How do you decide between private school or state school?

[Hecegoza]

I'm so torn... There's a lovely prep school, relatively close (15 min drive) and it only has 123 students - from age 1-11. I'd want mine to start at Pre-Reception.

It's very family-like and has great pastoral care (which I think is more important than results, for sure).

It's reasonable price - it's £21 a morning session for Pre-Reception and then £2,900 each term up to Year 6. That includes lunch/swimming, etc.

Then there's an 'Outstanding' state school which is walking distance, it's a lovely newly built building. Then friends he met at school would most likely be in his village too... So that's a bonus, and most likely to go to the same secondary.

I'm struggling to decide if your kids go private, why is that? If state, why did you pick that? I feel they both have good benefits!

Without a doubt some private schools will be better than state schools, it depends on the schools.

Private schools do not necessarily filter out the riff raff. They just have riff raff with money! of course.

Its maddness to think everyone going to a private school is going to rich, have a perfect family life and be like julie andrews in the sound of music! you can also gets lots more variety in a private school drawing its pupils from all over the world.

however, in your instance for primary I would start and go with state.

its a good school and you can always pull him out and move him.

a good primary is a good find, its secondary you may have more problems with so I would potentially save my money for that.

the state of the schools in the uk is dire in some areas. I would not personally risk my dc happiness and education, for the sake of principles if I could afford private. you only get one life and its my job to make my dc lives as best as I can within the means that I have.

( we cant afford private but our school state is excellent) AND as someone so rudly said earlier - we do have our share of riff raff.

We have also gone state because our local state school is wonderful, at this stage (yr &y2) it's better than the local private school.
If this changes, I'll consider swapping, but ATM it's not worth wasting the money.
I would go and look at all with an open mind op.

The word was spelt wrong so I automatically thought...
SirChenjin One thing I've learnt about this site is people do ask for opinions/advice and if you don't say what others like to hear, they start to being some what horrible. OP asked a question, all I did was simply answer, there's no need for me to continue to comment, OP I hope you decide what's best for you.

I've put 2 children through both private primary and secondary and let me tell you, there are so many other factors determining success such as parenting.

If you have a self motivated child who's willing to work, a good state school is fine, possibly backed up with tutors at GCSE.

I will just quote what my DSis said when making this choice

"Private because we are ruthlessly ambitious for our DC. We know they already have the advantages that come from having intelligent parents, a wealthy background and a lot of experiences and extra curricular, but we want more. Our friends do the same and we are frightened that if we do not go private our DC will fall behind in the race to the top"

With those fees and that class size I would take a very careful look at the finances. 13 per class can be very limiting socially and academically. 18- 20 is better.

No Love, what you did was insult state school children.

FWIW there is no need to "dread what they are like now" - the vast majority of them are absolutely lovely. They are not "horrible" now, nor were they in the past. Your children are very gentle, quiet and never boisterous - guess what? State school children are also like that. Your 6 year old has always preferred girls as friends? Ditto. They just wouldn't get on as well at a state school? Why - because of all of the lovely, non horrible, gentle, quiet, non-boisterous state school children they would mix with?

We are choosing private mainly because:

• the state primaries near us have

If money isn't an issue then you visit both schools and choose the school that best suits your DD.

Remember that private schools aren't necessarily better than state and that state schools aren't always the best choice either. There's no right or wrong.

My DC have been through a combination of state and private depending on which school was the best fit at that stage of their education.

Agreed with class sizes - intake at DD's private school is 60 and they change classes every year so mix up 4 classes of 15, rather than at other school option which is 2x classes of 30 which don't change unless there is a problem

Ours are going private.

We can afford it fairly easily and have back up plans if our business goes down the pan.

We want the breadth of education private can provide. Our state options don't do classics or Arabic for example.

The sport. Our local schools have one tiny pitch and do football and that's about it. The private we're hoping to get to does 3 afternoons a week a secondary.

The extra curricular - the private school we're aiming for does so much more - d of e, young enterprise, chess etc. You can do woodwork, dressmaking all sorts of things. D of e is the only thing offered at our local state.

Totally agree with the poster who said we have one life and give our kids the best we can. I went to independent school and I believe most people in our year group are pretty successful both emotionally & financially. Friends drom the state sector are often ok for the former but not many of them have professional or well paid careers

All these children who'd be 'lost' in state schools?

And more diversity in private?

Come on! I'm not against private schools actually but we're lucky enough to have an excellent state school close to us and one that we're very happy with. But honestly, some of the reasons I hear for going private to make me cringe.

For what it's worth, both DH and I went state and have professional and well paid careers. Hard to imagine I know.

Agree totally with useyourimagination. I have 3 DC, 2 of whom are now at university and all 3 have had a combination of state and private depending on which made sense at the time.

DC1&2 did state infant and junior, private secondary, state sixth form
DC3 did state infant and is at private prep, will probably stay private for secondary, but may not.

Private pros

• better sport (every day), longer days (I work), closest school to our home. Class sizes between 15-20, ability to choose single sex education (which we wanted for secondary).

State pros
Free, More local friendships, schools we were able to get into were outstanding, sense of being part of the local community (infant school). Sixth form - very large, felt it was good preparation for the transition to university, more choice of subjects with good class sizes (20).

