Secondary education
There are approximately 4,600 secondary schools in the United Kingdom, with approximately 233,600 teachers and 3,606,000 students.
The student/teacher ratio is approximately 15:1.
The type a secondary education a student receives will depend on the type pf area a student's family resides in.
If a student comes from a middle middle-class background and lives in a conservative area, s/he will probably go to a Grammar School or a Secondary Modern School.
If a student comes from a lower middle-class or working-class background and lives in an industrialised, working-class area, s/he will probably go to a comprehensive school.
i. Grammar Schools
There are two types of Grammar School, differentiated by the way in which they are financed by the state:
a) Local Authority or County Grammar Schools
b) Direct Grant Grammar Schools
Local Authority or County Grammar Schools are financed entirely by the Local Education Authority in whose area they are located.
The name of such schools include the term "County" in order to indicate the way in which they are financed, for example, Dorking County Grammar School or Bexhill County Grammar School.
Direct Grant Grammar Schools receive a grant directly from the Department of Education and Science.
This makes them completely independent of the LEAs.
In return for state finance, Direct Grant Grammar Schools must provide some places for students who reside in the LEA area in which they are situated.
Many Direct Grant Grammar Schools have a long history, many are ancient Grammar Schools dating from the 16th. and 17th. centuries.
Most Direct Grant Grammar Schools are regarded as being superior to County Grammar Schools.
In December 1975, when Grammar Schools were invited to become part of comprehensive schools, 110 of the 173 Direct Grant Grammar Schools in England and Wales announced that they would rather be independent than co-operate in comprehensive schemes.
Today, with the Conservative Government's attempt to make schools operate as if they were privatised, the Direct Grant Grammar Schools have become the ideal model within the state system rather than the exception.
Direct Grant Grammar Schools have names like Reigate Grammar School and Steyning Grammar School, that is, without the term "County".
Also, many Direct Grant Grammar Schools provide education for day-boys and boarders.
Boarders live in accommodation within the school.
Many Grammar School are single sex schools.
Some Grammar Schools are co-educational.
Grammar School students are obliged to wear a distinctive school uniform.
Grammar Schools place considerable emphasis on sports, cricket, football and rugby for boys and hockey, tennis and basketball for the girls.
Grammar School students are assigned to a "house" when they enter the school and remain in the same "house" throughout their education in the school.
"Houses", which are an imitation of the house system in Public Schools, are used for the organisation of team sports and other competitive activities.
Grammar Schools have a Prefect system, also an imitation of Public Schools, whereby senior students are given authority over younger students.
Grammar Schools have a Head Boy and/or a Head Girl who lead a group of prefects.
It is considered an honour to be a Head Boy/Girl or a prefect and the prefects' school uniforms will be slightly different to signal this distinction.
Some Grammar Schools have army cadet training corps, airforce training corps or navy training corps, depending on the facilities and location of the school.
The main academic purpose of Grammar Schools was to prepare students for the General Certificate of Education (GCE) O-level (Ordinary level) and A-level (Advanced level) examinations.
Grammar School students would be placed in forms, first year students in the First Form, second year students in the Second Form, third year students in the Third Form, fourth year students in the Fourth Form and Fifth year students in the Fifth Form.
Students in the Third Form would be divided into three streams, Arts, Sciences or Modern, according to their academic record at the time.
Students in the Arts stream would study English, Mathematics, Latin, History, Geography, Fine Art, modern languages and a science subject.
Students in the Science stream would study English, Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Biology and other science subjects.
Students in the Modern stream would study fewer, less specialised subjects.
Grammar School students would prepare 7 or 8 subjects up to O-level standard on average.
Students in the Fifth Form would sit the GCE O-level examinations in the subjects they had prepared.
In this way, a student would pass 4 O-levels or 6 O-levels etc.
Students wishing to continue their secondary education after O-levels would enter the Lower Sixth Form, choosing three subjects for preparation to A-level.
Again, Science students would choose science subjects to specialise in, Arts students modern languages or history and geography etc.
After two years' study, in the Upper Sixth Form, students would sit for their A-levels in the subjects prepared.
In this way, a student would pass 2 A-levels or 3 A-levels.
In order to get a university place, a student would normally have to achieve high grades - A or B - in at least two and, more usually, three A-levels.
GCE examinations were not state examinations.
The GCE examinations were prepared by university examination boards, for example, the Oxford University Board, the Cambridge University Board, the Oxford and Cambridge University Board, the London University Board, the Northern Universities Board, the Joint Matriculation Board etc.
