to wonder what the fuss is regarding Private Schools?

[peppapigandhumf]

A friend has 2 kids at a local prep school. She doesnt really bang on about the school to me etc but i wonder why bother pay for education when schooling is free.

Is it really just about small class sizes and fancy expensive uniforms?

It is very easy to have principles if your local school is good.

Begonyabampot Well done - Brilliant post.

Exactly Soupy. Perennial battle with SIL who thinks it aberrant that we didn't send ours to our catchment comp. She lives in catchment for the one of the best comps in London and chose to send her daughters to Camden high school for A level. Yet because we wanted ours to do triple sciences and chose their schools accordingly (private as local comp would only do double science at the time my son was reaching that age), she believes us to be morally inferior to her. We visited local school again for DD2's transfer to secondary and realised that there was no opportunity for her to do any of the music she loves (and no, being out of the house 4x evenings a week to take her to band practice in the town was not my idea of fun- much better she does it at school over lunch). And that was our best local school. The ones in the city are mostly truly awful apart from one which we had no hope of getting into and one (performing arts specialism) completely the other side of town which gets poor results on the whole but seems a very much better school but would have been a bugger to get to. So we went for the lazy option because we could afford to.

I cant believe my earlier posts caused such a ruckus!

A couple of facts:

My children go to state schools.

We used to live near this school. One murder, one serious stabbing, and these are just the stories that made it onto the news. I specifically stated that you cannot generalise a whole sector from one school, but please find a private school with a record like that.

Until all state schools operate at a decent comparable level and perform as equally well as private schools generally do, then I can't blame parents going private. Ideally i would like every child to be offered the same quality of education - it would be nice if private schools were a thing of the past as they do on the whole give an unfair advantage to those pupils taught there - whether it be academic or moving in the right circles, being accepted to the best universities, etc - unfortunately we aren't there yet. I'll save my sympathy for the children and their parents who have to go to those schools no-one wants to go to - how shit is that.

Ultimately though it's not just about state/private is it, it's about wanting what is best for one's children and what works for a family - financially etc

When my children are 11 etc I will face these options:

1 - sink local secondary
2 - private
3 - move house to a better catchment

I would much much prefer to go for 3 as I do prefer state schools in terms of ethos for my children; I also love one particular state school for various reason, but houses in that catchment are hugely expensive.

So however you turn it, unless we are prepared to send our kids to the local sink school, then we are paying...so I could never take the moral high ground here over private as I don't see moving to a better catchment being much different than paying for private tbh.

"Until all state schools operate at a decent comparable level and perform as equally well as private schools generally do, "

But they never will - see my posts about selection earlier. Peopel forget, when they look at statistices that ordinary state schools take anyone in theri catchment, private and faith schools select. And any form of selection is liekly to imporve sresults because, again as I said earlier, parental involvement is a key indicator of success.

I think that's correct seeker.

Certainly your assertion that most children who do well at private school would have done well at a local state school because their parents are motivated and supported, sits as common sense with me.

Unfortunely, though, so many parents don't seem to want to support.

There's a thread alive at the moment where posters are saying how wrong it is that they have to sign a reading record.
How it's too much to ask.
And there are always threads from posters who think anything remotely taxing for their children is stressful and pressure.

Then there are the parents at the school where I volunteer who just don't give a shit at all.

And I just despair and would much rather be surrounded by parents who are like minded. I know I could fly the good flag and blaze a trail...but we would be out of step...and I would be disheartend all the time.

The thik is, I don;t think you would be out of step. There are always plenty of motivated and interested parents - they may not look or sound like you and me (wild assumption on my part about how you look and sound!) but they care about their children's education and behaviour as you and I do. The ones that don't are, in my experience, in a minority. They just get disproportionate air time. Especially on here!

Maybe you're right, seeker.

And to be fair, on the homework diary thread a lot more posters did wade in and say FFS, it's hardly a chore. Not just me.

And I know not all schools are like the one where I volunteer. The level of disinterest among the parents is breathtaking, but can't be usual.

The problem with choosing between state and private is that you basically don't know the right answer until your DCs have tried them ... and then it may well be too late.

