To find people say X public School is OK because

[NoComet]

It gets DCs into Oxbridge and RG universities, a daft justification for choosing a school that costs £15,000 plus a year.

We have a local secondary (not even a true comp as there is some creaming off of bright DC by Grammar schools) that is in Special Measures that has just got two pupils in to Oxbridge.

And this is hardly news, bog standard state secondaries and sixform collages all over the country send DCs to Oxbridge and RG Universities every year.

My very ordinary Welsh Comp sent someone in the year above me to study medicine at Oxford, there were others at prestigious med schools and, now, RG uni's me included.

Yes, private schools are very nice, yes DC avoid some DCs with a bad attitude to education, Yes DC get good sports facilities and yes DC may study a wider range of subjects, esp. MFL.

But in the end your DC will, quite likely end up at exactly the same uni, doing the same course, just with poorer parents!

Thanks running!

I won't be sending my DCs to private school but my colleague does - her eldest has just sat her standard grades (Scottish equiv of GCSEs) so she has two years of school left before university. Last week my colleague attended the "Oxbridge entry" parents evening the school hold every year to talk about the steps that would be taken and the support the kids would be given. My jaw dropped when I heard that. The state school people I know who went to Oxbridge were terrifyingly clever and IME not many people from state schools who aren't even attempt the exam but it seems to be something private school kids who are bright but not on the genius scale are happy to give a whirl.

Thatball I think that is one of the huge misconceptions about Oxbridge; that one needs to be a genius.

Yes, a candidate needs to be clever to stand a chance, but a genius? Absolutely not.

I'm involved in the widening access program and it really pees me off that so many teachers still tell their pupils that a. you need to be a genuis and/or b. you must have all A*s at GCSE and A level.

Grrrrrr...

Coming to this late, so apologies if I'm repeating others, but some fee-paying schools get 80%+ into Oxbridge. A school by us (girls) has something astonishing like 95%. A local comp simply cannot achieve that.

You are repeating others, yes!

A school isn't necessarily failing a pupil if they don't get them into Oxford. A school is only failing them if they don't help them realise their full potential. Getting into Oxbridge may not be their full potential.

I take it that school is academically selective notyou

wordfactory there's also the opposite of that attitude which is equally annoying. The " if you didn't go to Oxbridge you're a complete idiot. I was reading some stuff on a student form the other day and the things some Oxbridge students and candidates were saying about the others ranged from mean to vile.

Before I'm flamed please note I said some, I do know there well be plenty of lovely Oxbridge people.

That is not a pleasant attitude at all, it's true.

I do find myself (more than occasionally) having to remind my colleagues that not everyone even fancies Oxbridge!!!!!

There are plenty of surprisingly not-clever Oxbridge types too

horry, of course you are clever.

I can think of a couple of people who deliberately didn't choose Oxbridge despite having the grades e.g. choosing Imperial for a science based course.

My non-RG Uni did better than Cambridge for my subject in the last Research Assessment Exercise

The state school people I know who went to Oxbridge were terrifyingly clever

Apparently about a quarter of MP's went to Oxbridge.

I think "terrifyingly clever" would seem to be a bit of an over statement...
Maybe the ones who went to private schools become MP's?

I think private schools were, certainly when I was there, better at realising you could be fairly thick and still get into Oxford.

I am (was) clever enough to get a good Oxbridge degree, but I still leave the milk out of the fridge and forget where I left my glasses and read Harry Potter and watch Homes Under The Hammer and so on.

Ok I might currently be reading a 19th century French novel, but most of the time you wouldn't know I was clever. We don't have to wear a label

mother I think traditionally that was certainly the case

These days, I'd like to think the filtering system is pretty robust. That said, private schools do tend to have a more positive attitude towards giving it a go. The reluctance from some of the state schools to encourage their students to try is marked. There seems to be a much greater concern about failure to get in.

A sign of TRUE intelligence horry you don't feel the need to have everything high brow to prove your cleverness but can turn to more intellectual pass times when you want.

Like wanking and listening to opera at the same time in The Clockwork Orange then?

depends on the opera surely

Yes, Hansel and Gretel by Humperdinck would be well dodgy, for example.

I can imagine Michael Gove doing it when the Valkyries come on though. And indeed half of the Tory party. They love a bit of strong woman.

frankly I see most of the cabinet in the drunk scenes in Der Fliedermaus

Are you calling me a wanker?

no of course not.

My old University tutor used to refer to a "one-handed read". I am sorry to say that I was long married before I had any idea what he meant

This was 18th C French literature with a sideline in Baudelaire. his pleasures were, um, esoteric, thank god they did not include me.

The school with the highest rates of Oxbridge acceptance is Westminster at 52% & that was for 2012 & higher than the year before. Westminster is the most academic famous school & is the only one with a mixed 6th form.

grumpy I was talking to Boffin et al. The cheeky bastards