to think people who pay for private tuition are just cheating?

[mdowdall]

There should be a stealth tax on all private tuition so that all private tutors have to be registered and charge, say, £500 an hour (enough to derter most families) - most of it going back to the treasury. I mean, why should the kids of pushy middle class parents do better in their grades than they ordinarily would have done just because they can afford to pay for extra tuition? People should just accept, if their kids are a bit thick in certain subjects, well, tough.
(btw - kids with autism, other probs etc - Im not including them - they should get all the free extra private tuition they need)

AD.

I'm sure it'd be beneficial all round, she can think over the schoolwork she's been doing in the day, and I can MN

Life is unfair and advantages are geared towards those with greater financial resources. Wealth inequalities impact on a person from the cradle to the grave. It is the way it has always been and it will always be so.

It isn't cheating and private tutors aren't only used in middle class households.

I was failing badly in maths. Very badly. I think I got an F in my mock exams. My father was greatly concerned that the lack of a maths qualification would massively hinder employment and university opportunities. Despite being very working class, he hired me a private tutor for six months who taught me the correct methods for learning maths at that level and beyond. I worked my arse off. I had an hour a week and an extra four hours practice that the tutor would check so that my knowledge was reinforced.

Needless to say I passed with a good grade. Not just because I had a private tutor but due to the extra work I had put in. A private tutor doesn't automatically buy you the grade.

Your OP just smacks of ignorance and possibly jealousy.

If you are lucky (rich) enough to live in the catchment area for a good school - is that cheating?

If you have lots of books at home - is that cheating?

Where state provision is lacking:

• the upper classes will already be going private so won't care

• the middle classes will scrape together to go private in case of need

• and anyone poorer will do without

Don't get angry at the people who can afford to go private - get angry with the failings of state provision

• and I am talking healthcare (physio being a prime example) as much as education.

Sorry maybe my definition of cheating is different to the OP's but can't you only cheat if you are taking away from someone else through unfair advantage? How is it hurting other people's children by one child getting a better education?

It is cheating, it is creating an unlevel playing field. In fact, I would say it is distorting the playing field. People are effectively buying an extra grade or two when going to private tutors. The other thing is, the cream will always rise to the top so surely such youngsters - who cant be that bright or they wouldnt have to pay for extra tuition - will get found out in years 2 and 3 at uni?

YABVU.

I had private tuition for A level Chemistry, as the teacher in state secondary was pants. You pays your money you takes your choice.

How dare someone say this should not be allowed. DH works 6 days a week, and I also work part-time, and will be returning full-time once both children are in school. I would hate for somebody to say we could not pay for private tuition for our children.

We could never afford private education, but I do not object to children being educated privately AT ALL. Hey, it saves my taxes being spent on their education.

ReindeerBollocks - there is no jelousy, thankfully quite well off.

People are not buying an extra grade or two, they are buying some education, as are all of us when we pay our taxes so that our children can go to school and be educated.

Where on earth do you get the idea that, in all of our hierarchised society, this is the place where the playing field becomes uneven?

I teach at 'uni'. Yes, kids who have had a very priveleged education sometimes find it harder to set the pace and discipline themselves when they arrive. But that comes from schooling, and tutoring is a totally different business in most cases. Tutoring helps people achieve what they always had the potential to do, but just needed a different context in which to work it out. Like I said.

it's no more cheating than having a childminder is cheating so you don't have to kill yourself rushing home from work eary to be there to pick up your kids. That's silly. Some people pay for private tuition because the parents' first language isn't English and they need help with reading to the children or helping with homework that any other parent takes for granted that they can easily do. Should there be a tax on SAHM mothers with degrees then??

Is OP just annoyed because she can't afford or find a private tutor but wants to? There's websites to find help that isn't expensive. Even books and publications too, for entrance exam help or A level/ GCSE help.

Has ReindeerBalls hit a nerve mdowdall prompting you to explain your financial situation OP?

Are you jealous because you're actually thinking of yourself when you talk about 'kids [who are] are a bit thick' and wish you'd had extra tuition?

