Private or move house for state school

You really can't compare state vs private. The decision is WAY more complex than that.
What does the independent school offer your kids that the state school doesn't?
Why would it meet their needs better?
Will they get in?

There are a LOT of private schools I wouldn't send my dcs to even if they were free.

Is there only one state school you could move close to?

My kids are in a very good Outstanding secondary where house prices are (in London terms) cheaper than neighbouring areas.

Racecardriver are you actually serious? It’s not families who send their kids to state school who are responsible for the dire straits that a lot of state schools are in, it’s the cuts to funding implimented by this horrendous government.
We send our daughter to independent school because there is no school that we are in catchment for that I would dream of sending her to. I lay the blame for this entirely at the feet of the government. She is on a decent scholarship and we still have to be careful of the finances to send her there but we realise we are very fortunate that we are able to do this. My preference would have been to send her to a decent state school that had provision for the sport she does and use the money to save for her uni because that’s financially crippling too

We have chosen private education over moving house. We adore our house and the area but the secondary provision is weak and very few state children get into the private secondary schools so we have gone private from the start.

The private school DS has joined is very unpretentious and the majority of families live in very average homes and sacrifices foreign holidays to pay for school fees, so we don’t feel out of place. This won’t be the case for all schools, but don’t assume all private schools will be full of super wealthy families.

I gave this matter quite a lot of thought in your position OP some years ago. I won't bore you with our decision but here are some factors that you may not have considered.

• Once you've paid the money to trade up the property ladder, you get to keep that property.

• Think about what happens after school. You'll have university fees to fund and then after that you're going to have to help financially to get the kids sorted out as young adults.

• The cost of our school fees worked out at around £180k per child not boarding (day schools from 3-18). And the expense will only go up as school fees increase ahead of the cost of inflation.

• Academics, music, sport and a hard working peer group are the reasons often cited for choosing private. Plan out your reasons for choosing private and then see if you can do the same in the state sector with a bit more running around,

Good luck

racecarderiver, seriously??? You do realise that taxation contributes to education?

Just to clear up from earlier - I've emailed my son's school twice in 3 years & always got a fast reply. Maybe because I'm not "that parent"! 🤣🤣🤣

“Do the right thing and take finacial responsibility for your reproductive choices instead of milking the welfare system that was meant to protect the poor.”

What complete bollocks.

It's morally wrong not to pay for your childs education if you can afford it. It is families like yours who treat state education as a free for all that are responsible for the dire state of state education. Don't be part of the problem. Do the right thing and take finacial responsibility for your reproductive choices instead of milking the welfare system that was meant to protect the poor.

Yes AgedTawneyPort, I understand OP has 3 which is why I say what was right for us. We would easily spend an extra 200k moving house to a catchment with a so called outstanding School.

Private education every time if you have done the maths properly and can afford it.

And what if Labour get in and put VAT on school fees as mooted?"

It would be fantastic....Oh, sorry, that's not what you were asking, is it.

And what if Labour get in and put VAT on school fees as mooted? Add 20% to your bill ...

Schools can change a lot over a few years. Our local primary school was in special measures just before our daughter was born. But by the time she started school it had turned around and people were actually choosing to send their children there.

When it gets nearer the time I'd go and look around the nearest secondary schools to you and see what they are like - most will hold open days either in the summer or autumn terms or both. Find out what people who have children there think of them (you will find that lots of people have opinions about schools that they've never set foot inside and have no experience of but have 'heard' things about it). A change in head teacher can make a massive difference - positive or negative to a school. Also bear in mind that schools judged as 'outstanding' by Ofsted may not have been inspected for several years so may be resting on their laurels. It can take time for a change in head and a new approach to filter through to the results for the school. A great school on paper may not be the best fit for your child.

Also consider the longer term - do you think that your children might want to go to university? How much financial help will you be able to give to that as well as having younger children at an independent school?

If you think you want to look at independent schools I think there are savings and investment plans out there that it would be worth considering to help you fund it.

There is also no guarantee children will get places at the independents worth paying for but I am London centric.

In your place I would keep my options open, keep an eye on property options/prices and keep an eye on the local schools and their results.

I would suggest trying to save £2-3k per month which is still significantly less than you would need to find for three sets of school fees.

If you do decide to go down the private route it gives you a significant financial 'cushion' and also the knowledge that you can find that amount of money each month and know the impact on your lifestyle. If you go for a state option and decide to move you will have savings to put into a new house, or a massive 'pot' for holidays, extra-curricular activities, tutors etc.

