To have enjoyed my state education MORE than my private education expereinces?

[poshsinglemum]

I do apprechiate my private school education BUT I went to a state primary and a state comp and I have to say that i enjoyed the state schools more. I just felt more at home.

I just couldn't relate to my peers at all at the private school with their yaughts, holidays in Necker and ponies.

I never felt that I could be myself and I didn't thrive socially.

I am so glad that I have experienced both as I feel that I can see the merits of both and I won't feel that I have failed dd if I can't send her to a private school.

The private school campus was an amazing environment in the physical sense but in a social sense it was very tough and based on flashing lots and lots of cash.

Depends on the school. Schools like Manchester Grammar (private) and those my children went to Habs, North London etc are not really "posh" and loads of people do not have huge amounts of money. Mos people who apply don't get in as they don't pss the entrance test. Other private schools are more comprehensive and some have very rich children some a bit thick,. If you want one where you get children of shop keepers and hard working clever immigrants and not posh then just if yo uhave a child bright enough, send them to that type and they do very well and get the chance to meet people of all kinds (albeit mostly those who can afford £10k a year fees).

"I just couldn't relate to my peers at all at the private school with their yaughts, holidays in Necker and ponies". You see I don't think most parents at schools my 5 children have gone to in the privage sector have yachts and I'm the only one who owns an island(!) and few owned ponies.

I don't recall many yacht and island owners either, quite a few ponies but then lots of us were the offspring of farmers so the land was there.

I'd choose private for a better academic education any day. I'd choose by individual school for it's ethos etc.

I went to a state school and had the shit kicked out of me for five years. I got a crappy education and had a completely miserable time.

I think that has everything to do with that particular school and fuck all to do with state schools in general.

Ds1 and his friends don't particularly know how much money the each have. Being flash is considered total wankery. Even if they knew they wouldn't give a shit.

Schools are all different. Extrapolating one experience across an entire system is daft.

And our private schools are the envy of the world. Their product, the children, goes on to lead this nation and comprises 50% of the student population at the better universities despite being 6% of all pupils and the women and men produced by these schools do so much better in all walks of life than children from state schools. There is little you can do better for your child as a woman other than love it of course, than to work hard and earn enough to pay school fees at a good school.

I was privately educated all the way. I think it did me good because I was a bit of a rebel and really couldn't be bothered with learning stuff. I honestly think that if I'd been at a school three or four times the size, I would have come out with no GCSE's and would probably have found myself in alot more trouble than I actually ended up in. You simply could not get away with skipping classes and the like, every teacher knew every child. So personally, I'm glad I was sent private because somehow I managed to come out with some decent grades.

What puzzles me on here though is that some people seem to think that private school is a one size fits all deal, and it's realy not. They differ vastly, as do their fees. And as others have said, there are good and bad.

I do remember having a feeling that a few teachers just didn't like any of the children though, because they were at private school and came from families that obviously had some money to spend on education. It was like that was held against you from the start by some.

Curlymama, I have a friend who says the same about her son. One child got into grammar school and her boy did too but he is a lazy rebel and she needed an environment with smaller classes and greater discipline. Arguably the school is not academically better but he would have fallen through the net in a large grammar school.

The head at our school frequently points out the children he is sending to University with A* grades are the ones that failed the 11+.
It is thought locally that if you can get into the grammars then private is a waste of money, I am not yet sure if that's the case but children who are considered to have failed at 11 often have the last laugh if their parents fund them.

Xenia - how terribly snobby you sound - good for you that you are able to afford school fees and can send your child to a private school but have to work your fingers to the bone to do it.

Pity the poor children who have to go to a state school like my poor nephew who left last year with 9 A*

Yawn

Some private schools are good, some are bad

Some state schools are good, some are bad

Some children will do better in a private environment, some in a state environment

It is impossible to say "state schools are better than private schools" or "private schools are better than state schools"

Next...

If it's such a boring subject minipie why keep reading the thread and making comment?

What I was trying to say, applecrumble, is that there are many threads saying "private schools are horrible" and the same answer is always given by MNers: some are good, some are not, they work for some and not for others. You can't generalise.

However, even though the same answer is always given, we continue to get posts like the OP's which again makes a negative generalisation about private schools.

Which seems to show that these threads achieve nothing ...