To think private schools should be banned?

[BethanyBoobs]

Why should someone have a better education just because their parents have money? Why should someone have a better chance of getting into university because their parents paid for their education? It makes me feel uncomfortable that people can buy their kids an upper hand when it comes to education.

I feel the same way about private health care too.

IMO private schools should be banned. Everyone should have the same chances when it comes to their education.

That's not what I said TOSN.

The point is that people make different choices for their children, and as long as their choices aren't harmful and have no effect on anyone else, no one has any right to stop them or tell them they are wrong.

nit. Is 'sacrificing children' a bad thing now? I only ask because earlier in this thread the private school banners were wanting the fee paying parents to sacrifice their children's education for the perceived good of some failing state schools.

But nat the lorry driver, nurse etc will be able to make choises about shelter and accommodation (basic rights akin to education) that oThers cannot. We don't try to take that choice away from them, do we?

Good point word.

So is there anyone on this thread who has actually chosen to send their children to the local state school for idealogical reasons despite it being a bad school and despite having enough money to either move or pay for private (or convert to Catholicism so that their DC can travel half way across London to a decent state school)?

Oh well, all these negative posts about people who want to send DC to a better school, but don't deserve it because of a fecking postcode.

I have a good friend who is very staunchly socialist, and a teacher, and officially, publicly, she is totally against private schooling. Her two eldest children passed the Kent 11 plus (not super selective, takes something like top 25%) no problem, but her youngest was very much borderline, and he had to be coaxed, hot-housed and dragged through it kicking and screaming, which is course is so much easier when your mother is a primary school teacher and she knows the drill.

He passed by the skin of his teeth, and spend his secondary years at one of the Bexley/Dartford grammars, utterly miserable and only just coping with the work, got terrible A level results, and then went to a university that languishes at the bottom of the league tables to do a degree in media studies.

But I remember her saying in a moment of blind panic, 'if he doesn't pass we will have absolutely no choice but to send him private. I don't want to have to do it, I don't really agree with it, but sending him to any of the non-grammars we are in catchment for is just not as option for us.'

But woo I do think those choices are harmful, and I do think they have an effect on everyone else - I think that's where we differ.

There are many harmful choices to make, though - consider the NHS. You could easily argue it's struggling to cope with bad choices. We all suffer.

Nataleeja, it's not about who deserves it and who doesn't. It's about parental choice.

You could just as easily talk about people deserving or not deserving the state education they want based on their postcode.

Why are they harmful, and why do they have a negative effect on everyone else TOSN?

A highly educated workforce is a good thing for society, it doesn't actually make much difference where the doctors/lawyers etc come from as long as they do their jobs well.

Harmful it is in the way that privately educated children take up university places and jobs provided by the state.

Segregation - whether it's along lines of race, religion or income, is not good for society. Private school perpetuate this.

Inequality of opportunity means we're not a meritocracy.

Inequality of educational provision for children is intrinsically unfair and divisive for society, and we should be trying to address it. Yes, it's difficult to put right - particularly as the situation is hugely benefiting those people who are best equipped to put things right and address the inequality.

I personally believe that schools are communities, and that depriving school communities of the talents and input of the richest, most educated, privileged and powerful parents is harmful to them.

You see this played out on a wider platform in relation to big social housing estates. Those estates with the most homogeneously poor and disadvantaged residents are the most difficult to improve.

"A highly educated workforce is a good thing for society"

It's how we've ended up with a government which has no understanding of the normal lives of the people it governs.

It's how we've ended up with doctors and lawyers who have little social understanding of the people who need their services most of all.

Any profession which is drawing its members from one sector of society is disadvantaged if it is hoping to serve the whole community.

Elites don't want a "highly educated" workforce. They need workforce who can do as they're told.

Nataleejah So are you suggesting that privately educated children should go to privately funded Universities and only work in private employment? How does that jive with your equality for all theory?

It's quite telling that those so against the idea of private education seem to have gathered their information about it from the 1800s and are being derogatory about it.

Also quite interested that those who are pro allowing parents to make the right decision for their children based on facts not just taking the moral high ground are well informed about all education options available to them.

Quite frankly I find the assumption that all privately educated children are 'posh and rich' both insulting and ignorant. My parents decided to send me to private school because the state schools in our catchment area were atrocious. They worked terribly hard, scrimped and saved and went without in order to pay my fees, for which I am hugely grateful as I wouldn't have the opportunities I did have in the local state schools. Incidentally, one of my fellow 'posh, rich' pupils was the son of a chippy. If there had been a good state school in the area, my parents would have loved to send me there in order to be able to afford family holidays (or a second child). Campaign for better state schools instead of deepening that chip on your shoulder.

I went single sex and am married with male friends and colleagues.

And I got stonking exam results.

Think my parents made the right choice!

Inequality of educational provision for children is intrinsically unfair and divisive for society, and we should be trying to address it . . .

I totally agree, but is banning a system of education that is working really the sensible way to go about it? How about fixing the bits which are broken first?

Agree holly and before labour abolished assisted places even more true.

Now that's just silly nataleejah The last administration put in a record level of investment into education both in terms of resources and good will.

Okay, so the result wasn't what they'd hoped in terms of social mobility, but there was a real drive to improve.

And a record number of us voted for it. Education, education, education.

Using private school, doesn't mean you want state education to be awful. Indeed, we're often being told that in fact it's pretty damn great.

We just want the frills and whistles and are willing to pay for it!

Clearly you just think your kids are better.

I know that this comment was aimed at somebody else, however, I do think that my kids are 'better' than other children. They are my children so I care about them more than I care about other people's children, I love them more than I could love anybody else's child and I am more concerned with their education and their futures than I am concerned about the futures of other children.
Can anybody really say that they hold other people's children in the same regard as their own children?
That not to say that I don't care about other children at all, just that in comparison to my own children the feelings are much less.
I do think that every child deserves good opportunities and a good education, but I won't stop providing the best or most suitable opportunities that I can for my children because not every child can have the same.
I will help my children with their education, because I can. I won't go about the neighbourhood trying to help every child whose parents can't/ won't support their education.
I will try and secure places for my children at the most suitable schools for their needs. I won't go and help everyone in my town do the same for their children.
I will take my children to the theatre and museums regardless of whether the entire child population of this country has parents willing / able to do the same or not.

Have you never looked at your own children and felt the most overwhelming sense of love and responsibility and adoration? Do you really feel the same for other children?

Minifingers I agree with part of your posts about professionals not able to understand the wider society.

However I do not want to send my child to the local High School as it does not provide a wide enough education. They say quite rightly that they can get kids into University but I want more breadth and more of a challenge for my child and I am going to have to pay for it. Probably that's fair enough. The education of the group is far more important to the state than developing my one child. The space freed if we don't take up the place will be used by an out of catchment applicant.

I don't think my child not being there will have any effect on the others, in fact it may be a positive thing. We as parents have no say in the running of the school (in Scotland).