I don't know what to think about this - Some parents need to be nannied by the state

The good thing about Surestart is that it wasn't selective, it was also a melting pot of people, who all, on the surface, just had parenting in common. The comments above suggest that some parents don't know what opportunities exist out of their own bubble, so mixing with people from different walks of life is beneficial, it also helps promote racial integration and understanding the experiences of parents whose children have additional needs. It also means you don't have to declare yourself as "officially struggling", which would rule out anyone wary of seeking professional help or who felt their needs weren't enough to warrant it.

Also being middle class doesn't mean you are not struggling, abused, parenting badly, have lots of support etc. I'm firmly working class, DH middle class, we had no spare cash but lived in
what was deemed a nicer area. I had PND and some days I struggled to get off the couch, but a local group (not actually Surestart, but the same idea) gave me somewhere to go at the suggestion of my HV. I breast fed for two years because of the intial support I had there. Should I not have benefitted because I was seen to have more?

I come from a background where university, education and even reading for pleasure was not for people in my family. I was the odd one out and had a gift for academia. Despite all the odds I went to uni.
And dropped out.
A combination of no money (student finance expecting parents to contribute, and one parent dead, the other an alcoholic druggie in and out of prison), lack of understanding about academic processes (what the fuck is a viva, dissertation etc, no idea what that was utnil I was told I had to do one), and simply not fitting in (never went skiing, couldn't drive, didn't go home for the holidays because I had no home).
For a long time I blamed myself, only now in my mid-30s I realise I never really had a chance.
I am childless, but my siblings not so. I see my siblings making the same mistakes as my parents did, not valuing education, bad-mouting the schools and teachers, not bothering to go through homework with them, not monitoring the kids social media and friendship groups, and worse.
It's ingrained into the cultural fabric of the family and I have no idea where to even begin to undo generations worth of experiences and expectations.

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I find that odd as my kids have due to moved had 3 NHS dentists and every one asked about toothpaste we used - even brushes as they favoured electric - and diet.

I did have one with weaker than usual milk teeth enamel - but dentist couldn't find a reason and could only suggest viral infection either in pg or in early childhood as these things sometimes just happen. They coated the teeth every visit and adult teeth came though fine.

At first glance the article seems fair, but I think it's pretty woolly really, and it's a bit lazy to so uncritically stigmatise poor white British parents. Just by turning up here, immigrant families have already self-selected out of everyone back home for ambition and aspiration, so their children are more likely to be pushed to do well in education than their white counterparts in all income brackets. At every level from Kumon to independent schools the % of kids from non-white British backgrounds is much higher than the local average population.

I wonder if the government should be looking to factors at home in aspirational but low-income non-white British families for inspiration rather than Cambridge graduates who read The Times.

@Namechange83649 I really disagree with the genetics thing. Yes, some people are just not bright enough to get a PhD in physics from Harvard, but I don't believe that being a bit dim and having unworldly parents should condemn a young person to uneducated poverty. We see plenty of very dim people with well off parents doing well in life all around us, so clearly the difference is about nurture and being prodded into the right career path.

I agree with this. The kind of people who should’ve been at SureStart never went!

Feckless, shitty parents don’t want be helped to be better.

I had my children in Liverpool in one of the most deprived areas in the country let alone the city.

My local Sure Start was connected to a primary school and was hugely popular, so from a purely anecdotal position I can say that's not my experience at all!

Background comes into play more often than you might think. It's learning to assimilate into situations more than anything. I'm
WC. My kids went to nursery, school, holiday club, they went to lots of extracurricular activities. It's teaching them to blend in and get along with different demographics of people and adapt their register accordingly. That is the middle class hack!
I've worked with some brilliant kids from poor families, who grew up in care etc. The thing which some of them lack is that subtle way of quietly assessing and changing their behaviour to suit the environment. Being a chameleon. Yes it's bloody depressing and fake, but it's what successful people do.
You cannot go around 'being real' in every social situation.

Sure Start was brilliant. It made a real difference.

Yes, two DC currently in primary and the amount they (and I!) have to do is ridiculous.

They have to do much more much earlier nowadays and I'm not even sure why?

Times tables used to have to be learnt by the end of year 6; it's now year 4. I remember specifically that my DC had a spelling in year 3 that I had got wrong in my work in year 6 as I remember my teacher pulling me up on it!

Why are we doing this to our children? Is it really needed? I had zero homework at primary other than spellings and times tables in year 6. I still passed the 11+ (with zero tutoring!), got good exam results and a STEM degree from a RG university.

I don't think that's true. I think the point he's making is that there are things that many chidlren don't know. For exaple, that from a ranking perspective for core subjects, certain universities definitely are well acknowledged as being better.

Ditto the business studies point - I'm not anti business studies by any means. But it is a FACT that an A level in maths will give you a better chance of getting into university, particularly a good university, even if planning to study business, than a business studies A level. And children should know this when making decisions.

I have worked in media for nearly 30 years. Nonetheless, I think a generalist subject at A-Levels is more useful than Media Studies. You can do Media studies any time, but it's not as easy to access the basics in other subjects. Similarly, DD is both academic and very focused on dance. I have no problem if she chooses to pursue a creative/dance/arts career. However, she can do the work to move into that later - at GCSE level, and probably A Level - if she takes more "traditional" subjects, she has more options. A dance college is not goign to reject her because she doesn't have a Dance A-Level. But that engineering degree will reject her if she doesn't have the right A Levels.

