numbers of applications to London private school - why so many?

Hi all, first post! The reason the independent school intakes are so big is the army pays school fees for the children of it's personnel. I pay £8000 per term and 50% of the kids in the school are military families. I can't imagine how much the government spends on this. The original idea was to provide continuity of education to the children of personnel posted overseas, but it is widely abused. All you need to do, as far as i can work out is be posted overseas once, and sign your kids up for boarding and their fees are paid for the rest of their time at school until 18. That is at least £250,000 per child at many schools when admitted from nursery onwards. If you have 3 kids you would have to be on a salary of a minimum £200,000 a year to afford that. with pensions and decent salaries life in the forces is a world away from our reality.
As far as London schools are concerned, don't forget how rich London is in contrast to the rest of the country and how many wealthy foreign nationals want top british education for their kids. there are masses of Chinese and Russians in boarding schools

I think people have been downshifting from boarding for a couple of years now, and applications to London day schools have rocketed (both private and selective) as parents in that über-competitive environment spread their safety net a bit wider with more applications than they might have felt the need to do in less pressured years.

Could it be people downshifting from boarding?

It seems tough on the poor DC who have to sit so many different entrance exams.

That's a good point sue - at least 3 if not more seems the norm.

Could it be because so many parents make multiple applications these days? I do know people who have entered their DC for at least 5 schools.

Is it the same at primary level? Or a case of people saving up to go at secondary? And is it London wide or spiking in
Certain areas ? I know that where I live the secondary provision is not so good so you get a spike in private education at 11.

There was an incremental increase last year too. We were told at least 50% more on applications for the school we ended up with. And I know yesterday's exam for Sept 2012 was packed.

It does seem very odd given the recession and job insecurities... I wonder if the availability of detailed information from Ofsted and league tables, etc., combined with quite a lot of bad press about standards in comps and academies, are driving the trend?