To think people who say that they wouldn't have children if they couldn't afford to educate them privately are ...

[seeker]

.....bonkers?

And before anyone says that nobody has ever said that, there have been plenty of threads on here with people saying they stopped at one, or advising people not to have a 3rd because they can't afford private school for more. So presumably they wouldn't have had any if they could not send them to private school.

@coconutty plenty of other countries manage to build olympic teams that are more successful than our without as much aid from private schools.

They just have governements who don't have a vested interest in keeping state schools shit.

All of my decisions to do with my children are selfish. So are everyone else's. Was seeker thinking of anyone but her own ds when she decided to appeal him failing the 11 +? Of course not and why should she.

I feel like I'm in a parallel universe on MN tbh ,especially on the education boards

But children don't have the same rights when it comes to education do they krumbum. The quality of education is great in some schools and dire in others. The choices I have are to choose the local dire school or work hard to send dc to the local private school. Im not wealthy, and what my kids do when they leave school is up to them. But if the two options open to me are such extreme opposites then I'm hardly likely to choose the shite option for my children am I.

Southeastastra. You're right about the middle classes. The problem for me is I regularly get slated for having an accent, my home town was described as the worst, most deprived area in the UK and I'm at people who call tea 'dinner.' Yet I'm also accused of being a 'brayer' because I refuse to say that people shouldn't privately educate. I fucking hate the middle classes

Chubfuddler.
If seeker sees your post you are sooo dead

Noqontrol. But I'm saying that it is because of private a schools that some state schools are so bad. Also being wealthy has nothing to do with working hard. You can earn minimum wage and work bloody hard! It doesnt mean you work any harder because you can afford to send your kids to private school. And if you can afford private school then you are wealthy.

i do like the globalisation of the UK, the most interesting people i have worked with in the last 10 years have been people from abroad. the middle class attitude in this country just holds us back and makes us look like tight arsed twats to the rest of the world

How does the existence of a private school diminish the quality of a state school? It's very flattering to suppose that my children being there would improve it but I doubt that's true.

Chubfuddler I answered that in previous pages

kumbum it is not because of private schools that some state schools are so bad, i've worked in one where private schools played not one jot of influence, but poor senior management meant that bad behaviour was not controlled, so the vast majority of lessons were disrupted.
I now teach in an outstanding state comp, where if you live in catchment you would indeed be mad, or snobby to pay.
However, house prices in catchment are beyond mad, a similar house to one i live in would cost three times what my house is worth.
My dcs are in private education, and i do indeed falll into seekers camp in that we chose not to have 5 dc due in part to the cost of school fees. I do however think that those who have access to the very best state schools in the country, and i include seeker in that, have NO idea what poor state schools are like.
Our local state comp is very poor indeed, we are restricted on where we live due to DH's job having a residency clause.
I will not restrict my dc's attainment by sending them to the local comp (think on average a new head every 2 years - repeated over the past 8 years, governing body sacked en masse by the LEA), and i strongly resent Kumbums and seekers ridiculous assumptions that i am a snob, or anti progression of other children or what ever other spurious reason they come up with.
I work very hard to ensure that all the students i teach have excellent access to whatever they need to further their careers. I do extra curricluar activities at weekends and evenings, at the expense of my own dcs (for no extra pay) that enhance their UCAS applications and their interview skills.
My own dc are not lucky enough to be able to access a decent state school, i refuse to handicap them by sending them to a failing (and consistently failing) one. Get over yourselves.

chubfuddler, private schools are shored up by the state via charitable status and their staff pensions.

If they had to bear the full cost of running their schools, I think we'd see some change. And lots of whining from those who've had an unfairly big slice of the cake for years. Will never happen, of course.

If you say so krumbum. You have no idea about my finances really, but if it adds weight to your argument then you stick with that
And I disagree that private schools bring the state schools down. There's plenty of good state schools out there. The key thing seems to be the parents backing and supporting those schools. In my area the lack of parental support impacts directly on the school. I hardly think that sending my child there would make a huge impact on a now failing school, but the impact on my children would be huge.

YRBU. To repeat what numerous others have already said namely, that Seeker's obsession with independent schools suggests a huge chip on the shoulder. It does get tiresome when she hijacks the independent school threads to vent about her hatred for them. I wish she would invest all the energy she puts into hating private schooling into lobbying her MP to improve those state schools that are failing. If anyone is in doubt I will be privately educating my two boys. We stopped at two because three would have stretched us too far financially.

The problem is having that attitude, that oh jus me doing it won't make a difference, whene everyone does that it does cause a problem. And no I don't know the ins and outs of your finances but if you just habe thousands of pounds a year to use on something that you can get for free then yes you are wealthy, how could you not be?

Your kids go to a good school krumbum?

seeker can post where she likes. You don't know whether she lobbies her MP or not, and it's beside the point anyway.

For myself, I'm not against private education, but feel it should be full-cost for the customers, and the schools should not be able to discriminate about their intake, as they do in Finland.

I agree I was privately educated I was bullied EVERY day from the age of 6 didn't fit in and didn't achieve anything I wasn't acedemic, sporty , pretty and constantly felt a failure as I failed to achieve my potential

I was made to go to an all girls bording school at 11 I was miserable lasted 2 terms before going to a co ed private were I wasn't sporty enough to fit in

I have so many issues from private school I don't think would have been an issue if I went state

I saw everything from eating disorders , drug abuse and underage sex onwards during my time at various private schools

Before 6th form I went and got info bout local 6th forms I found one that totally suited my arty talented as appears to my parents preference to an upmarket 6th form for posh kids , they wouldn't let's go cause it was state

I ended up having a breakdown and leaving and never went back to school

I send my ds to a local state he's happy as lately and goes with all the neighbours kids

I wish my parents had not paid out all the money on private and let me do activitys, live in a nicer house etc... All which could not have been afforded due to paying for private education

And as I said, why the fuck is this about me?

Because you started this thread love. Are you bored or just fancy another private versus state fight?

FizzyBee I could give you exactly the same scenario only the other way around.
Some kids are just a target for bullies, you can see it at nursery school and it doesn't change. Maybe your parents thought they were doing what was best for you given the characteristics you displayed from a young age.

Apologies I don't think I got my point across very well

Basically I think my parents should have looked at the school not wether it was state or private to determine suitability

also if kids can't afford designer clothes , nice houses , activitys etc ... Die to parents struggling to pay school fees they will stick out and become a target at private school

And kids may be more happy in the long run to have nice things but a state education

My child couldn't care less about designer names - and I do buy her them but they mean nothing. We have company BMW's so nobody knows we couldn't afford those if we had to buy them and nobody has ever passed comment about our house and they would be booted out the front door if they did.
Most of the parents at my children's school are hard workers from down to earth backgrounds made good who would kick their kids up the arse if they dared to look down on or bully anyone at all.
There was a hell of a lot more snobbery at the local church school full of rich, thick kids who's parents thought going to see JLS was more of a priority than paying for tutors, music lessons etc.

seeker - it is very easy to be dismissive about private education when you live in a county that has grammar schools, so that your bright child can go somewhere where they can be stretched.
Paying for a house in a good catchment/grammar area is just as divisive as private school.