How can state school parents try & bridge the educational gap that's rapidly forming?

[Kenthighst]

Following on from the excellent thread regarding the shambles of state education. What can us parents do to bridge the gap? Our state school children are being failed & we are being kept in the dark.
What can be done outside school to bridge the gap that has formed between state & private?

And yet the workload generated by overhauling the curriculum and assessment system AGAIN would knock quite a few more teachers out.

Nothing should be done that will increase teacher workload until we have enough, and robust enough teachers to manage the change.

I imagine Labour is banking on the fact that there won’t actually be enough families for whom it is marginal to make a significant difference to the number of children whose parents can afford private and thus how many state secondary places are needed.
It always strikes me that when it is discussed on Mumsnet there are always an awful lot of people who can only just afford the fees and for whom VAT will be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. This isn’t the case for the people I know in RL with children in private schools- I mean there must be marginal people but probably fewer than it seems on here.
Of course they might easily have got it wrong and it will be a disaster.
However I can see that the bigger the state-private gap grows the more politically untenable it is not to charge VAT on school fees, when it is unquestionable that a large percentage of those paying them can well afford it while state schools are becoming ever more desperate.

Quite a few private schools have closed recently and I wouldn't be surprised if even a new Tory government put vat on private schools given fiscal issues so more will close so there will be fewer private schools and less private school leavers to compete with. Already universities are to some extent taking into account higher grades from private schools are not due to merit..

Also education is not leading to a good life for the next generation at the moment due to high cost of rents and student loans, and jobs can be outsourced or taken on by ai. So if they have any practical skills I would amplify those. Not having the pay tradesmen and a career in a practical field could be more lucrative.

PTA money can only be spent in particular areas. It can’t be spent on additional teaching staff for example. So it might bring nicer equipment or the odd day of a classroom guest but it won’t solve deeper problems in education.

Re online exams - exam boards are desperate to introduce them because it would be way cheaper for them to administer (bet they wouldn't reduce their prices though)

https://www.pearson.com/en-gb/news-and-policy/news/2024/01/pearson-gcse-english-onscreen-assessment.html

Schools on the other are basically laughing at the idea that they can get a full class of kids logged onto a laptop at the same time without issues let alone a whole cohort. And of course we don't have the equipment.

Plus recent experience of online exams has shown the potential for massive fuck-up https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/oct/20/oxford-university-online-admissions-tests-plagued-by-erratic-crashes

yes it’s a big shame. I’d prefer it if they dropped the policy

They probably don’t need it anyway

@NotAPsycho have you identified exactlywhat the problem is?

Is it that they're getting behind at ks3 because they don't understand and that's causing them to lose morale and interest?

GCSE is a complete course in itself so if your child is managing for now I wouldn't worry. You will be able to obtain the revision books, past papers etc for the exam board they're studying so it should get easier to support them.

I have or have had children in private education and am reading this thread with interest.

One thing that immediately leapt out at me was the handwriting practice - in pretty much every private school a child with bad/poor handwriting will do though the necessary steps to be able to use a laptop in exams so they won't spend hours working on that but instead be utilising their time more efficiently.

It definitely isn't a level playing field and that is very wrong. If it was I wouldn't be paying insane amounts in school fees.

@OceanicBoundlessness yes part of the problem is that their lesson notes are shit. Whether that is just a DC problem or not I don't know, but comparing to previous year of same subject is like looking at two completely different children's books.

DS1 is in year 8, the secondary schools in our town are massively oversubscribed so he was only ever going to get the nearest secondary. It requires improvement and has done for years. Most of the schools near us are dire. DS1 had no science teacher for the whole of year 7 or the first term of year 8. He's now got a games teacher teaching science (for the first time ever). They don't have textbooks or exercise books. Everything is done on their phones, including homework, or on loose bits of papers.

I don't know how people can choose what secondary their child goes to, we have no choice, it's the shit secondary down the road or private which we can't afford.

I have bought study guides, revision cards, test papers, downloaded the school syllabus, tried to encourage an interest. It's so difficult, he's bright but there's no encouragement at school, the teachers seem to spend most of the lessons sorting out the disruptive students (of which there are many). I'm looking into tutors for year 9 as I don't know what else to do.

Suspect you are right @TheCountessofFitzdotterel - there's also a big divide between those who will pay school fees out of income vs those paying out of savings - the latter could potentially dodge VAT by putting down years of fees upfront before rules change.

One thing that immediately leapt out at me was the handwriting practice - in pretty much every private school a child with bad/poor handwriting will do though the necessary steps to be able to use a laptop in exams so they won't spend hours working on that but instead be utilising their time more efficiently.

that’s true

You could work thru past papers. The mark scheme is always there so that you can see what examiners are looking for.

There are often also videos running through these on YouTube.

not that we will get into round here..

Google can come up with whatever policy it likes. 🙄

I control our router and I pay my ds' phone bill. Which means they go off at night, and will do until he's 16, after his GCSEs.

@bravefox Is moving not an option since private may be unaffordable?

Unless he does as my friend’s dd did and gets a secret phone.

Also some private’s are struggling with the TPA & are opting out, I think it’s about 25%. That will likely impact recruitment.

We are currently in private prep but planning on state for secondary - so reading this with interest but it all sounds thoroughly depressing 😕

I don't know, DD who is very quiet, well behaved, is in year 8 and has had the same cover teacher for DT for 3 weeks in a row, he's told them just to get on with sketching their designs at the start of the lesson and that is he all he does. He is on his phone the rest of the time and then says, 'goodbye'.

DD was in nurturing group for maths last year, in year 7 and now she is in top group! Nobody noticed her and she was ill the day of the CATS so didn't do well at all. She had challenging behaviour from peers in the nurturing group, violent behaviour and she would get frustrated with some girls who were always moaning. We advocated for her and asked what had happened as we were shocked and she did really well at the test at Christmas. She is so quiet that she needs that advocacy.

@TheCountessofFitzdotterelare you in the SE? We are in the NW and before that we lived in Yorkshire but we are both from the SE. Up here we see a lot of parents, friends of ours, who are just about managing the 12k a year to send their child private. Fees were similar in Yorkshire when we looked but more like 12k a term in the SE meaning it was far less likely that parents could make sacrifices such as no nice cars or holidays abroad to just about afford fees. That’s not to say everyone or even most people can manage that but it’s certainly more common to be in that position when fees are 12k a year rather than when they’re 36k a year.

What’s your school nearby like?

State can vary quite a bit

We’re Yorkshire but our private-educating friends are mostly SE, a few scattered around the country, not many local. The local ones can well afford it. But what you say makes sense.

I think a massive contrast - a huge comp which is sadly has a poor reputation (although amazing facilities) and had an ofsted "requires improvement" or grammar - which we'd hoped for but might not work for my eldest. But as @CarrieCardigan says we're in the SE so the cheapest private is over £30k - which is almost double the prep fees! Will have to research options thoroughly!

Excellent post. Agree totally.