secondary education - not privates school choices

Potty - if you're new to MNs education threads, don't make the mistake of thinking reasoned, friendly argument will work in the state v private debate. It won't. Ever.

Secondary school appeals can be another lottery. I know families who moved house solely to be in a catchment area of a school, and all the parents in the road they moved out of stayed put then got in on appeal. Every last one. God knows what they all said to the panel!

Hi again shootingatpigeons, that's what I was saying, hence my tag line Volvo /dog comment. Was just trying to say stereotyping is dangerous and show how ridiculous it is.

Well that looks good at the top of the page!

@ nit

Richmond is something of a special case and although they have problems they don't apply to the same extent elsewhere.

Ditto with 'DD/DS hasn't got accepted into XY Independent school - what should I say to the school?' The answer being that you need to know the school because they can make up their own rules.

Appeals for state schools I think, do come into a different category, because the rules are supposed to be laid down properly and applied fairly. So if someone asks 'what can I do, I wanted A but I have been given F' the advice is to tell the appeal panel that you want school A because it suits your child because of ..... and not to tell them why you don't want F because you think it's a shithole, or find out whether the e.g. distance rules have been applied correctly. This advice should be as relevant for someone in say Tyneside as in Cornwall.

I didn't say anyone was annoyingly loud! I just said I don't go on the School A vs School B vs School C threads!

TOSN The loud noise is in relation to the fact that that actually in our borough only 60% of children are state educated, and of those, many have faced a difficult process getting a place, and that the 40% are often first time buyers. Every March hundreds of middle class mumsnetty parents are told they do not have a school place, or one they cannot access and that generates a lot of anxiety amongst the rest. To the extent that it is very rare to find a group of mums who met in anti natal or nursery who are still in touch because their children have gone to the local primary and secondary, however much they would have liked to, communities break up as people find different school solutions or move. That was exactly the rationale for the Free School Proposal "was founded in 2011 by a small group of parents who care about our local area and its people. Faced with shrinking catchments and increased demand for our local secondaries, we could see our community breaking up as families moved away or chose non-local schools. We believed our area needed another excellent secondary school. We knew many other people agreed with us, so we decided to do something about it."

So yes we probably are annoyingly loud but we do have something to be loud about

I never go on St Ps vs H&Js vs JKL threads... so I wouldn't know... if they're all people who have no place at all that they can have, then it wouldn't be a good place to debate about state and private, yes.

I get what you're saying, because the OP does sort of seem to reference 'should I go to this private or that private' in a way which might be seen to apply equally to people who would also be saying, in brackets (because there is no state place at all).

But all I took from it was: hey, given that 93% of us do send our children to state schools nearby, isn't it odd that we feel in a minority here? I guess I would see the rest of the posts as a bit of an outburst of it being a pretty normal thing to do - not something that is, in ordinary life, all that much of a big deal.

I found it kind of nice because it didn't feel defensive for once (yes, my child is not the only one in top set maths with A*; no she is not being beaten up; no I didn't move somewhere posh to get that; yes, most state schools are doing a damn good job, and all those of us who find this to be so can't all be wrong!) - perhaps it was a bit cathartic!

I bought my house pre kids because I loved the garden.
At the time the catchment was poor but bearable.
Since then its ended up in the BBCs list of the worst performing schools

I therefore have no guilt at all in admitting that I am MC
that I work part time to feed my yoga habit so cannot afford private
and send my kids to the next available school in that direction
which happens to be a pretty good comp

how long it will stay that way as an academy is anybody's guess

ALL of the state admissions threads are biased towards areas with problems
because people without a problem never feel the need to seek out the opinion of random others

FWIW a friend at the gym reckoned getting her son into Winchester last September was a doddle with no tutoring

TOSN But to go back to the OP, in fact most of those ABCD v EFG v HIJK (and state school names also get abbreviated, quite a few on RPA a state school that has recently improved dramatically from a dire state) actually do come from posters in Richmond or similar boroughs. I really do not see why coming on here to seek advice with what is a difficult decision provokes such derision, which is why I have stood up for them. Those posters are unlikely to deserve to be stereotyped as state school hating elitists. Some of them indeed have been on here asking advice on the state options as well and discovered the difficult environment they face, and others are in the process of researching that.

Fine go on the threads where those who do come out with grossly derogatory comments about state school education and let rip, I'll join in, but isn't Mumsnet supposed to be supportive? If someone asks for advice on state schools in the area, or an area I know, I will and do offer the benefit of my knowledge (and have faced threats of libel action as a result ), the local thread in particular is about to fill up with no school place, or how quickly the waiting lists move, or indeed just moved to the area and how do I make sure I get offered a place with my late application, how close to the school do I have to move? threads.

I am not saying poor me, just live and let live, and don't assume everyone conforms to an easy stereotype.

Well that looks good at the top of the page!

Are you a 1920s Lesbian who despises the lower orders?