Your children are also very young and you don't really know how they might do academically. If you are considering a selective private option you can't guarantee that they will all meet the required standard. It's worth finding out about as many schools as possible given that the same school may not be the right one for all of your children (and that's another debate!).

I would so so so recommend state, as long as you can afford a nice enough house in the catchment.

Imo, state schools can be great, the only thing I am not impressed with was the sport and DS had his heart set on fencing... so we moved into the catchment of good state schools and I promised to take him to fencing lessons myself, paying £80 a term for lessons with the same coach who coaches the 35k a year public school down the road

Another thing to think about is that life can throw you some curved balls, I have two friends whose husbands had phases of redundancy, and had to beg the school to be allowed to delay payment. Stress stress stress. Another friend has cancer and is not allowed to go back to work, with 3 kids in private school this was additional stress (though her parents can afford fees)

The safer bet imo is a good state school, and take them to after school sports themselves

We found two 'barriers' to our plan of moving house for a great secondary school vs paying for private education:

1. there is absolutely no guarantee your children will get a place at the state school, even when you live very close (as has happened to several friends of ours - one of them, 60 seconds walk to the school!). Check out the admissions criteria and who gets priority on places.

2. the cost of moving house plus the 'premium' on the house price in a location close enough to mitigate the worry about 1), FAR exceeded the cost of fees for our two children (even with inflation). So, private education was more affordable than moving house.

No surprise, we chose private (and international school rather than local now we're abroad).

The facilities, sports, extra stuff is where we get the value. My kids love sport and they have PE/ games of some sort just about every day!

That's nice, I suppose, but the OP has three kids! I really can't imagine paying putting three children through private school for xx number of years, in order to enjoy somewhat nicer extra curriculars and a better equipped sports gym...

OP, if the great state secondary gets similar academic results, invest in a property close by. You will have money to spare for extra curriculars and tutoring, and still have money left over to put into investments or savings so that your kids will have money for university fees and a housing deposit in the future.

maisy, we trust the school to get in touch if they need to.

We didn’t get appointments with everyone for parents eve. The message came home ‘Mum, Miss X said tell your Mum you are doing really well but she can email me if she wants to’.

So I didn’t bother, I am sure Miss X is as busy as I am and if she needed to she would contact me.

if the eldest is 4 you have time to plan your lives to relocate somewhere with outstanding secondaries and decent housing.
honestly unless you are both earning serious cash and will carry on doing this for the next 20 years dont start on private school for 3.

aged
It's not an issue for most people. Generally common sense wins and if a child has complex needs or SEND then there is often a nominated point of contact.

Some parents (not saying the PP is one btw) seem to think that whatever their particular question/query is, it's more important than anything else staff are doing. They can get really short and whiny if staff don't reply within the day so by the time you have caught the 3 members of staff needed in order to answer Mrs Blogs' query, Mrs Blogs has already rang school again wanting to speak to someone senior because the person they originally left a message for 'can't be bothered to deal with it properly'.

Can I ask why contacting teachers directly is such a concern?

I have had need to contact secondary school twice in a year, I email admin and whatever it is gets dealt with.

I haven't felt the need to contact a teacher directly.

All very much depends on the individual schools.
Where we live our catchment secondary is dire and we had the choice of moving to be near one of the nearby outstanding schools or going private. Dh went to one of the state schools and hated it so that ruled that one out. The other one would have required us to move into our local big town (busy suburban estate) but we both love the countryside plus it’s a much more expensive area. Also both of the state schools are enormous - 1500-2000 kids with classes of over 30 which we both didn’t like.

All in all we love where we live so decided instead on a local private school. Parents are a real mix. Some are very wealthy but many work hard and make sacrifices to send their kids private. We don’t do big holidays, have fancy cars etc and the kids are very happy and fit in fine. Of dd’s two best mates, one lives in an enormous house with tennis courts, swimming pool etc and the other in a 2 bed semi on the nearby housing estate. They all get on fine and have no money issues.
However there is another local private (much higher fees) where I have heard that it’s a different story...

Every state school I've worked in has enabled parental contact with staff.

I'll be honest the better ones have a reasonable system for it (e.g. call reception, leave details and we'll call back in 48 hours / email 48 hour responses).

Now if you are expecting a system where you'll get a call back within an hour or so or same day replies to email then I'm afraid expectations need managing.

(I'll never forget the state school I worked at where parents would email us directly and then call the school to complain that they emailed us at 9am and they have STILL not had a reply by 1130. Parents would also send emails at 1030pm outlining that their child has not compelted their homework and so they will not be getting a sanction tomorrow! Entitlement central for some people)