To think that if grammar schools were more available , private schools would almost 'vanish'

[smokepole]

The percentage of pupils educated in private schools is about 7% of the school population, similarly 4% are educated in grammar schools. I am wondering if there was a 'nationally' available network of about 350 grammar schools (including Boarding provision) , what percentage of parents would still use private education.

I think the challenging of anecdotes cuts both ways. And is generally challenged by...more anecdotes!

No big deal, these threads are conversations. Not graduate thesis papers.

I'm in kent and have a year 5 boy so I am in the middle of all this. It's a nightmare. He's a bright boy but won't pass as his maths is poor. The whole system is flawed. I believe state education should be for state educated children. Around here people send their children to private in order for them to pass the 11+. It's incredibly unfair. But there life!

That's life even!!

I had a terrible experience of private school - I was neglected in every possible way, educationally, developmentally, emotionally. That was my experience of two private schools.

Private school teachers train in the same way and at the same institutions as staff working in state schools. Pretty much all schools are delivering the same exam syllabi. What makes private schools more successful usually isn't better teaching and management, but a MUCH, MUCH easier case load of children and vastly more financial resources per child.

That's it.

Spend more, get more. Sift out the challenging children. Dump them in the state sector, then blame state schools for having difficult kids who sometimes don't achieve much academically.

Would add, that far and away the worst teaching I have ever seen has been in a private school which achieved really good exam results. The very best teaching I've ever seen has been in a state school which achieves very mediocre results.

"Around here people send their children to private in order for them to pass the 11+. It's incredibly unfair. But there life!"

Yup - happens all over.

But we shouldn't be saying 'that's life' when it results in unfairness towards children. We should be saying 'that's unacceptable, what can we do to make things fairer'.

"The school I work in also offer bursaries to students with parents who have a low income. More independent schools should do that."

Err, no.

A lot of excess dosh floating about in private schools comes from them having charitable status. High achieving children are, by definition, high achieving. If tax payers money is to be used to support education it needs to be used for those children who are failing, not those who are already succeeding at a very high level. Sifting out the brightest children from poor communities and educating them separately in private schools is divisive and it culturally and educationally impoverishes local schools and distorts their intake and provision. That's not acceptable or fair.

What an odd view! Private schools would be full of the 80% of children who won't be at the grammar school. Far more than today - but not many can afford it.
Also amazed that people think grammar school = good school. You get the whole range, like any type of education.

I'm sure there was a Mumsnet survey once that showed that 50% of Mumsnetters children are at private school- or did I imagine that?

I expect it is 50% of those vocal about selective schooling v comprehensives, not the silent majority.
At least 90% of children are at state comprehensives. Most children are average ( even MNetter's children). Selective schools are not for the average.

I think it was more like 30% Hak, but yes, obv massively skewed from the 7% nationally. But then where I live it's something like 12-15% so already double. Yet we have some fantastic state schools here.

There are anecdotes on both sides. My kids are at private school and I teach in the state sector. There's no more chair throwing or general bad behaviour in most state schools than there is in private schools. So yes, the chair throwing anecdotes drive me nuts too. But then so do the inevitable 100 posts on every thread like this where smugposters 1-100 trot out the line about either themselves or their children who were state educated getting better results that their privately educated cousins/ neighbours. I just want to scream 'I don't give a f*ck!' 'Why are you smug about that? I haven't paid to ensure better results that those at state school. I've paid for the facilities and the extra enjoyment that brings them.'

And as for suggesting that children who have been privately educated at junior school should not be allowed to access a state secondary that their parents contribute towards like everyone else. What about the the bit if grammar catchment which includes houses costing 1m upwards who all attended the small state primary which gets 80% level 5s and pretty much 200% level 4s each year? Should they also be excluded as their whole educational experience had been so far removed from the kids at other catchment primaries? Sure, build in a system which allows kids on FSM to access the school in a lower mark but to exclude an entire section if the community is ludicrous.

Not that I believe in grammar schools. I'd rather pay more tax and make the comprehensive system better all round. It's the reason I didn't send my daughter to the ridiculously academic, ridiculously high achieving girls school she gained a place at. Too narrow, too concerned with exam results for me.

Sorry for typos esp the ridiculous 200%

Miredcardigan, would you be happy for grammar schools to take in representative numbers from state and private primaries? So that if only 10% in catchment were privately educated no more than 10% privately educated grammar intake? Or take a set number from every school within catchment?

Private schools will have badly behaved pupils, troubled pupils, pupils with LD, etc.

Just because your parents pay for you to go private doesn't mean there is a white wash of a human being into the perfect ideal of a human. Humans bully, are petty, are mean.

I guess with private schools, and grammar there is more reassurance that your child is going to reach potential.