I have a deep frying pan on my shoulder. I am both oleaginous and inflamed.

Well, I'm back from my day as a not-very-cool lecturer at a not-very-top University.... but cheers!

I still don't see much wrong with this thread to be honest... I take the point that some are objecting because not everyone who uses private schools feels they had much choice but to do so, and they personally wouldn't dream of coming out with some of the statements and ideas which have been parodied above. But it's not as though you see an awful lot of posts on MN angsting about situations like that - I've never seen anyone say they are fundamentally uncomfortable with private education but are using it anyway - though of course perhaps those people don't post on that subject. If there are such people, I don't think they should feel targetted by anything on here!

But I do not see most of the irritating comments about state schools/comprehensives as coming from posters who live in Richmond and got offered No School... Indeed, some people seem to me (or perhaps I am paranoid) quite deliberately to set out to rile with some of their comments. So 'let's all feel sorry for those who had to go private and just be a bit more supportive' doesn't quite sit right with me.

There's not a post on the first few pages here that isn't a response to something that's actually been said - and maybe it is a bit snarky, and even a bit childish, but that's all I can see.

It never takes long, though, for 'chips on shoulders' and 'inverted snobbery' to get thrown about!

Shooting absolutely. Under this government there has been a massive rise in factionalism and mistrust. It's really sad actually.

Actually Eli we are hopefully going to meet as MAS is heading up the M3, we just need gigs to give us dates and I'll pm you. I'll be the one in the Porsche that is washed hourly by a chav flunky who uses the hides of pitbulls to get a nice sheen.

"Battered old Volvo" is a Mumsnet meme- meaning "honestly, there is just as much of a mix of people in the private sector as there is in the state sector" cf "We don't have holidays any more- we just chuck the tent in the back of the BOV and go down to Cornwall"

It's ironic rather than offensive.

Crikey. Serious sense of humour failure in some quarters.

It is also worth remembering that the median UK income is £27k pa (gross)

Waves at Shooting. We must stop meeting like this

at Potty's Volvo-washing pitbull

Potty Irony. The dog, volvo thing was taking the piss out of the stereotyping. Believe me if you knew what I do for a day job you would know why I am passionately opposed to all the dangerous stereotyping that goes on in our media, on these pages etc. It is wrong to assume that someone fits a mould because of one aspect of their behaviour, economic situation, ethnicity, country of origin or whatever parameter you care to choose. Often those moulds are very dangerously wide of the mark. Sadly we have a government that embraces that sort of soundbite thinking.

Hope that doesn't include me!! LOL!!!

Must say, lavolcan, I just thought that the private school thread flurry had happened because of the offer dates and would be unusual, didn't realise it was the norm as am new to mumsnet. I think you are absolutely right, as I said earlier, I agree that after Monday it will be state sector appealsville.......

lavolcan give it a wekk or so for state school allocations to come out and the boards will be on fire... appeal advice a-go-go.

But I suppose private schools will always be over represented here on MN because it's essentially a middle class forum, and quite London-centric at that.

And yes, because as you say, most parents choosing private schools do have a choice, so want to chew it over with others. It's a big decision for many parents, particularly first time buyers.

Similarly, if you look on the Higher Education threads, Oxbridge and other highly selective universities gather more airtime than, say, Leeds Met...it's just the MN demographic .

Martorana, don't understand, I was agreeing with your earlier thread. I don't feel got at by anyone on this thread, the lampooning doesn't apply to my situation (still need winning lottery ticket) nor do I think that the lampooning is completely unjustified, but it does smack of chips on shoulders and feeds directly into the justification of some better-off families to sneer at worse-off ones. It just doesn't help the situation.

That's all I was trying to say, I did state that "I'm sure some mums have been on the receiving end etc. etc." And I've no doubt, in fact I'm certain, that people have get worse abuse because I've seen and heard it from both ends of the spectrum at my kids' own state school between parents from different financial circumstances. (Sighs and wishes they'd all give up and just concentrate on supporting the school).

But the "battered Volvos", breed of dog comments etc etc ARE stereotypes. Even dogs are getting class stereotyped now!! It's the "us" and "them" that I'm getting at and I don't like, I don't give a flying one whether anyone is from state/ private sector (I'm state, btw, in case that makes me more popular ;) but make no apologies that I've tried for the private sector due to my daughter's needs. To get to the best state comprehensive in my area would constitute a house move into a very expensive postcode.

It isn't fair that not everyone who wants it has access to private education, it isn't fair that not everyone who wants it has access to the massive amount of excellent state education available, but slagging off any sector of society isn't fair either: having or not having money doesn't make you a worthier human being. There's not a massive amount we can do about the school situation, voting red instead of blue or any particular colour didn't make much difference over the last two decades. I just think that the "us and them" attitude is the kind of unfairness that we CAN do something about on a public forum...must go now, just looked out the window and seen my pit-bull peeing on my Volvo.