To think it’s hard for a middle class child to attend a working class school?

Despite all the handwringing on the baby names forum, people don’t usually get bullied because of any specific characteristic that you can change. They get bullied because they are perceived as weak. That’s not an excuse for it at all, but it does make this sort of thread pretty pointless, given that we don’t know the child in question.

I grew up in a deprived area and was sent to a school in a solidly middle class area. I had zero problems with kids at school but the kids in my home area totally ostracised me for being ‘posh’.

Where the child is one of the only middle class ones and gets bullied for being different or posh.
There's no excuse for bullying but curious to know how the other kids have come to the conclusion that the child they're bullying is 'posh'?

This is where grammar schools did their thang; before they were infiltrated by Jemima and Jonathan tutoring the hell out of Imogen and Rupert in order to secure places away from Simon and Sharon from their state primary.

YY to those saying anything can be a target for bullies and any child looking noticeably deprived will be far more of a focus, tragically.

Ignore the chippy comments, OP.

It was a long time ago but I was in a secondary school like that, a very large very mixed comprehensive. There were 360 kids in my year - 12 classes of 30. I was relentlessly bullied for the first 2 years for doing my homework, not swearing, not telling the teacher to fuck off, not smoking, being a virgin, getting good marks in tests. It was a bit better at the start of 3rd year (Scotland) when we were streamed by ability and the kids in my classes were the ones who wanted to be there and wanted to learn. Most of the disruptive kids left during S4, either because they were old enough or just stopped attending. Last two years were better, the number of kids in the year shrunk from 360 to about 60 staying on for Highers. I think about 25-30 of us went to uni.

For my own kids, we have purposely chosen to stretch ourselves and buy a house in catchment for a really good school where the demographic is very different and the kids are there to learn and not be disruptive bullies.

Actually, I taught in one that did. And she was a little star that just dealt with it!

I would imagine that it would be much harder the other way around. In my experience the parents of disadvantaged kids in schools where that isn’t the norm really stick out and don’t get welcomed into the fold. My daughter goes to a state school in the ‘best catchment’ in our town and the there are two mums who are genuinely shocked whenever they are spoken to. I’ve seen other parents completely blank them or obnoxiously talk about how skiing is affordable at parties when these women have literally said something alluding to their tight budgets. Hideous.

I didn’t grow up working class, but my mum came from a working class background and her side of the family are gifted at making people feel included. That’s been my overwhelming experience of ‘working class’ families.

In my experience, the parents whose children don’t go to that school think it’s more of an issue that it actually is.

It should be fine, just make sure to remember to remove their shoes before sending them to school and ensure that they have had some tution in using a small blackboard with some chalk.

At primary in my experience not at all but that is London where people are not generally obsessed with people not speaking with the local accent as they can be in other places. Kids who are bullied will always find something of they want to.
To be honest it doesn’t matter about the wealth of the parents more the approach of the school and whether diversity is welcomed and bullying stamped out.

That's not something I've seen or experienced. Children who bully will find any reason they want to, there doesn't need to be a real reason.

Nice try.

I think accent can be a problem if everyone else's is different. I remember one 'posh' kid in our school getting a bit of shit for that, though there was definitely another kid whose dad was a doctor and he seemed to be fine. Neither was bullied so far as I know. The focus for bullying was a family of kids who were a bit neglected and smelly (unwashed clothes etc).
I think you'll be ok - likely you're not that different from everyone else in the catchment area.

I was a girly swot who "spoke posh" at a Black Country comp in the 70s. Never bullied.

It's hard being noticeably different from your peers at that age.

I'd say class / family finances are one of the less noticeable differences.

No excuse for bullying, if that's what's happening (OP very vague), but suggest you do a bit of research on those "ex mining towns" and what happened to them.

Wow. What awful prejudice.

Why does being middle class mean that they’ll have expensive gadgets or luxury holidays?

Had years of being dubbed “posh” at my comp then went to university and socialised with the public school set then I wasn’t posh enough ! you can’t win in the middle!

😆

Only if they are particularly precocious, or like to boast about expensive gadgets and luxury holidays.

Depends. If they joined at the same time as the rest of their class (ie in Reception or Y7), then I can't imagine they would be identified as 'different'.

If they joined midway through the year, or as a transfer from another school, then yes, it could be tricky. But because they're the new kid, not because they present as middle class.

Why do you ask OP?

It’s much harder being a working class child in a working class school.

Probably the marker of being middle class is having been to university and having books around the house. So the middle class kid already has a massive head start on resources, learning behaviours, and aspirations.

Only my experience but I went from a private primary in a very posh area to a state comprehensive in a very not posh area and had no issues.

Had a lot more issues being at the posh private primary having parents who were from working class backgrounds (much snobbery from other kids and parents).