Rows over admissions policies have hit the education headlines in the UK this year. In fact, they’ve dominated the education debate in this country ever since the introduction of the eleven plus. This is a shame because bitter arguments about how places at a few good schools are rationed detract attention from the real fight: making all schools good. Nevertheless, having the right policies on admissions can help achieve this goal and we can learn from the experiences of other countries.
There are, broadly speaking, three types of secondary school admissions policies: ones where schools decide which pupils are given a place (for example, the tripartite system used in Germany, Austria and Hungary); ones where the government decides (parents either have to go to their local school, as in France, or are entered into a lottery, as in South Korea); and ones where parents decide (Sweden and some US states).
In England we currently have an amalgam of all three models. We still have 164 grammar schools that select pupils on academic ability. Some local authorities have starting using lotteries (most famously, Brighton) or banding, which amounts to more or less the same thing. Most authorities also encourage parents to ‘choose’ a school, although this is actually the chance to express a preference, which local authorities then try to fulfil.
All three models have their advocates in the UK, so what we can learn from those countries that actually use them?
Academic selection
The right-wing press regularly calls for the return of the eleven plus – those who win a place on academic merit, they argue, are more deserving than those whose parents can afford a house in a good catchment area. Unfortunately, the experience of countries that still have academic selection does not back up these claims. Data from the OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) studies shows that Hungary, Austria and Germany have the highest levels of social segregation in schools in the developed world. In Germany this has led to some serious soul-searching, and reducing inequality is now the main focus for education policy-makers. Increasingly, states, especially those run by the SDP, are overruling the decisions of schools if challenged by parents and there have been calls to increase the number of comprehensive schools.
Top-down policies
The left in this country has tended to support top-down admissions policies in an attempt to ensure sections of the local community are not excluded. Again, there is little international evidence to suggest that this route is politically possible. Countries that have traditionally forced parents to use specific schools are having to ease regulations. A law was passed in Japan in 2000 allowing education authorities to depart from the practice of admitting pupils only to their nearest school. Many now offer a choice. In France, parents in socially mixed urban areas are increasingly making use of transfer requests so that their children can benefit from a more academically successful school.
South Korea is the only country to use a lottery for the majority of secondary admissions – but even a lottery has to be conducted within geographical clusters, so parents regularly
move house.
Parental choice
Countries that allow parents a choice of school seem best placed to manage the politics of school admissions. Those countries that have developed the most innovative approach to admissions over the past 15 years, Sweden and the US, have shown that by allowing a wide range of providers to operate state-funded schools, performance is boosted because it introduces a real choice, which leads to competitive pressures being placed on schools. Over time, good school providers will operate larger numbers of schools, forcing out failing providers. Through this mechanism, the admissions process can improve the quality of all schools by harnessing parent power.
Sam Freedman is Head of the Education Unit, Policy Exchange
