Aibu to wonder why private schools produce more "well rounded" children? Is it the school or the parents?

Those ethics are completely different to mine. I think it’s ethical to do the best you can for your children. I don’t think it ethical to intentionally do less than your best for your own children because other children won’t have the same. If you feed your children healthy food when some can’t access this or read them a bedtime story or take them on holiday or to sports clubs or help with homework or even just play with them and spend time with them you’re giving them an “advantage” because a lot of children don’t have these things and they are hugely beneficial. I don’t see how private education is any different except that it’s linked to financial resources rather than time etc. (That isn’t to say that private education will always be the better choice for a particular child or family - it’s a very individual decision and parents will use their resources in different ways but most parents will do so in the way which most benefits their own children).

And when I read to my child or choose a school for them or make any one of a thousand other decisions you make as a parent, I don’t do it on the basis that they might end up doing “better” than other children. I’m just thinking about what’s best for my child.

Two of my children went to private school.
Because ( I suppose) of class sizes ( 12 ) it did not feel like ' school' -when you was inside the building. More like ' family'. Emphasis on ' manners'.

Something which made me chuckle one day : One of the pupils was taken home afterschool curled up in a pushchair ( sucking her thumb) ..she was ' Head Girl'. Ha ha ha ironic.

oh yes becoming a real princess nothing tops that

It often seems to mean "nice manners". Which are good things to have- but say nothing about what sort of person you are except that you've been taught to have nice manners.

I have 2 at secondary school, 1 at an independent and 1 at a state school. They were allowed to choose whatever school they wanted.

They are both as confident and well rounded as each other but I have to put in a lot more effort for my one at state school.

He is a member of the local cricket club, the local tennis club, he does boxing, and is part of a theatre company. All of this is outside school and I’ve had to get him onto waitlists, have to drive him around to all these activities etc.

With my daughter in private school I don’t have to think about any of this. She does sport daily in school, is in the A teams for all the sports, is in the drama club and debating team. She is in school generally from 8am to 5pm every day and plays for the teams every Saturday morning with all transport provided by the school.

So what I guess I’m saying is that you can produce confident well-rounded children regardless of which school they go to but the parent needs to step up and fill the gaps from a state education.

Good grief. Listen to yourself.

Parents underestimate the difference that the time and interest they give their children will make to their ‘roundness’. Cultural capital, listening to them read, being interested in them, giving them your time, playing with them goes a long way in developing‘roundness’.

Agree.

That's great then I'm very happy for you and him. Our choice was to do something different and put our spare cash into the education of our daughter rather than lots of holidays/upgraded cars or other materialistic things which we probably would have spent the money on.
Is private education for SC with SEN but no EHCP who are unable to cope in mainstream schools ethically indefensible? Is it indefensible for DC of army parents who constantly move and uproot their DCs education? Is it indefensible for those DC who are on full bursaries ie parents on very low wages?
Or is it just indefensible for parents who can afford to pay the fees and choose not to send DC to state?

‘As someone who went to state school, I think it is a shame that those who are strong proponents of the state sector come across badly on these sorts of threads. Inverse snobbery, lazy generalisations, narrow minded, using derogatory terms and seeming like they have a massive chip on their shoulder’

💯. These days, I just don’t talk about private school (apart from here). There’s no point. The judgment and inverse snobbery from some, is palpable. Especially the chips on shoulders.

OFSTED is absolutely toffee if you don't mind me saying. It's about 'distance travelled' which actually means a school that used to be a total dump and gets terrible progress 8 scores will be 'outstanding' and another school that has never been terrible remains 'good'. State schools and the provision they can offer has been exacerbated by Labours acadamisation of the UK school system. Which saw responsibility for our schools removed from local authorities and given to organisations (owned by Tory donors like Mr Carpetright). It's a disgusting shambles.

Oh that brings back memories from going with my state school English class to take part in a regional debating competition. Even then as a teen it was blatantly obvious to me that the private school children had been coached and regularly practiced public speaking whereas we were thrown in at the deep end with no preparation or practice. So obviously we and the other state schools came across badly. Later, at university I noticed that the private school students, while full of confidence didn't have anything more intelligent or interesting to say than anyone else!

I don't know whether to be sick or cry!

