic education has already said the practice should not continue after 2012. During the interview with Tara Mills of the BBC the Bishop reinforced the Catholic Trustees intention to end academic selection to grammar schools despite a failure to deliver this objective by 2012, as promised.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/i/b01c2tlp/ Watch from 31 mins and listen to how Bishop McKeown expresses his concern for the schools of North Belfast. Then check out the table of results at GCSE for the grammar and secondary school in the area.
Bishop McKeown had stated to the Belfast Telegraph on July 12, 2010
“Catholic schools have been forced to move ahead with plans to radically reform the post-primary system across Northern Ireland because of the political vacuum at Stormont. Bishop McKeown also said action must be taken to improve the education system here, which currently does exceptionally well for a minority but “terribly badly for others”.
Exactly how terribly bad did Donal mean? The results in the table below compare differences between those pupils obtaining GCSEs without English & Maths and those pupils obtaining GCSEs including English & Maths and provide evidence of the deception. The Entitlement Framework is a deception practiced on young pupils, many of whom are disadvantaged. The deception sold by teachers and schools pretends that the qualifications obtained from a wide range subject choices have an equivalent value or merit. The reality is very different.
So Catholic schools, wherever they exist, would claim to be offering Catholic education and not just an educational separateness for ethnic Catholics.”
Bishop McKeown is Auxiliary Bishop of Down and Connor and Chair of the Northern Ireland Commission for Catholic Education. NICCE represents the Trustees of all primary and secondary Catholic schools in Northern Ireland.
Catholic schools, grammar and secondary have average enrolment of over 99% Catholics.
Read the table below very carefully when making decisions about which school to enrol your child.
Data obtained through a Freedom of Information request of the Department of Education.
| School | 7+ GCSE A* – C | 7+ GCSE A* – Cwith Eng & Maths | 5+ GCSE A* – C | 5+ GCSE A* – Cwith Eng & Maths |
| Boys Model | 32 | 21 | 51 | 24.5 |
| Girls Model | 56.4 | 23.1 | 71.8 | 23.1 |
| St Patrick’s | 13.1 | 10.3 | 34.6 | 19.6 |
| Little Flower | 42 | 20 | 60 | 20 |
| Dominican College | 88.6 | 87.2 | 96.6 | 91.3 |
| St. Malachy’s College | 82 | 79.9 | 94.2 | 88.5 |
| Belfast Royal Academy | 88 | 87.6 | 94.7 | 93.3 |
| Methodist College | 97.4 | 96.2 | 99.2 | 97.4 |
Source Detail.tv via DENI
The Education Minister, John O’Dowd appeared on BBCNI’s Hearts & Minds programme on Thursday 16th February, 2012. He tried to defend his unpopular position opposing academic selection but failed to answer Noel Thompson’s charge that he had been defeated by parents.
He fell into the usual technique of parrotting the civil servants line of schools with academic excellence not academic selection. Unfortunately he choose St Dominic’s Girls Grammar School and St Rose’s Comprehensive as exemplars.
St. Dominic’s results for 7+ A* – C GCSE 93.4%;
St. Dominic’s results for 7+ A* – C GCSE with English & Maths 91.2%
St. Rose’s results for 7+ A* – C GCSE 24.1%;
St. Rose’s results for 7+ A* – C GCSE with English & Maths 16.7%
St. Dominic’s results for 5+ A* – C GCSE 97.8%;
St. Dominic’s results for 5+ A* – C GCSE with English & Maths 94.2%
St. Rose’s results for 5+ A* – C GCSE 48.1%;
St. Rose’s results for 5+ A* – C GCSE with English & Maths 22.2%
Why doesn’t the Education Minister focus his attention on improving numeracy and literacy teaching in primary schools instead of talking about his useless statutory Entitlement Framework?
The AQE CEA and GL Assessment Test Results: Advice to parents
February 6, 2010
UPDATE for 2011. Visit the page of February 4 on the cautionary tale of exam results by computer. http://paceni.wordpress.com/2011/02/04/exam-results-a-cautionary-tale/
Today saw the delivery of results for the two very different tests used to determine entry to grammar schools. The AQE test and the GL Assessment tests. The AQE results were delivered efficiently and effectively but the GL Assessment results encountered some difficulty with attendant stress for pupils http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/breaking-news/uk-ireland/school-exam-results-delivered-late-14670533.html
- The GL Assessment results delivered late
AQE CEA Tests
Three tests were offered with the best two scores counting. Most applicants took all three tests. The scores range from 55 to 145 with the average score set at 100.
