to be amused that the more exclusive a school is..

[seeker]

.. by faith, fees, ability, aptitude..whatever- the more diverse a community the school's parents say it is.

Hasn't this model already been tried in Soviet Union, China, South Korea etc ? Strangely, you would find that Uk's exclusive schools are very popular with them ..

South Korea? Schools there are unreal, incredibly academic. Terrifying.

Casn I ask a question seeker?

What will you do if you don't win your appeal and your DS doesn't thrive at the high school, or if he isn't happy?

Do you have a Plan B?

And so they were in USSR and China. No exclusive schools. Everyone's equal. Only somehow some always became more equal then others (Also described in the "Animal Farm" ).

Are you hoping the answer is 'send him privately if we have to and eat my words', word?

theoriginal not at all. I know the answer will not be that.

It's just that seeker's views are so very resistant to nuance and fluidity, I wondered what she would do.
Cleveing to the mantra 'he will be fine, he will be happy' doesn't necessarily mean it will be so, especially as an appeal surely indicates that she already has misgivings.

I'm intrigued is all...

I'm one of those people who can never say never. You just don't know how things will pan out. You need to prepare for all eventualities, with Plans B,C and D if necessary, up your sleeve.

I'm always a little gobsmacked when I come across anyone who is trully rigid.

TOSN I have asked Seeker the same question in the past (IIRC). Not because I would want her to eat humble pie as you seem to be implying but because I was concerned that her very fixed views on private education might lead her to discount it even if it really was in her DS's best interest.

Like Ingles I suggested Cranbrook as fall back as its 13+ entry (State Grammar with boarding).

In the end Seeker is only answerable to herself and her son for the choices she makes. If her son really wasn't getting on well she could send him to a public school and .... not tell us ...

I hope her DS gets on well and thrives at his school but, if for some reason he doesn't, I would hope that all options would be considered.

I suppose that if something is exclusive, then yes, it will be less diverse, depending on what the criteria are.

For e.g., a fee paying school which naturally excludes those which can't pay the fees, will be less diverse in terms of the income of the families whose children attend that school. But, within that group you could have a rather diverse mix of people in terms of nationality, religion, languages. I'm sure schools like Eton, while not diverse in terms of how wealthy the students are, are pretty diverse in terms of where students were born, where their family live etc. Likewise, a non-fee paying school where only children from the catchment area are allowed in would be more diverse in terms of the students wealth, but could be less diverse in terms of nationality, religion and languages.

Well it might be good to have a plan b if you could afford it: obviously though for most people there's not much point planning what you'll do if your child doesn't love school because there wouldn't be much you could do except keep in dialogue with the school in question and your child. I for one have no plan b at all: there isn't one.

When I was applying for secondary school my form had three options.
Option 1 : Feeder Comp school out of county
Option 2 : Comp school out of county (deadly rival of 1)
Option 3 : Catchment sink school sponsored academy.
I told both my kids that if they did not get into 1 or 2 I would home educate them rather than send them to 3 while we went through the appeals process.
THAT was my plan B.
I looked at the fees for the local Independent but it would have involved remortgaging the house and that did not seem sane.
Luckily they both got into Option 1.

Home ed wouldn't be a workable plan b for me, so we shall just have to hope that all is well with my year six child. I'm by no means complacent about that, or anything, but it doesn't hurt to err on the side of thinking all will be well I suppose.

My DD is at a grammar school. Being studious is fine there, because all the girls are. They are each good at their own thing, some better at maths, others at English and so on. I have seen on another MN thread where the head of the school is quoted as saying "unusual girls are welcome here".

At the Australian equivalent of a comprehensive that I went to, I learnt that being studious was deeply uncool. There was no room for the unusual students. We had to conform to the lowest common denominator. It took far more strength of character to be uncool there, than it takes for my DD.

But the uncool students of today will be the scientists, inventors, writers and artists of tomorrow. The dreamers. The ones with passion.

I agree that the grammar system is flawed. It doesn't seem to allow sufficient numbers of the very poorest students in. But there is nowhere in a comprehensive system for the nurture of the dreamers. And without them, our society is screwed.

Original
Nor for me - both work and mine and my kids temperaments. BUT I was prepared to do it rather than subject them to a term or two of option 3 !

The default options for my DC were so awful I sometimes thought I would be prepared to do anything for a place in a good school (remember that scene from Forest Gump where his mothers is sorting out his school place ?) - luckily I didn't have to. Only joking.

.... Your mother sure does care about your education....?

But there is nowhere in a comprehensive system for the nurture of the dreamers
Sorry but that is too much of a generalisation.
DD and her fellow geek girls are being well and truly supported in their dreams by their comp.
DS (when he pulls his socks up) will be supported in his very different dreams.

That's the one :) This lady will always be my role model.

I suspect I have similar views on education as seeker and for that reason despite living in a grammar school area I woud not use one , just as despite having the funds for an independent school I do not use it. If I did use a grammar, despite thinking with every bone in my body that it was wrong, I would, like seeker, end up obsessing about the inequalities in education . You do not have to apply for a grammar place, even if you sit the exam and pass you do not , IME, have to take the place . My son sat the exam as he wanted to know if he would get a place but he never took his place - nor did he ever intend to.

I agree that there are different types of diversity to consider. The comp my son attends is more socially diverse than the grammar. Neither are particularly ethnically divere and that frustrates me. But I have not actively chosen to send my child to a school with little ethnic diversity, it just happens that is where we work and live. However if I chose to educate my children independently , I am actively choosing to education in an environment that is not socially diverse.

Handmadetail my son is a very academic dreamer in a comprehensive and is thriving .

I teach lots of academic dreamers who are fully nurtured.

I agree in some comps it is difficult to be an academic child, particularly if you come from a home which does not value education, however that is not the case in all comps .

"However if I chose to educate my children independently , I am actively choosing to education in an environment that is not socially diverse."

not always.

we live in a naice, leafy green Surrey village.

there is a perfectly lovely state school at the end of our road. with an intake of nicely turned out, middle class, well-off children.

dd2 goes to the prep school at the other end of our road. with an equally middle class well off intake.

we chose one school over the other (for various reasons), but there is no difference in socioeconomic status between the schools (indeed 2/3 of the year at the state infant school are down for places at dd2's school for Yr3...).

to get social diversity of the type you want, we would have to go quite a way away for dd2's schooling.

ironically, dd1 is at a super-exclusive private school, and there is far more social diversity there. but it is a SN school, so dd2 cannot attend (it is also in the next county.)

Nice I think the problem some (me certainly) have with the OP, is that in spite of her apparent loathing of any kind of selective education, her DD attends a grammar school and her DS has just missed out at a place in one, which she is appealing.

If seeker were to withdraw her DD from grammar school, and not appeal for a place there for her DS, then she might actually have a valid place from which to preach her supposed moral and social superiority.

HTH.

Agree diabolo.

But the only children attending an independent school are those whose families can afford to pay the fees. You know that when you choose that kind of education.

My Ds school is less economically/ socially diverse than many other comprehensives but it does have children who could never afford school fees. It must be very rare to have a state secondary school in which all the pupils come from families that can afford state school fees. Even if such a school were to exist , which I doubt , i suspect very few parents would send their child there knowing they would only come into contact with other rich kids.

Diablo I have said much the same, I do to understand why someone with those strong views would choose a grammar education .