Beloved, I'm not sure how that can be justified. I actually sympathise with the idea in theory but you simply can't have a state education system which effectively denies access to its schools based effectively on parental income. And what about parents whose income drops sharply when their child is Y5 or Y6? They can no longer afford private education but they're suddenly denied access to a local state school? Are you proposing a tax break for parents denied access to a service they contribute to or just saying they should suck it up and pay for something they can't use simply because of choices they made at primary? I know of 4 families personally who have paid for primary as they relocated with work and couldn't get their primary school children into a local school. Should they be denied access back into the state sector they would have chosen? Who is going to pay the fees at secondary? Them or Trafford council for failing to offer them schools within a reasonable distance of home and each other?

And in the grammar areas near me (Trafford) you can have primary schools where catchment houses range from about 800k-4m. Do you think those kids are more disadvantaged and more deserving of a place at the grammar than the ones whose parents pay for whatever reason?

Hello, just coming back and noticed ref to the chair chucking comments.

I'm not sure but think I was first or thereabouts mentioning these incidents that I had experienced teaching in our local college and my dc had at school.

I didn't mean at all to suggest all state schools were like this, indeed I know they aren't.
But unfortunately, during the time our older 2 were at school and my time as a teacher these were our experiences in this authority.

I am sorry if I gave the impression that I believed this was widespread throughout the sector.

Morethan, the thing is that all the experiences posted are anecdotal so most people by the nature of the subject have a very limited experience based on their own time at school and that of their children.
You have obviously experience of poor schools within a poor LA and your views are no less valid that posters whose kids attend high achieving schools with no behaviour issues. But I would say that really bad behaviour such as that experienced by your DCs is thankfully, rare.

"but you simply can't have a state education system which effectively denies access to its schools based effectively on parental income."

It wouldn't do.

People with a high achieving child who wanted to increase the chance of their child gaining a grammar school place could simply send them to the local state primary, where they would stand as much chance as any other child. And children from private schools could still apply to grammar and stand a chance of getting in. Just not a disproportionate chance, because of a privileged education.

"I know of 4 families personally who have paid for primary as they relocated with work and couldn't get their primary school children into a local school."

All children will have a school place within the borough in which they live. Local authorities HAVE to offer one, and people who don't have the means to refuse it HAVE to take it.

Yes I know they were offered a school but the LA don't consider how you can get 4 children to 3 different schools miles apart by 9am as was the offer to one family.

You are denying privately educated children in the borough whose parents pay for the upkeep of the state school through their taxes just like all the other parents the opportunity to access it. And what about the state primary I talked about which has ridiculously expensive houses across at least 90% of it's catchment. Who raise 25k without thinking at their Christmas fayre. Are they allowed level pegging? After all their parents are paying £60-£100 a wk for private tuition to ensure a place at that grammar?

"You are denying privately educated children in the borough whose parents pay for the upkeep of the state school through their taxes just like all the other parents the opportunity to access it."

Not at all.

I'm not suggesting that children from private schools shouldn't be able to apply for grammar places.

I'm suggesting that the number of places offered to children from state and private are proportionate.

What is your problem with that?

It would meant that children from state and private schools have exactly the same chance of a place at grammar.

If 15% of all children in the borough were privately educated than a grammar could allocate 15% of its places to children coming from the private sector.

I think that's perfectly fair. Unless of course you want to defend a system where a hugely disproportionate number of children from private schools can snaffle places in grammar schools, as they do in some areas...

"And what about the state primary I talked about which has ridiculously expensive houses across at least 90% of it's catchment. Who raise 25k without thinking at their Christmas fayre. Are they allowed level pegging?"

I'm sure grammar schools could find a way to ensure that expensively educated children weren't dominating its intake.

What about taking a number of children from every single primary school in the catchment - appropriate to size of the school? So a child attending St Shitbag's on the local estate would have just as much chance of a place as a child at St Heehaw's in a greener and leafier part of the borough.

I think that sounds fantastically fair.

A

But what I'm saying is that certainly in Trafford, a large proportion of state educated children will be just as privileged as those privately educated.

And you say that you're sure grammar schools will find a way. How? How can you distinguish between the child whose parents earn 80k and pay for school and the child whose parents earn 150k but who send their child to the massively high achieving primary and who holiday 3 times a year, pay for horse riding at the weekend and employ tutors from Y3?

And you're perpetuating the myth that privately educated junior kids have a massive academic advantage over those who attend very high achieving state primaries such as the one I described and indeed my catchment primary. It simply isn't true. If all I was concerned about was my child achieving a L5 or L6 and padding the 11+ for either a grammar or the selective independent then I'd just use my state primary.