Scores were adjusted to take account of age. The scores will be split into five bands or quintiles. The top band are marks greater than or equal to 113, followed by 106-112, 98-105, 88-97 and, less than or equal to 87.
Within each quintile fall 20% of the scores obtained by the total number of candidates – so 20% of scores fall between 145 and 113, 20% between 112 and 106 and so on.
Only once all transfer applications have been processed and places allocated will a school be in a position to publish how the application of admissions criteria arrived at final admissions decisions.
There is not a direct relationship between each quintile and the traditional Transfer grades. The advice of PACE is that parents should use the Transfer form to put down their chosen schools in order of preference rather than trying to anticipate whether or not the score is sufficient to gain admission.
It was never the intention by AQE that transfer grades (A, B1, B2, C1, C2) would be applied as CCEA did with the regulated transfer test results. Anyone suggesting otherwise is misleading you and should be challenged as to the source of their information. Parents have been conditioned into talking about grades as if they represent some form of ranking but this is not the case. A score of 123 is not the same as 113.
Admission to a grammar school based upon strict rank order is the fairest method. However some grammar schools have adopted different criteria and it is here that parents and pupils are likely to run into difficulty and may be misled. Parents should check the admission criteria published by each of the grammar schools to which the pupil has applied for admission.
The second method claims to be similar to the old 11-plus (it is not)— taking all pupils in first two score ranges (quintiles) and then using other non-academic criteria if oversubscribed within the other bands of scores.
The third method involves schools taking a proportion of available places e.g. 100 of 150 places based on scores alone. Then a pool of pupils is created (the size of which has been decided in advance) and the school will apply other non-academic criteria to all of this group to select for their final places. (social selection) Such schools undermine the principle of equality of opportunity and the purpose of the AQE CEA test. Parents should exercise caution in applying to these schools for admission since they may attempt to rely upon information from the primary school which is unreliable. Some schools have asked parents to access this information on their behalf. PACE recommend that such requests are refused.
Schools using the third method include Inst and bangor Grammar School.
The GL Assessment Tests
The GL Assessment tests are completely different. The questions were multiple choice and marked by computer. To highlight the misinformation campaign mounted by supporters of the GL Assessment campaign (remember the Catholic grammars and others refused the opportunity to use the AQE CEA tests) it has been reported that remarking can take place. If any educationalists can suggest how the computer can remark a test paper designed to be read by a computer and issue a different result PACE would be delighted to investigate this AI device. Claiming that GL Assessment remarks are “free” underscores the attempt at deception. It will recalled that the GL Assessment tests were” free” to applicants but as yet the identity of the philanthropists paying GL Assessment’s bill has not been made public. Interestingly no political party, educationalist or investigative journalist from the local media have even investigated the matter.
Today’s Irish News makes mention of Standardised Age Scores (SAS). Simon Doyle, their education correspondent must not have access to Google or other search engine because if he did he would have immediately discovered that the correct term is Age Standardised Score (ASS). If the Irish News education correspondent does not know the difference between an ASS and the SAS, readers should not rely on his counsel on important education matters It will be of great interest to learn where GL Assessment obtained their standardised scores from. Was it from template? Where did the norms come from?
Attempts to link the results of GL Assessment tests with CCEA grades only further complicates the issue but the most complicated situation of all arises at Victoria College, Belfast where pupils are to be admitted on the basis of results from both tests. The school Board of Governors was warned about the problems by PACE but refused to accept the advice.
Victoria is the only school in Northern Ireland admitting pupils using the outcome of both AQE and GL tests. Dr Darrin Barr, the school’s deputy head, has said pupils will be admitted by considering the percentile ranking in the particular assessment sat. The AQE were queried by a school principal who was concerned whenever a percentile was given as a decimal such as .68 It will concern parents to know that numeracy problems extend to primary school principals not just the pupils. Ms Slevin the principal has rightly stayed silent.
In the case of an applicant who sat both assessments, the higher percentile rank will be used. The first pupils to be accepted will be those with a percentile rank of 60 or above.
