Comprehensive school (England and Wales)

In England and Wales, a comprehensive school is a type of secondary school that does not select its intake on the basis of academic achievement or aptitude or the wealth of the parents of the children it accepts.

Before the Second World War, secondary education provision in Britain was both patchy and expensive. After the war, secondary education in England, Wales and Northern Ireland was provided free to at least the age of 14 under a policy introduced by Conservative Secretary of State for Education R.A. Butler. The Education Act 1944 made provision for primary, secondary and further education but did not mention the 11+ exam or the tripartite system (secondary modern, secondary technical and grammar school). 'The tripartite system was no more than the continuation of the 19th century class-based system of English education which had been promoted by the reports of Spens (1938) and Norwood (1943)' (D. Gillard, 2011). However, as a result of the flexibility of the Education Act 1944, many Local Education Authorities (LEAs) were free to choose how to establish the secondary school sector. Many LEAs chose to adopt the tripartite system described in Norwood's 1943 report.

Comprehensive schooling was introduced in 1965 by the Labour Government of the time. Pupils sat the 11+ examination in their last year of primary education and were sent to one of a secondary modern, secondary technical or grammar school depending on their perceived ability. As it transpired, secondary technical schools were never widely implemented and for 20 years there was a virtual bipartite system which saw fierce competition for the available grammar school places, which varied between 15% and 25% of total secondary places, depending on location.

The first comprehensives were set up after the Second World War. In 1946, for example, Walworth School was one of five 'experimental' comprehensive schools set up by the London County Council Another early comprehensive school was Holyhead County School in Anglesey in 1949. Other places that experimented with comprehensives included Coventry, Sheffield, Leicestershire, and the West Riding of Yorkshire.

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