How do you justify seding your child to boarding school?

You’re missing the point, Word, if you care to read through all the postings on Winchester College, we are led to believe it’s the only academic school on earth.

And what’s so pathetic about rivalry between public school parents anyway? Threads on education here on MN are all about agreements and disagreements. There's no difference here between pro and against boarding, for example. It's up to readers to decide which is which and learn something from them. If you can’t stomach that, then go and read something else.

(Oh, I have set up an accidental straw man. I do not put DS's happiness over his academic qualifications. I have every expectation that he will get the same 'paper' qualifications as a child in a selective school would, because that is 'the norm' for high ability pupils at his comp. However, I do understand that an identical string of A / A*s in identical subjects will not necessarily reflect an 'identical educational experience.)

I understand your reasoning teacher I have a friend with a child who is regarded by all as a genius (maths and music).

In his primary years she stuck with her local state school as they a very average family. They are also black. This mattered to her a lot, in her choice of school, because she flet that no matter how gifted, he was still going to be a black working class teenager in London, and he needed to be able to live that life IYSWIM.

However, state primary admitted defeat very quickly and suggested a selective private school (on a bursary). My firend was very against this as she felt it would make her son an outlier in his own extended family.

I understood this and sympathised, but other matters pushed it forward so off he went (even they found it hard to deal with him, and organised sessions at university as part of his school day).

It hasn't been perfect by any means. But it has been the least worst IYSWIM.

For my DC, it was different. He is not a mathmo. His ability is pretty high across the board. He's not a genius. Other than that he is a perfectly prdinary kid; loves footie, playing on PS3, watching Inbetweeners and eating crisps.

What he needed was an accelerated education across the board, but also lots of sport and banter etc.

"I did not want him to be the outlier. I wanted his ability normalised."

When DS was little - before the anxiety, selctive mutism et al - I would absolutely have subscribed to that.

Those events wholly changed my outlook. Essentially, I want DS - and different, but also very able DD - to live, as far as possible, an absolutely normal life. To understand 'normality', to have a wide range of friends, to fully see that academic ability is only a small part of oneself. As Word says, his ability is not going to 'disappear' through attending a mixed ability comp. [Though numbers are coloured, in his case. He had initial difficulty with algebra because the relationship between 'non-coloured' letters and 'coloured' numbers wasn't intrinsically obvious to him]. But through choosing to place him in very 'normal' educational environments, other parts of him - music, an exceptional ability in a sport, an unexpected flair for languages amd history [at a 'normal' high ability level], as well as the ability simply to knock around with a wide mixture of friends - have been encouraged to a much greater extent. If you like, he 'passes as normal' in most environments - and that is something I could not have dreamed of some years ago. Choosing to focus on 'making the normal bit his exceptional ability' would not have led us to quite the same point. And I understand, like the boarding / not debate, it depends a lot on an individual family's values whether you think it is 'a shame that DS's area of very strong ability (which isn't going away, it's just not being 'dragged out of him to the full in every lesson' at this precise moment) isnt being maximised' or 'great that he is such a relaxed, happy, well-rounded young man with such a vibrant and eclectic grioup of friends'...

Oh pet I think it's a stretch to try to pretend that Win Col isn't a very academic school.

Honestly, the rivalry between public school parents is frankly pathetic!

”In twenty years studying/working at Oxbridge, I don't think I have ever seen a maths genius from happygardening's son's school. Admittedly I would reserve this term for a handful of maths students but most of the people I would call maths geniuses don't come from the well-known public schools. (There are exceptions - Fields medallist Tim Gowers, for example.)”

And which School educated Fields medallist Tim Gowers, do you think?

Certainly not that “very academic” school, Winchester College. . .

He was a KS, no less.

Wordfactory: "I did not want him to be the outlier. I wanted his ability normalised."

This. This is why we are looking at boarding schools for DS, because there is no day school option, state or independent, in which he would not be very much an outlier.

I think what I say also applies to most of science and engineering, probably economics too, but I cannot back up my opinions with facts apart from in maths and physics. But in any case I just don't agree with happygardening that Winchester is the place to be if you're great at maths.

I suppose what I'm saying is that for pure maths ability at that level, I think education at school level is almost by-the-by, whatever the sector, whichever school.

gauss I'm no mathmo, but it has always struck me that ability in maths is a bit of an exception. A one off if you like.

Many young mathmos seem to almost teach themselves irrespective of background.

It seems to be a very different way of looking at the world. My friend, for example, says 'numbers are freindly'. She sees them in streams, helping her to order her world, and always has. When she looks at a bridge, she sees the numbers that make it work, and always has.