Because Mn skews towards a strongly aspirational lower-middle-class mindset which is terrified of ‘not getting on’, and their child ‘being left behind’ and, in a particularly class-bound society, is eager to seize any perceived advantage.
I think this is really unfair.
My family was working class and there was a strong culture of learning and wanting to work hard and do well for yourself so you can offer your future children opportunities.

What I actually hate on MN is the endless assumptions that being interested in education, being interested in a range of topics, having hobbies, want to your DC to do well is middle class. It's seen all over the place from the suggestions that wanting your child to get on is middle class, to other threads where going to museums/local education events etc isn't for working class people.
It's like a certain section of Mumsnet thinks working class families are uneducated idiots who don't have aspirations for their children.

I don’t accept the status quo. Private education is ethically indefensible. My ‘aspirations’ involve everyone getting a decent education.

I have more than enough money to educate DS privately, but would never do it. He has gone to the geographically nearest school everywhere we’ve ever lived, and will be doing the same when he starts secondary next year.

It's both. There are many perfectly capable and well-rounded state school kids also, schools vary massively as do parents - dependent on area, income and their own education. My experience of private school and the parents is that kids are pelted with extra curricular activities all through term and weekends. Because of the lengthy holidays (almost 7 weeks over summer) are often also sent to language/sports/science/coding camps to fill the time for working parents. The result of this is children often find their talent/passion early on and this is polished up over the years. Private schools are experts at admissions processes (how scholarships are awarded) for secondary schools and this along with their advocacy for students - means measurably they generally can deliver better outcomes. Speaking to friends some of their kids absolutely thrived in state school, others didn't and they moved them to private school - it's very dependent on the specific school, parents and the child.

Shouldn't we all have aspirations for our DC though? Those aspirations will all be different according to the starting point but if you don't have aspirations then you just accept the status quo and eventually it becomes a race to the bottom.
I can not see how it is bad to want our DC to do better than we did. Surely this is what progress is built upon?
Otherwise my dad would have stayed in a northern manufacturing town instead of going to Cambridge and working in London. My mum would have stated in her Welsh village and never gone to London to become an artist.

It is an awfully narrow and repressive curriculum. We are lucky that we can afford to give DD an alternative, I accept that. I was brought up with the view that education should be about installing a love for learning, not exam results.
You seem to have an awfully big chip on your shoulder about this. However at the end of the day if we didn't choose private we would have moved house into a different area because we can afford to do that, private was the cheaper option. That would have meant pricing another family out of that state school though.
There will always be people who can afford to make choices. Our choice was to stay in a small 3 bed semi and send our DD to private. No apologies from me about prioritising the education of my daughter.

I went to a very good comprehensive school but our local secondary school has been in and out of special measures - currently (inspected late last year) requires improvement. Dd's friends go there and there is a merry go round of teachers, a lot of bullying and most leave at the end of year 11 to go elsewhere. As I've said dd has always been strong academically and probably would have done very well in her gcses there - she got 119 greater depth in year 6 but I do think she would have dropped some of her extra curriculars by now if she'd gone there. And she'd probably be stressing about boyfriends etc.

Because Mn skews towards a strongly aspirational lower-middle-class mindset which is terrified of ‘not getting on’, and their child ‘being left behind’ and, in a particularly class-bound society, is eager to seize any perceived advantage.

Gosh, that awful national curriculum that everyone else has to study.

And I have to laugh every time I see that self-serving old chestnut ‘I am forced to send my child private because of a lack of good state schools’ coupled with ‘It’s all right for you, you clearly have good state options’.

If all state schools are so fantastic why are there so many posts about moving house to get into catchment areas/tutoring/adding a huge amount of extra curricular activities/the number of teachers leaving the sector and crisis in recruitment?
If state is so great then leave us idiot private parents to pay the fees and laugh at our stupidity. If private schools are so bad just leave them alone and bask in the smugness of being able to send your DC to the superior state schools.

I know in education so I am very aware of the limitations of Oftaed thank you. I know several teachers from the school as well as friends whose DC go there. Results are obviously on school website.
I very much don't have to justify my decision to you but I appreciate if you have good local state schools then you may not appreciate exactly how dire some are.
I also wanted to give DD a break from the god awful national curriculum and to have the freedom to a wide range of subjects/topics to find out what she loves.