I have to admit that I hated school, but was probably even more fearful of what lay beyond! I took the 11+ from College Road Juniors and was the youngest in the class anyway. I can't remember much about the actual exam, but some time afterwards I was called to an interview with the Headmaster, Mr Shakespeare, to be told that I was a borderline case, i.e. it was down to him what would be my fate! I was told that along with my mother, I would be going for an interview with the Headmaster of Moseley Grammar School, and if all went well, I would be starting there the following September.
Being a borderline pass I would be going into the lowest of four streams, 1D, and I would be re-assessed at the end of each year. I was moved up two grades at the end of the first year and also dropped biology, in which I had no real interest. To be honest, I didn't fancy disecting frogs which you had to do from the second year. My father died the following year, so all did not run smoothly. But at the end of year five came the biggest inequity of the whole system.....
Unless you were 16 by a certain date in September, you were not allowed to take GCE 'O' Levels and had to stay on for another year. So about 31 of us across the 4 grades were pushed into an additional year called 5X. I was told that I couldn't take Physics and Chemistry 'O' Levels (two of my best subjects) but that we all had to take General Science I and General Science II, a third of each paper comprising biology, which I hadn't done since Year I. Accordingly I failed General Science II, but somehow managed to pass General Science I. I believe that silly age system was scrapped about two years later, but those of us who encountered it remain bitter to this day.
I couldn't stay on to take 'A' levels - for one thing I didn't have the requisite number of 'O' Levels and secondly, without a father, my widowed mother was really struggling to keep me at school. None of the benefits that widowed parents get today. I don't think that any of us in that extra year stayed on to do 'A' Levels.
Maurice