Attending a comp in Hackney didn't affect this ability/way of seeing the world one iota.

I don't know if I'm making sense here...just musing.

In twenty years studying/working at Oxbridge, I don't think I have ever seen a maths genius from happygardening's son's school. Admittedly I would reserve this term for a handful of maths students but most of the people I would call maths geniuses don't come from the well-known public schools. (There are exceptions - Fields medallist Tim Gowers, for example.)

I am very familiar with happygardening's son's school through family attending it and also through knowing one of the governors. I don't accept that it is miles ahead of other state and private selectives in maths and physics education - e.g. they extend physics in the sixth form but most of what they do is decades out of date and not relevant to modern physics. I also don't believe that the students there are massively better than those in other selective schools - whatever their own studies claim to show, it's hard to probe intelligence in a way that does not reflect background and education also. (Oxbridge students are selected not just for intelligence but also for achievement, which is enormously affected by background and education. The top 5 or 10% are very smart but many of those coming in from places like Winchester don't turn out to be in the top 5 or 10%.)

Finally, if one looks at the UK Maths Olympiad teams, which really are searching for maths geniuses, it is true that members often do come from some of the top private schools. This year's team included boys from St Paul's and Dulwich. Yet many of the team also come from state schools, sometimes regular comprehensives. (And of course many state schools and private schools don't enter the Olympiads at all - I was never entered but topped my year in Maths at Oxbridge.) See:

www.imo-register.org.uk

for the relatively few Winchester students - and note moreover that rather few of the Winchester students have gone on to become mathematicians.

This is not to say that I would exclude sending my DS to Winchester because I think the depth and breadth of their education is great. But I wouldn't send a DS there just because of maths and physics.

I think it depends what you want for your DC.

I have a very able child and what I wanted more than anything was him to be one of many and have a like-ability peer group.

I did not want him to be the outlier. I wanted his ability normalised.

I believe that the experience of education should be collegiate and challenging and to get that you need a good chunk of people just like you, working at your level.

IMVHO the best way to provide this for my DC is a super-selective school. Fortunately, I have one I can access where he doesn't need to board. Everyone's a winner.

As an aside I also work at Oxbridge and obviously come across many able young people, including those who attended comps (though they are the minority). My view that able people are more satisfactorily challenged and happier in a like-ability envoronment has not been swayed. In fact, I would be hugely in favour of more state super selectives.

Hak....

I would say that sums up my DH in a nut shell.

Teacher....

Actually it is the same in HK..Where the selective state schools all out perform their private sector school. Although, competition in these schools are really fierce. Tutoring is rife and quite frankly expected. You are expected to be tutored from academic subjects through to extra curriculum subjects too. Pastoral care is zero. You swim or sink. If you sink then your out.

So I understand that if I just wanted my daughter to get good results. I could have let enroll in the state secondary that is a super selective. All go onto Ivy league or RG universities.

People say well isn't that the same as a private selective boarding school. Well know because they actually get taught at school. They get to understand. Thats saves time instead of just rote learning answers. They get to think.

Then when they board they get to play with their peers instead of being at some tutorial center. Trying to get an academic edge over your peers.

Hmm actually Im more sure of how right my choice is now. Than ever before.

"BTW Kenlee local private schools where I am now are a fall back option if children don't get a place in one of the selective state secondaries."

Exactly the same here, with the addition that they are a fall back for parents if cildren don't get into the residual grammars OR the good comps - because the private school results (with a single, single sex exception) are lower that both selective AND good comprehensive schools round here. Which is why the comparison should always be made on a school by school, not sector by sector basis.

Briefly replying on very able mathematicians. One of the ex-pupils of Happy's son's schools I know very well is a mathematician. By any measure - Maths olympiad, PhD, publications, position in Cambridge Maths tripos, simple ability to 'do maths stuff' etc - he is exceptionally able. His son is, equally, a 1 in 10,000 type mathematician (won't bore you with the testing regime that got there), but attends an almost non-selective private day school and thrives, mathematically and otherwise.

Of course, it helps being 'second generation very able'. Family discussions can supplement school teaching. The family has a picture of what 'interesting maths' for each age group loooks like, a network of mathematician friends to draw on, and knows about things like the Olympiad that provide interesting challenge. The school is flexible and makes individual accommodation for able pupils. But the son is also, by virtue of a more 'balanced' education but without sacrificing his maths, also a much more 'balanced' individual than is dad was at the same age [pretty much the age at which I first met his dad, so I can make the direct comarison]. And that is a deliberate choice by his parents.