These examination boards prepared GCE O-level and A-level examinations in a wide range of subjects.
Every Grammar School chose one examination board and prepared its students for the O-level and A-level examinations offered by this board of examiners.
The examinations were evaluated by the corresponding board of examiners and the results were communicated to the students by post by the corresponding university examination board.
Each subject taken at O-level and A-level was evaluated independently.
There was no global evaluation.
The fact that each Grammar School had the right to choose the university examining board proved to be an obstacle to student mobility in the country.
Students whose families changed residence may find that midway through their preparation for GCE examinations they changed school and found themselves in a Grammar School which prepared students for a different university examination board.
Since the university examination board set not only the examinations but also the O-level and A-level syllabi, this often proved very inconvenient for the student.
For example, a student who moved from Bexhill County Grammar School which prepared students for the University of Oxford Examination Board to Dorking County Grammar School which prepared students for the University of London would find him/herself having to study an entirely different syllabus in many of the subjects.
Also, there was a perceived difference in academic levels between the different university examination boards. For example, the University of London Examination Boards O-level and A-level examinations were perceived as being more difficult than those of the Oxford and Cambridge University Examination Board.
Once again, the syllabus a student studied was determined by the school s/he attended and this inevitably affected his/her results and subsequent achievement of a university place.
From the Grammar School students' point of view, his/her fate within the system was entirely arbitrary and a question of luck.
ii. Secondary Modern Schools
Secondary Modern Schools were conceived originally for non-academic students.
Although introduced in the 1944 Butler Act, it was not until 1964 that parental lobbying caused the Secretary of State for Education and Science to recognise a change in the function of Secondary Modern Schools and introduce the Certificate of Secondary Education (CSE) for Secondary Modern School students to prepare for.
However, compared with the GCE, the CSE was never to be more than a second-class qualification.
A few Secondary Modern Schools prepared their students for the GCE O-level examinations.
Also, in some exceptional cases, on completing his/her GCE O-level examinations at a Secondary Modern School a very successful student was able to pass to the sixth-form of a Grammar School to prepare for A-level examinations.
In reality, however, any movement from a Secondary Modern School to a Grammar School was virtually non-existent.
Secondary Modern Schools were established in new, purpose-built buildings, with well-equipped workshops, laboratories, gymnasiums and extensive playing fields.
Many Secondary Modern Schools were co-educational and students generally wore a distinctive school uniform.
Even though some Secondary Modern Schools were located next to a Grammar School, there was no communication at either staff or student level between schools.
Competitive activities and sports meetings between the two types of school were virtually taboo.
In general, classes in Secondary Modern Schools were larger, that is, more students per teacher, than in Grammar Schools.
Also, the most qualified teachers usually preferred to teach in Grammar Schools rather than in Secondary Modern Schools.
Like Grammar Schools, Secondary Modern Schools usually had a prefect system, with a Head Girl and/or a Head Boy.
iii. Comprehensive Schools
There are several different types of Comprehensive School:
1. "all-through", which provides secondary education for students between the ages of 12 - 18.
2. "two-tier", which comprises a Junior Comprehensive for students between the ages of 12 - 14 and a Senior Comprehensive for students between the ages of 14 - 16.
3. A Comprehensive School which provides education for students between the ages of 12 - 16 and a Sixth-Form College at which students prepare for the A-level examinations.
There are three other types of Comprehensive School.
The "all-through" Comprehensive School is the type favoured by the Department of Education and Science.
The basic idea of the Comprehensive School is that it provides secondary education for students of all ranges of ability.
Students are divided into groups within their generation according to their ability within the different subjects.
This system is known as "streaming".
For example, if a second-year student is good at History, s/he will be allocated a place in an academically high-level class for that subject, for example, Class 2A. However, if the same student is weak at Physics, s/he will be allocated a place in an academically low-level class for that subject, for example, 2C.
In this way, each student is graded according to his/her academic ability in each subject.
For the system to work with an average of approximately 40 students per class, the school must have a large number of students and a correspondingly large teaching staff.
Comprehensive Schools can have as many as 2,000 students with over a hundred teachers.
While "streaming" or "tracking" as it is known as in the USA democratized education by doing away with the selection process at the age of 11, it also proved to cause a major weakness of Comprehensive Schools.
Comprehensive Schools came to be criticised for being impersonal institutions in which students found it difficult to get to know each other and to have personal communication with their teachers.
"Streaming" means that students are continually changing their classes and that they have a different set of peers for each subject.
Comprehensive Schools are perceived by many as being overwhelming, dehumanised institutions.