'Frosty' response to schools plan

Admission to post-primary schools is being examined

Grammar school support groups said their reply to proposals for change in NI's education system received a "frosty response" from government.

They handed over more than 7,000 documents at the Department of Education's NI headquarters at Rathgael House, Bangor.

The government has decided that there should be no more academic selection of pupils for grammar schools.

The consultation was on how popular schools should select pupils.

Protesters said there should have been consultation about academic selection.

Instead, the decision was left to the education minister.

However, given that there was consultation on how popular schools should choose between pupils, the grammar school lobby took the opportunity to make its opposition clear.

Disputes

But they said that the presentation of a trolley load of boxes containing all their responses at the education board's headquarters on Tuesday, did not go smoothly.

There were disputes about how many delegates would get into the department to deliver the documents and who would officially receive them.

Parent Claire Bain who was present as the responses were being handed over, said: "We moved our children back to NI because of the education system here.

"We know that the results are so much better over in Northern Ireland. Therefore my children are now at the school I was at."

The protesters said that the consultation had been "veiled in secrecy" and that the government did not want to hear opposition.

Tim Mc Quoid from Concerned Parents for Education said he hoped that the government would taken note of the wishes of parents who took the time to join in the consultation.

"It seems that the department are not really interested in meeting us," he said.

"There is more access to Downing Street than to the Department of Education today."

A spokesperson for the department said this was an important consultation. However the department has rejected requests to extend the time limit.

Education Minister Angela Smith said she would consider the responses and would meet the organisations involved before coming to a decision.

After 2008, grammar schools will no longer be able to choose pupils on the basis of their academic performance with the end of the transfer test.

In January, the Department of Education published a list of options for what should happen when the 11-plus transfer test ends.

The department said the intelligence of a pupil would not be permitted as a factor. The decision to abolish the 11-plus transfer test and academic selection in Northern Ireland was announced in January 2004.

The announcement was made following consideration of the Costello Group's report, a government-appointed working body, set up to suggest alternatives to the transfer tests.