Sir Peter Lampl writes about Open Access in the Financial Times.

Last month’s A-level results may have been the first for 20 years to show a small decline in the highest grades, but the stark gap in performance between state and independent schools remains. Fifty per cent of A-level entries in the independent sector achieved an A* or A grade, compared with 23 per cent in state schools and colleges. This is in spite of the fact that virtually all students at independent schools go on to do A-levels after GCSEs, compared with only the brightest 40 per cent or so of state school students.

So, as with Olympic medal winners, the independent sector continues to produce a substantial proportion of those who will one day be the country’s leaders – whether that be in law, business, media, medicine, politics or one of the other professional elites.

 What is behind this success? Superior facilities and motivated and well-supported children are part of the story. But I believe the biggest single factor is teaching: not only do independent schools enjoy a pupil/teacher ratio almost half that of the state sector but the highest-qualified and the most effective teachers are found in independent schools. They are seven times as likely as their peers to have graduated from Oxbridge, five times more likely to hold a PhD, and are much more likely to have a degree from a Russell Group university in the subject they teach, particularly in shortage areas such as maths, physics and modern languages.

Recent research commissioned by the Sutton Trust, the social mobility charity, shows that on average 3.1 per cent of students in the OECD reach the highest level in maths at age 15, but just 1.7 per cent of English pupils do – and the majority of these are in independent schools. One of the main priorities for the trust has been, and continues to be, to fund successful and cost-effective programmes that support highly able children in state schools.

Working with the state sector alone is not enough to open up top universities and the professional elites. Imagine a world in which children’s chances of getting into the top independent day schools did not depend on the wealth of their parents, but on ability alone. Such a world did once exist. Research by the trust has shown that until 1976, 70 per cent of leading independent day schools were principally state funded through the direct grant and other schemes. These schools have a tradition of educating bright youngsters from all backgrounds.

There is a way to open up these schools once again. Through Open Access all places at leading independent schools would be awarded solely on merit, with parents paying a sliding scale of fees according to their means. The trust, together with the Girls’ Day School Trust, trialled such a scheme at the Belvedere School in Liverpool over a seven-year period, and we know it works. The social mix of the school was transformed, with 30 per cent of pupils on free places, 40 per cent paying partial fees and 30 per cent paying full fees. Academic standards went up considerably and the school improved immeasurably.

Because fees were shared with parents, the cost per place to us as sponsors was less than a state school place. In other words, if the government stepped into our shoes they could have funded the highest-achieving school in Liverpool for less than they spend on a child in a state school. More than 80 leading independent day schools, almost half of the total, would be willing to adopt Open Access.

It is exactly this proposition that the trust discussed at an event in parliament on September 5, which brought together MPs, peers and opinion-formers with the heads of the more than 80 schools that have so far pledged their support for the programme, including Westminster, Manchester Grammar, King Edward’s Birmingham, City of London Boys and Lady Eleanor Holles.

These schools want to educate the brightest young people from all backgrounds – which would enable them once again to be the engines of social mobility and the beacons of opportunity they once were.

Read the original article here.