Kingscote sixth form

[chezzachez.livejournal.com]

I've been puzzled as to whether the sixth at Kingscote is one year or two. I think that in FL it says that Rowan is going to miss two years of school; but then Jan Scott in CT is, I think, referred to as having been in teams with Rowan and the sixth with Kay. And surely Lois was in the upper fifth with Rowan, but then stays on, but just for one year? Can anyone shed any light?

Comments

[hooloovoo_42]

Sixth form is 2 years, although some people stayed for an extra year - usually for reasons of applying for special university scholarships. Teams weren't necessarily related to school years. The first team would be picked mostly from the upper forms - 5th & 6th - with younger pupils getting picked only if they were exceptionally good. So it would have been possible for Jan to have been in the 6th with Kay and in teams with Rowan.

[manda-09.livejournal.com]

In the 1960s, anyway, Oxbridge Entry was normally done in the Third Year Sixth - the pupil stayed on for one more term, and did Oxford or Cambridge entry, then left at Christmas. That's what my Dad did, in 1968, anyway. He did his A levels in the summer, then did Oxford entrance in the autumn term (third sixth) and then spent from New Year to the summer working in a youth hostel in Germany before he started university.

My mother, unusually, did Cambridge entry before her A levels, and therefore in the autumn term of second sixth. Then she did her A levels the following summer, and started at Cambridge that autumn.

[ratfan.livejournal.com]

That's so confusing :-) I'm an Australian but I did attend a girls' school that tried to imitate English schools as well as it could! So for a few years I remember them doing that, using 'lower fourth' and 'upper fourth' and so on before giving up and going back to using Year 8 - 12. But it did help me when reading the Kingscote and other school stories. :-)

Sue

[mrs-redboots.livejournal.com]

My school, in the 1960s, offered a one year "General course" for those girls who didn't want to do A levels but did want not to leave school at 16; often they re-sat an O level for a better grade, or learnt a new language, or something, as well as the "General courses" we all had to take in addition to our A level work. I assumed Lois did something similar.

Although many training colleges did require at least 2 A levels - I know one friend of mine was saying just the other day how much she'd enjoyed the 6th form, as with only 2 A levels to do, she had masses of free time.

[helixaspersa.livejournal.com]

I think the sixth form in this context is relatively undifferentiated - some girls would have been in it for one year, others for two with a mixture of options. I don't think they are all doing A levels, and certainly not all doing the same number of them. Some will essentially be marking time before a vocational course or a finishing school of some sort.

[chezzachez.livejournal.com]

Thanks all, that's much clearer!

[antisoppist.livejournal.com]

The people doing O-level retakes at Kingscote (with the fateful Maths papers in Attic Term) are in the Tutorial Fifth rather than the Sixth, so presumably Kingscote did separate them out from the people doing A-levels.