'" There is nowt worse than to wake up ta go ta school. Knowing you will be alone with your books. Teachers aren't any xxexpletivexxx use. xxexpletivexx bastards each and everyone of them..Hated them. They taught me xxexpletivexx all. "

What a masterly exposition of the state system.

Mummy I will pm you the school...I would be intrested too..I dont think my other half would be though.

I think the ability to make lots of money is not related to academic ability. If your smart your smart. If your not you can work hard and still do well for yourself.

He would say he is a product of poverty ...racial abuse and discrimination.

Mumtrying there are obviously many extremely bright children in the state system and some will do very well helped by some teachers, their parents and their own ambitions. However in either private or state, parents are going to be frustrated when they see their able DCs disengaged from learning and losing that spark.
I think that disengagement can also happen in state superselectives or some private schools which can equally suffer from patchy teaching. Certainly teaching a narrow curriculum aimed at the middle of the normal distribution curve is not going to help.
Selective schools, whatever the teaching quality, do have the advantage that a bright DC is less likely to overestimate their own ability as some top set comprehensive pupils do by comparing themselves to less academic DCs.

Kenlee can I ask which school this was. After all your exceptionally bright OH, who is now a wealthy businessman, must have been a top performer so if "He did scrape by a few good O levels" the other children at school with him must have come away with very few qualifications at all. I would be very interested in knowing if that school has got any better according to OFSTED ;-)

BTW Kenlee local private schools where I am now are a fall back option if children don't get a place in one of the selective state secondaries.

summerends thanks for the link, will investigate tomorrow, much appreciated :-)

Kenlee interesting, I'm a northerner and can't relate to a single word your OH said, other than the expletives TBH. I imagine Cherie Blair and Kenny Everett agree with me as they went to the same state school as I did. OK not the most inspiring examples.

I wonder if every genius who existed went to private school, certainly reading MN threads it would suggest they did. HO HUM, never mind the rest of us will happily sweep the gutter.

Mumtryingherbest this is of course going off topic this thread on a recent programme might interest you. www.mumsnet.com/Talk/education/2164172-Educators-on-R4-What-really-matters-in-education.
Generally I think those teachers who have the most experience of teaching the very able, (helped by the framework of a superselective school, freedom from the curriculum, time to prepare lessons and higher qualifications) are best qualified to do so, just as an eye specialist has more experience and is better qualified to treat eyes than a GP.

Smoke what you seem to not grasp in your commenty is that if a child gets into a state school by foul means then its not the done thing. If all state schools were all as good as each other these things will not happen. I have not stated in any of my statements that state school are bad. I have only stated that with boarding you have a choice.

Now yes I can sign a 30K cheque or more for my daughter to school. It does not make me a bad person because I can. Im not partiularly bothered about sending my daughter to Oxford or Cambridge or even UCL where I met my husband. Im sure she will find her place in life. I want her to be happy. To be with liked minded people to have adventures. To discover the world. Im sure that can be done at state too. Yet my daughter is more than happy to be in boarding with her boarding friends. Its a choice we make.

On your State vs private boarding Im sure lots of kids get into elite university form state school. My husband is from state and he is the first to say before we had children that none of them will goto state school. He siad it was lonley and he always felt like he was left out. Opposed to his cousins who went private. He doesn't have friends from secondary school. He only has University friends So I suppose now that he is successful he is a product of a good state school education?

That is why he is adamant that if his daughter chooses private he will let her. We have now found that at the end of year 7. She has friends she is loved by ...Some are just friends and some dislike her. To my husband its all worth it for the friendship sge has made.

My husband words as he is from the North

" There is nowt worse than to wake up ta go ta school. Knowing you will be alone with your books. Teachers aren't any xxexpletivexxx use. xxexpletivexx bastards each and everyone of them..Hated them. They taught me xxexpletivexx all. "

He did scrape by a few good O levels...which lead to A levels...he did ok..and was accepted into UCL...Where he eventually flourished.

He still hates memories of his state school and any mention of it will get him going on how state schools are full of xxexpletivexx teachers.

I am sure State school have many good teachers but since everyone is giving isolated examples. I think I should too.

happygardening smoke I've been told on three separate occasions by teachers in the state school I've looked at, two were outstanding high achieving schools that they cannot sufficiently challenge the super able. Were these personal friends by any chance as I've yet to find a state school teacher that will tell a parent that they can't do their job (redundancy/sack anyone).

BTW I know four state school teachers that have never claimed that they would be unable to sufficiently challenge the "super able" (what ever "super able" is as I don't believe it's official academic terminology). PM me happygardening, I'll be happy to tell you what schools they are teaching at, bear in mind there are super selective state schools ;-)