Private schools - want to shout IT'S NOT FAIR!

[Yermina]

Went to PIL last night and heard all about sil's children's school. One of her boys is already attending a fantastic private school. Just found out his two brothers have also got places at very good private schools.

In the mean time my dc's are in classes of 31 at the local state school. My youngest needs additional support (sn) but isn't statemented (diagnosed but no statement) so doesn't get it. SIL's middle child has got into a mainstream private school that has outstanding support for children with dyslexia, which he's been diagnosed with. And will be in classes of 18.

Our middle ds is musically talented but there is really poor provision for music teaching at his state school and very few children there are learning an instrument. We struggle to pay for music lessons for him outside school.

Is it wrong of me to feel eaten up with jealousy and anger at the unfairness of a school system which privileges the children of well-off people so openly and seemingly without anyone else seeing it as something that's wrong or deeply, deeply unfair?

How would you explain to a group of children: you lot over here will have XXXX spent on your education, and lots of opportunity to develop your talents, and you lot over there will have about half as much spent on you, and will have much less attention from the teacher because there'll be twice as many of you in the class. Oh, and you kids with sn or specific gifts - unless your parents have money, you probably won't get the help you need to thrive educationally.

I know it's the way the world is but at the moment I feel bitter about it. Really really bitter. And jealous

Every time I go to my PIL's and have to hear about all the amazing thing SIL's dcs are doing at their school, their academic achievements, I want to go home and hide under the duvet and cry.

We'll never, ever be able to afford private education. We'll never be able to afford to move to an area with really good state schools. We'll never be able to get our children into church schools as we're not church goers, and our local grammar schools (2) are bursting at the seams with children from the local private prep schools, who bus their students in to take the 11+ en mass.

It's just so fucking unfair. It really is. I just want to get that off my chest.

That is all.

And obviously that Chesterfield of mine is a magic sofa - as it comes up with that 40k not just the once but every year - a bit like the story of "The magic pot" always bubbling up with porridge

i'm glad you can see the funny side, i would have been desperately sad if i couldnt have afforded to send mine private.

i enjoyed a private school education myself, the best that money can buy, and have always been grateful to my parents for sacrificing. other local children weren't so lucky and have ended up on the scrapheap, on heroin, or dead.

So... Miranda.... let me get this straight... Anyone who doesn't earn enough/ have the desire to pay for private education has failed in life and failed their children...

Errrrm ok, so the fact that my oldest DS is doing a good degree at a good university having come out of the (shock, horror) local (free) comp means I have failed in life and failed him.

I'll just go off and self flagellate for a while then..

Miranda- how spiteful you sound.

The two heroin addicts I know are both ex-public school. One went to Kate Middleton's old school.

I hope they will learn some respect for their fellow human beings miranda13. Something which you don't seem to have.

Come on guys, Miranda is clearly taking the piss.

I did link earlier to a one bedroomed flat for £450 pcm, which is what Flatbread thinks a child should be brought up in to enable him to go to private school. However the not-specially-impressive private school nearby is over £5k a term. Even supposing the preferability of being an only child of 15, sleeping on the sofa in the kitchen-cum-living area of a one bedroomed flat and doing your homework on your knees, to attending a state school.

Pmsl at the idea that private schools prevents you becoming a heroin addict.

I went to a very well known paid for school 5 girls that I knew there are now addicts and 2 more died from it.

Education and life has given me a better sense of perspective miranda so no, I'm not sad about where my children go to school.

It is possible to have a wonderful state education, op. Not all private schools are as wonderful as they eould have us believe. I think a good state school I
provides an ideal education.

miranda13
other local children weren't so lucky and have ended up on the scrapheap, on heroin, or dead.

What all of them?

My children go to private school because I think it provides them with the best education for them. The state schools in our area were not as good as the private school option.

I do think some state schools are not good enough, children deserve better because not many people have the luxury of choosing their child's school.

perhaps it was a local thing to me then but the local comprehensives turned out loads of heroin addicts and ne'er do wells. It was all my mother could do to keep me out of their way and bad influences, and she stopped me and my siblings associating with children that went to the local comprehensive schools until we were at least 16.

Chaz I think the real problem is the children who most need a good education to change their lot, often have parents with the least and lowest choices.

JustGettingOnWithIt

Exactly!

pmsl laughing miranda. Forgive my former posts, didn't realise you were a comedy poster. Very funny, good wind up.

JustGettingOn
I would agree with that. I don't think it is a class thing e.g. pushy mc v laid back wc but partly a reflection of the parents own experience. If you didn't gain anything valuable from school and found it a frustrating and negative experience you aren't going to push your children. Additionally, if you add in social, health and financial pressures then you can see why education isn't necessarily a priority for some people.

erhmmm, miranda, drug use is not unknown among private school pupils

and if your mother would not allow you to associate with anybody educated in a comprehensive for fear of you being corrupted, she can't have had much faith in your moral stamina, can she? Perhaps she was right, who am I to tell, but my mother was equally right when she trusted me to make sensible decisions about my life in a comprehensive.

Ignoring Miranda - how is clearly barking or taking the piss!

JustGettingOnWithIt - that is what is so sad. We live in a country where free education is provided & yet so many kids let the opportunity to do well pass them by. Yes, some schools could be better - but some state schools are really fantastic - as can be seen by the house prices in the surrounding area - and many are very good or good, yet there will still be kids at those schools & indeed at private schools who can't be bothered, drop out etc.

That has to have something to do with the influences outside of school?

Lots of wc children have well educated parents who are extremely involved in their children's education. Some don't, it is true, but I don not consider those who have never worked to be working class!

btw miranda, it might be worth reflecting that some of the people who provide you with that special education are probably not paid enough to educate their own children privately.

Does that mean that school teachers, school admin staff, lower grade academics, and academic admin staff- all the ones that enable you and your children- are failing their own?

And what will happen the day they all use their energy and drive to get out of teaching and research?

Chaz I'm an under 10K a year (very) early school leaver who left with nothing but the knowledge I was stupid. Many of my friends are the same.
You're wrong to thing it results in us not pushing our children or thinking education's a priority, it results in us being pissed off that we know it is, and get fobbed of with crap education and excuses from people who did better than us and tell us the standard we're being offered is good enough for people like us, actually.

Many realise they can't change it so they focus on what else they can do or have, some try and do something about it, but the cards are pretty stacked, and it has nothing to do with private schools existing or not, but the ability of better of parents to buy into catchment areas of decent state schools and squeeze out the estate kids to the bad ones, is a huge issue for us.

Near where I used to live is a very well known private school. It is local knowledge that the drug dealers are waiting outside the gate as they know that many of these kids have money ...

As for the Russians who were brought up and schooled in communism and who speak several languages, are good at maths, play instruments, etc - that is not a product of corruption or some people being 'more equal than others', it's a product of their very very academic educational system which puts emphasis on core disciplines but on very wide general education as well (which was also free and merit driven). That is probably the only good thing about their communism. I would not go down that route though, because you can achieve similar results without screwing up the whole society.