To feel so fed up that the only way to get a good education seems to be privately?

Nope you don’t. I worked in a state school, which was an academy school more than 1/2 English state schools are. They used unqualified “cover” teachers when teachers weren’t available. In my particular subject on three occasions I had to correct the cover teacher. I’m not blaming her she did have a degree but not in my subject. I’m sure I would have made errors if I’d been asked to teach chemistry for example. Cover teachers don’t get the training offered to teachers who are being asked to teach a subject they have studied to degree level.
My DC went to a private school all teachers were qualified.
Im not saying that private is always better than state or vice versa but the one thing I learnt during my teacher training is that most parents haven’t got the faintest idea what was going on day to day.

I attended private school and was horribly bullied.. DC are happy in their state schools. They are still at an advantage over lots of kids as they will get an inheritance, have a good diet, youngest has a private tutor, both have extra curricular activities, and parents who are involved love and talk to them. The only advantage out there isn't just private education. Life is never fair.

100%

Wow don't let your prejudice and assumptions get in the way! I would actually hope as you work in recruitment that you would hire someone based on their merits, not what school they went to!

Intrigued to read this. How do you know that a state school educated child has not been heavily tutored, interned at mummy and daddy’s work and doesn’t ski/sail? How do you know a private school pupil has not had personal challenges, studied independently and had grit? What about state school children whose catchment is very white and middle class (a nearby state primary is flanked by houses that are over £1m)?

What does study independently mean?
Last I checked with family members in both state and private, who are from similar socioeconomic backgrounds and have engaged parents, the children were being taught in school and were having to do the revision, homework and exams themselves. No-one was doing it for them.

Having typed this, I just realised how awful you sound and very much like the type people who purport to be against.

I've been teaching in the independent sector for twenty years and find your sneering, judgemental attitude appalling. I've taught thousands of bright and not so bright motivated young people who have worked their arses of to get the grades they achieved. A lot of them had jobs at the weekend or after school in retail, hospitality, sports coaching and did DoE and partnership schemes with local schools. There is nothing "not real" about their experiences. Your post does just as much to entrench these tropes and fallacies as any other. I've also taught in the "good" state schools that are held up as alternatives..the ones where you need a six figure salary to be in the catchment, money is spent on tutoring and skiing and the kids are basically the same. There is far more diversity of standard within the state sector than between most average privates and good state schools. You're missing out on a pool of great candidates if you automatically dismiss someone based on their schooling.

That’s actually unusual these days (for cost). We have classes of 32 for everything in Year 7 and 8. Then 26 in Year 9. Year 10 and 11 vary by subject. English is 26 in every class. Some option classes have been as small as 4! Maths might be larger in top and middle sets enabling lower set to be smaller.

In state sector it comes down to cost. At A Level our school caps classes at 20. This is increasingly unusual.

It’s also a myth that children are in classes of 30 all day long in secondary school.
DCs are at a state comp, a big one, and class sizes vary according to subject. Maths - for one is 18 and the other one is 12, languages - vary so once DC is 16 for one and 13 for the other, 18 in another. Sciences capped at 20 in lab and on and on.
In fact the only ones over 25 students are the home room which is for registration in the morning for 20mins and after lunch and PE is sometimes 30 for outdoors sport like football or crosscounty but small grp for the fitness suite or tennis.

@twistyizzy

Definition of the word empirical: "based on, concerned with, or verifiable by observation or experience rather than theory or pure logic." Oxford English Dictionary.

Go back and re-read my original post. It relates events that I actually observed. So, by the above definition, empirical facts.

Empirical does not mean statistically significant. I did not claim to have collected a large sample of data or make any extrapolations about the full population of British schools (private or otherwise) based on my personal experiences.

Importantly, though, I did not make any generalised pronouncements based just on my personal opinions. I stated events I had observed with NO statement of any conclusions drawn about schools in general from those facts.

OK? Has that cleared things up for you?