Decisions become based on dubious statistics, anecdotes and the parent's past experiences. None of which are ideal. So as parents you tend to become very risk-averse and will tend to go with the safest option even if it costs more.

I don't think you can blame parents for that.

I don't think that you will most disinterested parents on a parenting site. Whilst I agree that disinterested parents are the minority of parents, there are still more than can be gauged from a random MN thread. And of course people have different ideas of what constitutes "interest" in their childrens' lives. For a significant minority this means teaching their children to stand up to what they see as oppression by schools and other institutions. All it takes is 2 children like this per class for all the other children to have their education damaged.

Bottom line is, for your childrens' sake you need to support your childrens' school 100% unless they do something absolutely outrageous.

This is where schools that tricky to get into have the edge- after the parents have made the commitment (of whatever nature) to get their kids in, they are more supportive of wjat the scjhool does.

Duchesse You make a very good point. Being an old bag I can say that in my day there was no such thing as going into school to take issue with a teacher.

Respect for teaching staff was key - even in the VERY run-down area I was brought up in.

All too often I see mothers complaining to the school about utter nonsense instead of supporting the school's authority.

I'm not so sure about that GORGEOUSX. My mum was a teacher, and had parents going in to see her even when I was a child nearly 40 years ago. One was complaining about her child being disciplined for swearing, "My family don't q"£$^ swear," she said .

However, this was in the head's office, which does make a difference - I don't know if teachers got challenged in front of or by their pupils in those days.

My husband was born in 1955 and he remembers a father coming into his country primary school (largely uppper working - middle middle class intake) and punching the teacher in the face in front of the class. That would have been some time in the early 60s. Pretty unusual then, though, I would think. I remember nothing like that from my own schools. My mum was a primary school teacher and I've never heard her mention anything like that either.

When people refer to 'sink' estates or 'sink' schools what do they actually mean? It's some sort of shorthand - for what? Failing? Poor? Why not just say that if that's what you meAn.

A "sink estate" to a mumsnetter is an "estate" where common people live. People who don't wear Boden and get deliveries from Iceland rather than Ocado.

Nobody on here lives anywhere near a real sink estate.

A "sink" school (not that I would ever use that term) means to my mind a school that is failing to cope with the demands of its population both academically and socially. Either this means that the population is so demanding that coping with it is impossible (eg gang-riddled schools with multiple weapon and drugs problems) or that the school management is too weak to use the tools at their disposal to sort out their particular discipline problems. To my mind, discipline is a prerequisite to good learning.

A school in a difficult area that still manages to cope well and deliver a good education despite the challenges is certainly not a "sink" school. I remember hearing about a primary in deprived East London with inspired leadership where they did philosophy to work through social problems, with excellent results (in terms of conflict resolution) and being really sorry that my children couldn't go there.

On the other hand, I taught in a "high-performing" extremely sought-after secondary where the lower-achievers and difficult children were left for dead. I wouldn't have wanted mine to go there for anything. Nor would I send them to school in special measures in Exeter because it's run by incompetents dealing with a lot of minor discipline problems very badly. They think they're in a well hard area and have simply abdicated.

I love what Duchesse said - you´re a good writer - wish there were more journalists like you!

I was educated in a very popular state school (I even had friends from primary school who had private lessons at home while they waited for students to drop out in the first year so that they could take their places).

Unfortunately Maggie Thatcher´s government destroyed it. The specialist ´Off Sight´centre was closed down. This was a place where children who would otherwise be excluded were sent to be taught by student teachers, where their class sizes were of 5-6 students. My friend was sent to it and returned a year later with a new calmness, loving her lessons and working really hard.

It has since become a failing school, been demolished and rebuilt as a specialist Humanities school.

I find it sad when people only see education as something to buy and look for the best available as if they are buying a house. Don´t you feel it should be a basic human right for everyone a good state education? Don´t you feel it could be the key to less crime committed by both rich people (usually fraud) and poor people (usually theft).

I find it very simplistic for people to have the view that all state schools are full of dangerous no-hopers. Surely a good state school instills social responsibility for all it´s students whether their parents are rich or poor. It is true that some state schools might not be as good as private schools - but shouldn´t we try to make them better rather than feeding the inequality that already exists in our society?