We went with the local state primary as it's excellent, just down the road and on a par with the preps. Secondary education around here is another matter so we opted for a selective independent, which offers a broader curriculum, stretches the able cohort and provides great pastoral care. Sadly our local state comp secondaries fall well short, are underfunded and selling off what little land they have. Many families seem to agree as there were hundreds applying for the 11+ entry at the selective independents and approx 20% of the children in the year got places (shows how good the state primary is).

So much depends on where you are, there are some ignoramus who think all states are 30 to a class breeding grounds of feral Jezza Kyle auditions, and that all public schools are like cosy Etons.

However, for us, where we are, we would choose state. There is a school a 2 minute walk away that is a cosy village school with about 15 to a class. It has a holistic approach to teaching, instills good values and will cuddle them when they fall over. There is a public school a half hour drive away who do the same to a degree (but less cosy) for a hefty sum...so we would be rather stupid to choose it. However our children will be home educated anyway.

I was public school educated and whilst the opportunities were great, no more so than most state schools now offer. And it was a cold place to my memory, despite being sought after and high achieving.

Meant to say 'in the year of my child's state primary 20% got places'

Also worth noting that many outstanding teachers (I was one) would stay state over and above private. So while class sizes may be smaller in a public school, quality of teaching may be no better...in many cases it may be worse.

Private because we are ruthlessly ambitious for our DC. We know they already have the advantages that come from having intelligent parents, a wealthy background and a lot of experiences and extra curricular, but we want more. Our friends do the same and we are frightened that if we do not go private our DC will fall behind in the race to the top"

Race to the top of what, exactly? The apex of the social inequality triangle?

Our state comp has many children from wealthy, intelligent families (e.g. dual PhD couples) extracurricular activities of all sorts (choirs, drama, sailing, skiing, Wolrd Challenge) debating, sport-students reaching national levels) and send a good proportion of children from all backgrounds to Oxbridge/Russell Group on competitive courses. It also has brilliant provision for less able and SEN students, and students whose vocation it is to have a practical career, such as farming. It flourishes partly because, by a quirk of geography, there is very little private education on offer locally. Therefore the range of students applying is truly Comprehensive.

It drives me mad that people think comprehensive means non streamed classes, feral children with no extracurricular activities, no rules and poor outcomes,

What I'm trying to do for my dc is to imitate the best of both options.

So, they're at a state school where I do believe you mix with more types of people and become more rounded socially.

Then, with the money we save from not going private, this enables me to only work during school hours, so outside of this I can take them to any desired extracurricular activity, plus spend a good bit of time 121 tutoring them with hw etc. (which I think are the good bits you get from private).

Also, it means I get to spend lots of time with my beloved children!

It is perfectly possible to top state education with extra enrichment to suit your child. My daughters (one sporty and one musical), had tennis, golf, piano, violin and dance lessons . If they had gone to the prep, their day would have been longer and from what I saw, their evenings busy with homework so less time for hobbies.
They both went from state primary to grammars as did many of their classmates.

Private schools have rules in terms how the students are to behave and behave towards others, which many states do not have.

Oh dear. What an absolute Crock. Of. Shit.

Many children have come to our school from the local private because of bullying etc. It's zero tolerance at our place.

Private because we are ruthlessly ambitious for our DC. We know they already have the advantages that come from having intelligent parents, a wealthy background and a lot of experiences and extra curricular, but we want more. Our friends do the same and we are frightened that if we do not go private our DC will fall behind in the race to the top

How very pompous of your SIL, Popocat. She sounds like a right charmer. I'm glad my DCs (who have essentially the same "advantages" as her DCs (but without the arrogance) don't go to school with her DCs.

I can't decide whether you posted that because you agreed with her, or because you find her attitude as appalling as I do??

If you have an outstanding primary school near you OP, spend the money on something else.

Popocats sil is exactly the kind of person I would prefer to avoid. Give me riff raff over that any day!

Hecegoza

Mine go to a school which sounds similar to the one your describing except even smaller! We were torn between that and a good state school after moving area when mine were in years 1 and 3.
It's cost a lot and we've made sacrifices but I've never regretted it if I'm honest, although their previous state school was also lovely and we'd have kept them there if we'd not moved.
The small family feel is hard to describe but many people will pass judgement because of the word 'private' - ours is the furthest thing from snooty or any of the other stereotypes. I'd write down pros and cons, visit the schools more than once, and remember that in reality they'll probably do well at either school. But equally don't dismiss the private school because of the views of others as there are clearly things about it which attract you

Agreed. Bullying was rife at my public school (as were drugs and underage sex...those were the days) my sister still bears the emotional scars now.

Kids are kids, however much their parents pay to segregate them.

If I had the finances, I'd send DD private, however my older DD and DS both have first class master's degrees DS in physics and dd in biomedical science and both went to state school, but it's really gone downhill since then, and I m worrying about sending little DD there, she's 7 at the moment and at a great state primary, wish I could send her private for secondary, but would be happy with a good/outstanding state school if we had one.
Private secondary definitely gives a leg up career wise in the job market, yes of course there are many professionals from state, but I bet more of their peers are privately educated.