As someone who hires staff in a globally company - give me a state educated, able graduate with some real life work experience - part time job in a shop or fast food place etc - over ANY privately educated candidate all day long.
We don’t need candidates who can ski or sail or who ‘interned’ in mummy or daddy’s company for the summer.
We need well rounded,hardworking candidates who can get on well with people from all backgrounds, and who really worked for those exams, studied independently and have a bit of determination and grit about them. Kids who were tutored, hand-held and has their paths eased through life on everything? Their overconfident is grating to say the least.

I agree that they are not automatically better. It has been stated many many times on here and elsewhere that the right school for the right child might be state, private or a mix at different ages. A huge amount of these discussions are based on complete ignorance, tropes and myths in all directions.

The idea that private schools are automatically ‘ better’ than state schools is a myth perpetuated by the private businesses who charge the average take home pay in the U.K. to educate some children ( the children from the highest earners).

Wrong. Many child don't need private education to succeed but until our state system adequately carers for ND and other SEN sadly, many do. Even more sadly, for most it's unattainable so those children have to cope as best they can or don't end up out of education completely. It's lovely that your kid and so many on here were ok / brilliant in state but to see such a sweeping statement as yours is utterly depressing at this point. Clearly there's still a huge amount of ignorance about the failings in the state sector and the enormous chasms that kids fall through when they can't fit the mould.

When I was at school (I’m 50) there were always 30-32 per class and there were no teaching assistants to help the teacher. We all did ok.

My niece (13) goes to a private school (8-15 per class depending on the subject) and her parents pay for an external maths tutor as the school’s maths department is so bad. Niece also had this at her junior private school in a different country so neither school seem to be any good.

DB is planning on moving niece to another school in the hope it will be better.

And it happens often in state as well. Lots asked to teach out of specialism. I’ve taught (successfully as it happens) a subject I don’t even have a GCSE in, to GCSE level.
In training we were told to keep it quiet if we’d done well at Maths in secondary to avoid teaching KS3 Maths (there were shortages when I trained too).
Many non-specialists are currently teaching across the country in a range of subjects (but especially in core subjects and even more so in Maths and Physics).

Do uou have evidence of this? I have worked in an independent for years - we all have degrees, PGCEs and QTS. There is no management intention to employ unqualified teachers. Parents demand qualifications.

No they are anecdotal evidence, not empirical facts. Anecdotal evidence is based on personal experiences, while empirical facts are based on systematic observation and data collection, so your story is anecdotal.

In our very, very narrow window of experience, compared to the state secondary my child attended first the difference was night and day. Mainly due to the Scottish state schools having no meaningful behavioural sanctions available to them.

If you think bullying in non-existent in private schools, well, you’re just wrong.

No idea. Not my problem frankly. Their money to waste if they want to.

It's really not true. Remember that private schools are a business and they go all out to win your custom. Our children also need far more downtime than we think, private schools are full on and leave time for very little outside of the school gates.

If you can't afford a private school and you can't afford a private tutor, spend 30 minutes- an hour a day going through the work a subject and recapping things or making sure they understand things fully. Another subject the next day and so on. There are loads of resources available these days. You can buy workbooks and revision guides for most subjects, and there are loads of YouTube videos or online quizzes or other resources like MOOCs if you want to go deeper into a subject at a higher level. Just do what you can. It will be a lot more than a lot of children receive.

@OnGoldenPond

Similar stories in other local private schools heard from others I know with DC there. I know a lot of people who sent DC to private schools.

That’s good your children saw what was happening and went to another school, but are the parents who still have dc at these private schools raising the matter of the widespread drug use with the headmaster/mistress? Or are they also removing their dc - in which case presumably these schools will close?

. I don’t know if my expectations are off but the classes are huge, like 30 kids in one room (I thought 25 was the max!).

30 has been standard for donkeys years, I'm pushing 40 & there were 30 in the class when i was at school.

There are lots of lovely schools. I don't know any genuinely nice areas where the schools are really rubbish?

We could put our dc in private school. But we never would.

A child doesn't need private education in the UK to succeed. I know many children that have gone to private school and have average jobs.

The more successful ones came as an immigrant, didn't speak English and now they lead the top AI for the government. Raised in a rough part of London.