This must be the most egregious use of an apples to oranges comparison. The two tests have no useful comparison properties.
If there are more within a band (B1 and B2 are five marks apart) than places available, other non-academic criteria will be used.
Age Standardised Scores
Parents with concerns over test result information should contact PACE at paceni@btinternet.com
Sex education about masturbation for five year olds say UNESCO Is this what N. Ireland parents want?
September 2, 2009
Professor Alan Smith is UNESCO Chair in Education at the University of Ulster. Publishing along with Professor Tony Gallagher of Queen’s University, Belfast they gave the DENI the research basis for changing post-primary education in Northern Ireland. Parents, pupils and teachers have suffered the consequences ever since.
Now a June report from the United Nations Economic, Social and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) suggests children of all countries and cultures are entitled to sexual and reproductive education beginning at age five.
In its rationale for creating the guidelines, the UNESCO report said it is “essential to recognize the need and entitlement of all young people to sexuality education.” An appendix backed that claim by pointing to a 2008 report from the International Planned Parenthood Federation that argued governments “are obligated to guarantee sexual rights,” and that “sexuality education is an integral component to human rights.”
http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=52988
For those aged 5 to 8, some key concepts to be discussed are:
– “Touching and rubbing one’s genitals is called masturbation” and that “girls and boys have private body parts that can feel pleasurable when touched by oneself.”
– That “people receive messages about sex, gender, and sexuality from their cultures and religions.”
– That “all people regardless of their health status, religion, origin, race or sexual status can raise a child and give it the love it deserves.”
– “Gender inequality,” “examples of gender stereotypes,” and “gender-based violence.”
– Description of fertilization, conception, pregnancy, and delivery.
It is incredible that not a word of concern has been raised by any of Northern Ireland’s educationalists.
Important exam information for parents from the incoherent AQE
February 19, 2009
The descent into chaos for the Northern Ireland education system continues to plumb new depths. Many parents and their children are feeling the effects of the bends as they are dragged recklessly from regulation to deregulation and back again towards regulation.
If parents are considering which test is offered by their school of choice then the answer may be one, the other or both!
The Parental Alliance for Choice in Education have issued warnings on the educationalists’ plans for many years but understandably most have chosen to rely upon school representatives for guidance and information at a local level.. Such loyalty has been sadly misplaced evidenced by the increasingly inconsistent incoherent and erroneous information passed on by principals, teachers and spokespeople for various “Associations”
In December 2007, the Royal Belfast Academical Institution (Inst) was challenged on their polite platitudes towards socially disadvantaged local boys. The school refused to provide detailed answers. In addition their contradictory simultaneous support for the AQE test of numeracy and literacy and the CCEA Pupil Profile was laid at the foot of Sir Kenneth Bloomfield, Chairman of Governors. Again no clear response was provided. Bloomfield is a jockey out of many stables.
Recently Ballymena Academy published admission policy and aptitude test information for prospective pupils. This contingency plan for their “aptitude testing” would be implemented only in the event of an ‘unregulated’ transfer procedure – a hint of a possible move back towards regulation. The sample test items are clearly of the verbal reasoning type although the school do not indicate who provided their “contingency test” or who the chief examiner is. The guidance suggests should an acceptable alternative procedure gain the necessary support within the Northern Ireland Assembly, Ballymena Academy will comply with that procedure, their plan will not be implemented and parents will be advised accordingly.
Perhaps the Ballymena “contingency test” is similar to that of the Catholic grammar Lumen Christi. One can only wonder at why 69 schools could not agree a testing approach based on numeracy and literacy.
The most grotesque example of incoherence comes from Victoria College, the Belfast all girls grammar school in East Belfast. In the pages of the Irish News the principal, Patricia Slevin, announced:
“ pupils will gain entry to the college on the basis of their results in either of the tests which are being provided respectively by AQE and NFER”
Perhaps Ms Slevin should make contact with the examining bodies for advice on how to equate the two tests. Did the board of governors of Victoria College actually consider the problem before offering the criteria to prospective pupils.
Why have non-denominational grammar schools eschewed tests of numeracy and literacy in favour of a discredited obsolete verbal reasoning test?
Parents are entitled to have answers. Just don’t ask Sir Ken.
