To think boarding schools are an expensive version of neglect?

[WriterofDreams]

I don't get boarding schools at all. Especially for young children. I will never forget watching a documentary about 7 year olds being sent to boarding school and the fear and upset the poor girls went through being separated from their families. For what? The mums seemed to think the poor children's suffering was necessary in service of their futures. Surely it's more important for them to grow up in their families and enjoy their siblings? I don't have a huge amount of personal experience of boarding schools so I may be missing something important. I do know however know two adults who were sent to boarding school as young children and consider themselves seriously damaged by it.

Surely it's better for a young child to be raised by people who genuinely love them than by a house mother who may be kind and loving but who essentially is just doing a job? AIBU to see boarding school as a form of high class care system for the wealthy?

Snap the point is you're both leaving them. In my book looking after your children isn't an optional thing - it isn't a case of "oh my it doesn't fit in with our career situation so we'll have to get someone else to do it." I dearly love my DH but if he took a job that meant I'd have to leave my DS he could stuff it up his ass. I'd leave him before I'd leave my DS because my DS needs me far more than my DH does. No amount of money, training, career prospects, is worth leaving my children for.

I'm not ignoring it. If you look up the thread a bit, you'll see that I pointed out that affording two homes is beyond many families.

If affording two homes is beyond you then clearly the career isn't compatible with your life circumstances and you need to consider changing it. I'm truly shocked that when faced with the problem of not affording two homes, people decide to leave their children rather than the job.

Exactly meditrina - and that was the point I was making last night. I changed schools three times before I was eight (and those schools were in three different countries). I had lived in nine different houses by the time I was nine.

Even if you put a child into BS after that to avoid further disruption, the damage is already done.

I went to a boarding school which was on the approved list or whatever the fuck it is, and the 'army brats' were all the daughters of commissioned officers, and the 'diplomatic brats' were all the daughters of very senior civil servants. That's why I asked about the elitism, because it was certainly evident in that real life setting.

A lot of the girls didn't see their parents during the shorter holidays, because of the length of the unaccompanied journeys to places as far away as Malaysia and New Caledonia, and many of us more local girls would have them to stay at our houses. They seemed so sophisticated and exotic compared to us! But also a little tragic. Some of them saw their parents just once a year, during the summer.

To be honest, we felt sorry for them.

WOD do you have a career that can afford two houses? I would say it is limited the number of careers that can afford to run two households.

When I was about 8 or 9 I went to a PGL style summer camp which was held in a boarding school in Sompting Abbotts, Sussex, for two weeks and made friends with a Nigerian girl called Toyn. She was there for the whole 8 weeks it was open. She'd gone from being at boarding school to being at summer camp - then straight back to boarding school. Never went home. 9 years old.

We used to have two houses, before DS came along. That was when DH was a student I was working full time. DH was on about 7,000 euros a year I was on about 20,000 pounds. We managed fine by renting.

Surely the army provides accommodation for soldiers who go abroad? They don't expect them to buy a house at every new posting do they?

Two Malaysian boys in our year only ever went home in the summer holidays. The rest of the holidays they stayed in some Malaysian government owned hostel place in London. The pressure on them was immense academically too because they were on government scholarships - failure would've been unthinkable. One went to Oxford to do Maths and the other to Cambridge to do engineering.

I loved boarding school. I went when I was 11 and boarded for seven years in total. There was a crap comprehensive in my local town with a serious bullying and truancy problem and my parents wanted me to have a decent education - does that make them guilty of neglect?

Mine was a far better education too juneau. That's probably why I don't resent my parents.

because I understand their decision.

juneau if you read the thread you'll see we're talking about young children - aged 7/8

juneau - that is also exactly why my parents sent me to a boarding school.

I only came back to this as teenagers are being discussed and some are saying it is not a good choice whatever the age.

Well no juneau, but it's perhaps a bit of an extreme over-reaction to a problem? Surely moving to the catchment of a better school or just putting you in a private day school would have solved the problem? Anyway, at 11 I don't think you'll find that many people arguing it's always wrong - unless of course the child is desperately unhappy and just not being listened to about wanting to be at home, beacuse of academic/class/cultural expectations.

I am not anti-boarding school for senior age children at all, and I think weekly boarding can be ok for some children over the age of 9 or 10. Personally I think termly boarding for primary aged children is an absolutely hideous thing to do, and I can never see any justification for it.

It's all the blustering hot-air justifying that I find quite laughable - even when all the alternatives and solutions are put before them, some people will still try to argue that their young children are boarding out of necessity and practicality rather than just admit the truth, which is that they want them there for educational and social advancement, and plenty of 'me' time for the parents.

Would you be equally as happy to put your child 'into care'?
Because that is effectively what boarding is?

I think the Big Questions on the thread are:

Who actually benefits when a very young child (7 years) is sent to boarding school because of the parents' lifestyle/commitments?

Should the taxpayer pay for this choice?

Should boarding schools be held to account for what happens to the children in the school holidays, i.e. it is assumed that they go home to their families but clearly some don't.

I think that if parents can and want to make the market choice to pay for education, then there isn't any welfare argument there. Far from it. It's just that there are some, hopefully rare, circumstances where the welfare of boarding school children appears NOT to be the first concern of the parents or the system; and for some observers this is compounded by the fact that it is funded from public money.

I was allowed to choose which school I went to at age 11, so chose the school my best friend was going to. Posh ( minor royals etc ) local boarding school, my sister and I went for 3 years. My sister ( 3 yrs older ) ended up as a day pupil as she was bullied appallingly. I was totally miserable but unable to admit it fully to my parents as I had chosen the school and at the time they were in crisis. The education was good, small class sizes,small class sizes, more attnetion, interesting subjcets eg Latin, I was used to being top of the class, so when we were pulled out and sent to the local all girls comp, I was a little shocked at no longer being top of the class.

Girls can be very, very bitchy and this is why myself and my sister were so unhappy. There is no escape from the bitches when you're boarding. . The expreicnes I had at boarding school have profoundly affected me. I know many more boys who had better experiences, but realise this is a generalisation.

As a result of my experience, I would never send my DC to boarding school. I would never, ever let my DC choose a school either. A child does not have the capability to understand all the ramifications and considerations that have to be taken into account. I read on some of the ed threads on here about people asking their primary age DC to choose and am horrified.

Jumeau: the accommodation provided, but the occupant pays rent. That is why costs of two would have to be met if a couple lived separately. The serving spouse could be posted anywhere the military goes, so in theory might never be able to live with their family.

And an expectation of non-accompanied service does nothing for single parents.

Another point for those interested in the numbers, as of 1 April 2010' the total strength of UK Armed Forces was just under 180,000. The number of serving families with children at boarding schools was about 5,000. It's not that frequent a choice. I think it is overly judgemental to assume that choices are made lightly or neglectfully.

"Girls can be very, very bitchy" - I agree - at least if you live at home you can escape for a few hours! Some of the cows in my year were utterly vile!

That's the crux of it - at a day school there is always someone to cuddle at the end of the day who thinks you are the greatest kid ever, and is always on your side. I can't bear to think of a child feeling ostracised or bullied or isolated and not having immediate solace to hand, and no way of escaping a hostile environment. and then being made to feel a failure and a baby if everyone else appears to be thriving and they are not.

In tears reading that, Fellatio

Fellatio - My mum wasn't exactly cuddly and affectionate or supportive (probably why she was able to seperate herself so utterly from me) - I was thinking more of the vital importance of having the privacy of your own room.