They should absolutely bring Sure Start back. It had a measurable effect. The IFS thinks it had a benefit to children of £1.09 for every £1 spent. And it saved a considerable amount on SEND spending because of early interventions.

https://ifs.org.uk/publications/short-and-medium-term-impacts-sure-start-educational-outcomes

A lot of the issues around subject choices and the relative value of a degree is why DC need good careers advisors in schools. The problem is that DC who don’t have family knowledge to fall back on rely on teachers - who may teach business studies - for advice.

I was thinking the same thing. I’m a UCL student at the moment and in my subject it is number 1 in the world. 🤦🏼‍♀️

The primary school point is really interesting. It most definitely feels like there is a lot. I’m just not convinced that kids are getting the input they need in a class of 30 (often with significant behavioural issues) and there is therefore the spillover into home.

Early reading seems to be heavily down to parental support. I guess it always probably has been but I’ve found it does take a significant amount of time supporting two children. Project based homework makes that divide bigger.

I also suspect there is a lot more tutoring going on than anyone will admit to. I’m sure a lot of primary schools have inflated sats because of kids being tutored for 11 plus etc.

we knew Oxford and Cambridge were the elite but other than that we thought university was university and a degree was a degree. Which is really how it should be.

DH and I were both told that - my Dad took me aside and said no look at the uni rankings - DH just knew it was rubbish.

Actually, your last paragraph, I think the parents have a point. To me, there is no such thing as a menial job, these are essential jobs and there should be more respect (and pay) for such work. The trades are highly skilled work and well paying. Personally I would rather be out and about than stuck behind a desk. Likewise lots of factory work is highly skilled and with good career progression. So kids are told by society these jobs are for failures so unsurprisingly don't want to do them, they're also not suited to university or sitting still desk work, these leaves them with nothing.

Some parents do need to be nannies for the sake of their children.

I work with a lady who is constantly harping on about how her son isn't allowed sweets or anything with sugar in, everything is natural and he even eats oysters! No chicken nuggets over here 🙄 but at the ripe old age of 3 he has tooth decay because she used a natural toothpaste with no fluoride in it because natural is best and she thought fluoride was harmful to brain development? 🥴

Now that poor boy has fillings in his milk teeth that were supposed to last him another 6 years because his mum is stupid. But thats not his fault! Someone should be educating his mother for his benefit because he can't do it himself poor lad.

I don't agree with the level of parental involvement and homework schools expect now. At primary school it felt like I had a second part time job dealing with it all. It only leads to further division and disadvantage.

I felt like this - my kids fell behind family history of dyslexia just dismissed - so either we gt external to school support or they stayed behind - and it did at times feel like I was doing huge amounts of basic teaching at home. A big move helped as next school had much less busy work.

DSis youngest just started - her eldest same age as my kids - say it's going even faster now - they're just ploughing though phonics at break neck speed and there homework every evening - which as a single working parent and child just started school who is tired is proving difficult.

Well, yes. I was the first person to go to university in my family in the mid 1990s and to us, we knew Oxford and Cambridge were the elite but other than that we thought university was university and a degree was a degree. Which is really how it should be.

Only when I got to my ex-poly university I heard about massive snobbery among law firms and that it would be really hard to get a training contract or even a vacation scheme placement in London with this university on my CV.

I did get to work for top City firms by getting experience under my belt and have worked alongside many people from far more advantaged backgrounds. And I also found that most firms are dreadful places to work and I didn't want to practice law that way anyway.

I lived with kids in lower social economic area than most of MN.

Sure Start had an impact - so some similar program perhaps more targeted would have an effect - it meant speech and language and even behavioural issue were picked up sooner and parenst sign posted to more support.

DH and I had what we though was poor career advice from career teachers - mainly lower our ambitions - but we did have access to career libraries and other school staff who told us things. My kids - in a failing school - don't seem to have this at all - they've signed up to a frankly crappy on-line service and get told some whoppers - like school A-level are better than college ones despite it being same board- and generally not really very ambitious for the kids at all. So the kids who don't have parents with interest and knowledge are at much worse disadvantage than ones which do because the school isn't filling in the blanks .

Mind you DH whole family is in various trades and I don't think MN view of them in based in reality - our degrees given us better options than rest of his family got - long hours crappy customers who don't want to pay and nick pick the damage to their joints lack of pensions. As a country we need more but the whole sector needs a good revamp to be made appealing and have obvious way in and ways up.

crab bucket yet again. My lovely late mother in law got thrown out of her family for having "ideas abover her class"

I'm lawyer and have never been much help with maths once it gets beyond arithmetic, fractions and percentages.

I'm struggling to help DD2 with her English Language GCSE work, which was a subject I absolutely aced at school. I just don't understand what they are asking half the time.

Which is why we get tutors to help, seriously fucking expensively.

It's a long time since parents went to school and things have changed. I don't agree with the level of parental involvement and homework schools expect now. At primary school it felt like I had a second part time job dealing with it all. It only leads to further division and disadvantage.

This is nothing new over 50 years ago sociologists were saying that children from working class not necessarily poor working class backgrounds were less likely to go on to university. The families lacked the social awareness the contacts to steer their children towards higher education it wasn't expected of them and in turn not expected of their children.

The T-Level Management and Administration has a really good syllabus, but is easily overlooked compared to A-Level Business Studies. I wish T-Levels were getting more coverage and better availability. For a lot of young people they are a fantastic route to a qualification with direct workplace experience.