So you make life fairer simply by making some people's lives worse?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_efficiency

Mdowdall - it's not always the case though is it that those who have private tutors are stupid. I passed all my other exams, due to ability and hard work. I couldn't grasp maths and it didn't help we had a succession of about five or six teachers during our last two school years.

Mathematics is fundamentally important for education and employment. My tutor brought me to the level of my peers. That doesn't mean I was thick or unable to attend university (I got into all of the universities I applied to). Just that I struggled until my tutor was able to rectify the lack of support I received in school.

By your definition I should just have left the education system after school, because I was clearly too stupid to continue...

Good luck with that mindset .

That's my point Mdowell, if they will be "found out" at uni who are they hurting? By doing the best they can they hurt no one else. They are not cheating. And where exactly do you draw the line?

Are parents allowed to help their children? What about teachers, surely if you are a teacher and you help your child you must be then giving them an unfair advantage right? So you should ignore them?

This must be a wind up.

I don't have a problem with private schools myself but I understand why some people do, but to not approve of tutors is stupid.

Should there also be a tax on helpful uncles and aunts who got into sought after schools or got high grades and uni degrees for helping out their relations' children for free????? (I am being a bit cheeky).

OP, get online and look for the books and set aside some weekends and one hour a night to sort out the problem. Calling a child (hope it's not your own!) thick is not productive! And intelligence has nothing to do with good grades. Lots of intelligent kids in my class got B's, while the ones who worked hard and followed instructions got A's. Good grades is down to hard work and being disciplined about reading the questions carefully, and lots of practice answering exam papers. Books and past papers are cheaper than a private tutor - you just need to get them and insist on the practice.

So if a child struggles with a subject its unfair to try and help them as someone else may not be able to afford that help?

Seriously?

So the person who can afford an operation privately shouldn't be allowed to have it if someone else can't afford it?

The person who can afford to buy a house, should rent a small house because someone else can't afford to buy one?

The person who buys a car, shouldn't because someone else can only afford the bus.

Life's unfair. Get over it.

My tutor got me from an 'F' to a 'B'.

That's more than just going up a grade, that's bloody marvellous on his part and on mine. Now where did I leave my gold star?

I got help to learn how to touch-type....so I could progress in my career....did I cheat?

Absolutely. All private tutors should be priced out of the range of all but the very wealthy. Then they can make sure only their children get the benefit.
And all the parents who can't afford tutors but are intelligent and well educated can tutor their children themselves. So the only children left out would be those with parents who aren't able to afford tuition and can't or won't tutor their children. So a child from a lower income family with parents who left formal education early won't get help when they're struggling with the maths A Level they need to go to Uni. But never mind. Because the cream always rises to the top

You know actually, I would like to say one thing. The school system as it is, is created with one child in my mind. One behavoiur, one attitude, one way of learning.

It ignores the vast majority of children who learn differently from the way currently being taught in schools. To assume some children are "thick" because they don't learn a certain way is ridiculous. It really is. A private tutor helps a child learn, it doesn't do the learning for them. The regular system can not account for every child and how they learn like a tutor can. A tutor can change their way of teaching to fit the child's understanding.

OP, why should hard working university students/graduates be deprived of a means of making a living? Or (whisper it) perhaps you'd prefer to see a black market in tutors emerging - unregistered, cash in hand chancers whose details are passed between PMCPs like contraband.

Actually I think your idea has enormous comic potential - cryptic ads in newspapers, tutors posing as gas men, fake moustaches, tea time raids by the ATS (Anti Tutorial Squad).

Better schools is the real answer, not trying to tax a service for which there is a genuine demand out of existence.

I got predicted Ds in my A levels, pulled my finger out and got Bs in the exams, perhaps I shouldn't have helped myself?

Learning to touch type was the best thing I learnt at school Mumbling.

I take it you are jealous OP.

Btw... We have our son tutored for English.

So up yours...

I tutor a girl in a subject her school does not offer, most state schools don't offer it. She has an interest and wishes to pursue it, I don't think that's cheating.

I think you would struggle to find a tutor happy to charge £500 and then pay most of it in tax. What a ridiculous concept.