HIC Research - Wikipedia extract - Tri-partite system

The Eleven Plus examination was employed to stream children into Grammar Schools, Technical Schools (which only existed in some regions) and Secondary Modern Schools. Claims that the Eleven Plus was biased in favour of middle class children remain controversial. However, strong evidence exists that the outcome of streaming was that, overwhelmingly, grammar schools were attended by middle class children while secondary modern schools were attended by working class children.
The most academically able of students within secondary modern schools found that their potential progression to university and advanced post-secondary studies was constrained by limitations within their schools, the wider educational system and access to higher external examinations.
The 'baby boomer' generation was particularly affected during the period 1957 to 1970 because grammar school places had not been sufficiently increased to accommodate the large bulge in student numbers which entered secondary schools during this period. As a result, cut-off standards on the Eleven Plus Examination for entry into grammar schools rose and many students who would, in earlier years, have been streamed into grammar schools were instead sent to secondary modern schools.
Although the Butler Act planned a parity of esteem between this and the other sections of the tripartite system, in practice the secondary modern came to be seen as the school for failures. Those who had "failed" their eleven plus were sent there to learn rudimentary skills before advancing to factory or menial jobs. Secondary moderns prepared students for the CSE examination, rather than the more prestigious O level, and although training for the latter was established in later years, fewer than one in ten students took advantage of it. Secondary moderns did not offer schooling for the A level, and in 1963, for instance, only 318 former secondary modern pupils sat A levels. None went on to university.
Grammar Schools were generally funded at a higher per-student level than Secondary Modern Schools. Secondary moderns were generally deprived of both resources and good teachers. The Newsom Report of 1963 reported on education for these children, and found that in some schools in slum areas of London 15-year-old pupils were sitting on furniture intended for primary schools. Staff turnover was high and continuity in teaching minimal. Not all secondary moderns were as bad, but they did generally suffer from neglect by authorities.
The interaction of the outcome of Eleven plus streaming (middle class into grammar schools and working class into secondary modern schools) and better funding of grammar schools produced the result that middle class children experienced better resourced schools offering superior future educational and vocational options while working class children experienced comparatively inferior schools offering more limited prospects for educational and vocational progress. This reinforced class divisions in subsequent vocational achievement and earning potential.



I feel that a good movement piece could be created from the unfairness of the classist system that the Tri-Partite system created. We could show three people going through the three different secondary schools and show that their opptions for work, pay and life are decided from birth and on the basis of their class. I was thinking of putting this piece to the song 'The Scientist'.