The most Socially Selective schools in England.

"The minute you segregate children into silos of god, gonads or the ability to be tutored for a test
you limit the potential of those whose parents were unable to line up the hoops.
And that is bad for the long term future of the country."

Well said.

I also think having a critical mass of parents demanding things like good music provision in state schools would make a difference. At the moment people whose children are talented or high achieving in music are often encouraged to remove them from state schools. My ds is the highest achieving child in music in his state primary. He's not a prodigy, just grade 4 in two instruments, but even at that level the school can't provide differentiated music lessons. He spends most of his music lessons at school stapling worksheets with the TA. I'm the only parent who has a problem with lack of differentiation in music and I've given up mentioning it. The school doesn't give a shit - they're too busy worrying about SATS.

few free school meals

I agree very strongly, choclover.

FWIW, my parents live in the catchment of Cranbrook School and I know plenty of people who send their DC there. Few school meals but it is not a ghetto of the über rich by any stretch of the imagination.

FSM is mot a very good measure of social elitism.Having few very poor children, is not the same thing as having lots of rich ones.Two completely different things.

Smokepole - many private schools offer generous bursaries and scholarships to kids who are highly talented at sport.

Doctors and lawyers?

It's what my fee paying friends want for their kids.

Know too many lawyers and docs to wish that for my kids though!

Why do people get so hung up on certain professions?!

What's more concerning imo is not the disproportionate number of privately-educated people competing in elite sports, but their over-representation in the medical and legal professions.

My DS is going to a private school but I still think the ratio of private:state educated doctors and lawyers should be a fairer reflection of society at large.

"The proportion of medal winners from "bog standard" or socially deprived Comprehensives must be very small despite the fact these types of schools account for 85% of pupils."

Well, yes. Regardless of whether your kids go to an academically selective school, they're more likely to be successful in any sport which doesn't have stacks of money available as a sport to invest in its grass roots (i.e. football) if their parents can afford their equipment, entry fees, petrol money to drive them to competitions, time off work if these competitions are during working hours, hotels if they're a long way away, and so on.

I'm not seeing anything in these statistics which goes beyond "if you're rich, you have more money to spend on luxuries." High level sports training and competition is a luxury.

Arsenic - I agree, working farms and proper stables would be lovely.

Mostly, in state schools, it involves children who already ride making themselves into a team and begging a member of staff to accompany them to competitions. This is why we don't usually have a team at our school. The few that have horses aren't interested. We had a team a couple of years ago due to a sixth former taking on the organisation.

Smoke pole - apologies for Nick Skelton - I should have checked.

I'm struggling to imagine how it works in schools TBH Dapple or how it is paid for.

Now I am imagining whole country fair style sports days (on the back of what happy said) and thinking agricultural schools would be no bad thing. Working farms and proper stables.....

Dapplegrey, all I know is that competitive horseriding at the highest level is very expensive. That means that you must either have family that can help with costs or you have some contacts or connections that can help you out. I read somewhere that the number of privately-educated sportmen and women in the last Olympic team was disproportionately high. So what I am saying applies to all sports at the elite level, but horse-riding in particular.

"Put it this way- if we were living in Sussex now and dressage was on the sports curriculum and DD was picked for a team, I'd arrange something. A pony share, something."
Arsenicfacecream - surely a child would only be picked for a team if she had shown promise on a particular pony which they wanted for the team? The pony wouldn't have to belong to him/her, but he/she and the pony would have had to have won competitions together before the selection committee would consider them.

Sorry - that post was addressed to outwiththecrowd.

"If equestrianism was truly egalitarian, there would have to be members of the hoi polloi getting into the British Olympic team from time to time - but does that ever happen?"
This is what you said in your first post, but then when I pointed out some state educated members of equestrian teams you changed your comment to state educated riders were under represented on the teams.
That is true, I think of eventing, but I doubt whether it is the case in show jumping.
I don't know about dressage.
Which particular team were you thinking of?

Posted too soon, just wanted to say that this is what you do if you live in a deprived area, you do what you can to sing a better song.
It was seeing this that made me realise that I had to do this for my family, nobody was going to knock on my door and offer them a great education.

but I still love cows they have pure poetry.

This has complicated the issue

I agree that cultural capital is essential to giving dc the opportunities in life.
It doesn't matter where you come from or how much money you have, if there is ability and talent a child should be given the opportunity to succeed.

I was a cow obsessed teenager. I've been successfully cured of the horse thing but I still love cows they have pure poetry. Cows like horses are inside you, for those who have it they are just so special.
But my point is that why shouldn't rural state schools have equestrian teams? Its not necessarily an indicator of a catchment area with wealth and privilege but a reflection of their rural farming catchment area. Many people associate horses with money and privilege but not cows and those who criticise state schools with equestrian teams probably would bat an eye lid about a rural school where livestock farming predominates with a school team showing cows.
By the way your average dairy costs just shy of 2k.

That boy's case makes me think of all the equally talented children who do not have the advantage of parents with cultural capital.

Which is precisely why I am in favour of Comprehensive schooling in the State sector - so that even the children of the most half arsed parents have the same opportunities offered to the motivated professional parents in the area.

The minute you segregate children into silos of god, gonads or the ability to be tutored for a test
you limit the potential of those whose parents were unable to line up the hoops.
And that is bad for the long term future of the country.