Publications

This chapter traces the way in which national and local policies have at different times favoured selective or non-selective admissions arrangements in English secondary schools. It shows how, for most of the past century, the key issue of contention in political and educational debates was whether and how to select for a bipartite system on…

The Assisted Places Scheme was introduced in 1980 by the Conservative Government to provide a’ladder of opportunity’ for academically able students from poor homes. Over the next 17 years,more than 75,000 pupils received means-tested assistance from public funds to attend the mostselective and prestigious private schools in England and Wales. The Scheme proved highlycontroversial and…

It is now nearly thirty years since Margaret Thatcher and her Conservative administration introduced the Assisted Places Scheme (their first education policy) and over ten years since New Labour abolished it. The Scheme, which was designed to provide a ladder of opportunity for academically able students from poor backgrounds to attend private schools, is of…