To not want my PIL to pay for my DC private school fees?

[swimmerforlife]

For context, I get along with DH's parents perfectly well, they are absolutely loaded though and DH (along with his siblings) were privately educated from reception onwards. I grew up on the breadline and was state educated for all my schooling.

It was always the plan for our dc to be state educated as we couldn't afford private fees, however the subject of schools came up in conversation over the weekend and PIL offered to pay for both DS1 and DS2 fees if we decided to go private (DS1 will be 4 early next year).

DH now desperately wants DS1 to be privately educated and is willing to accept PIL offer as he thrived in private school, whilst I am not totally against private schooling, I feel my DSs will learn and be educated just as well at state. After all I am University educated...

Also, I don't want to feel I / DH or the DSs 'owe' PIL anything because the paid for our DSs private education, I really don't want to have that hanging over our heads for the next 20+ years.

Besides, DH had no qualms with our DCs being state educated before PILs offer. Now DH has gone and changed his mind after everything was practically agreed.

AIBU?

something else to consider is, do you think your children will enjoy being in a single sex school? Many private senior schools aren't mixed which doesn't suit every child.

This isn't really the case anymore - less than 25% of independent senior schools are single-sex.

On the subject of Marianne's post, some feel that it is harder for private school pupils when they get to University, because they are used to much more personal attention.

What a potentially life changing chance for your children.

You should grab it with both hands.

Yes, you can argue that you went to university... but there are always some success stories. Statistically your children will do better and have a more rounded education privately. More facilities, more clubs, more options.

Think of it like taking out insurance ... your house might not burn down but you wouldnt risk it. Your kids might do just as well in a State school but do you want to risk it when the chance is being offered to you?

For your children's sake you should accept.

I (State educated) felt it harder at University because I didn't have a very good grounding in self-discipline and rigour and expecting excellence and my private and grammar schooled peers did. (I so wanted to be like them! They seemed 5 years older and wiser and infinitely more confident in their own ability).

"Well if bitter means you want to see all children being educated to a high standard regardless of how much their families have in the bank, and then have an equal chance at getting into a career of their choice, I'm also bitter, and glad to be so."

I cannot see where any of the posters urging the OP to consider this offer say anything to imply they don't agree with you wholeheartedly on this point.

I agree with you completely. But I will not sacrifice my own DC to my strong belief in the state system if it means they will individually suffer.

If I think that they won't be educated to a high standard, nurtured, encouraged and reach their potential in the state (secondary) schools we have available to us, then despite my moral obligations to the principle of paying for education, I will do so.

And if that makes me a hypocrite, no problem, I'm happy to be one.

My thoughts on private education are that it isn't fair. All children deserve a good/outstanding/brilliant education and I don't believe that being rich should mean that you are going to get that education. Less affluent families also deserve their children to have the same standard of education, with smaller classes, better access to extra curricular activities, music and sports as a given etc etc.
We have no chance ever of sending our children through the private system so it isn't something I've ever really thought about. BUT. If my parents or inlaws offered this opportunity I would probably be snapping their hands off. Of course I want the best for my children and want them to have the best education they can get. Our local schools are fine, but there are several issues at them all (one child is currently at a 'requires improvement' school) and I think I would move them in an instant for secondary given the chance.
However, I a am not naive enough to think that a private education offers a guaranteed right to a good set of results, a university degree and a high powered job. There are three privately educated people in our group of friends, a teacher, a teaching assistant and a band 5 (so not high up) NHS worker. We are late 30s to late 40s if that is relevant. All good jobs, but nothing high powered or flash compared to the rest of us state educated people.
My only worry in this situation is if your in laws should be taken into care homes and their wealth needed to pay for their care, the money quickly dwindles, meaning there may not be enough left to finish paying for your child's (and any future children- do it for one, you have to do it for all) full education. But I have no idea how much money they actually have as to whether that would actually be an issue or not.

My parents sacrificed my education on the altar of their socially altruistic principles. It did me no good.

The money can be put into a trust fund which can only be used for school-fees, and therefore it is protected from being used to pay for care.

The totally ironic thing is that the children for whom private school would be a life changing experience are the sort of children who haven't got a snowball's chance in hell of going to one. Even paid for by grandparents.

And private education is no guarantee of anything. The only person I know (actually have met) who has been to prison was privately educated their whole life.

If you have the choice for your kids you must seriously consider private education and not let principles get in the way.

I have been involved in education across primary to secondary, state to private for 20+ years... one thing it has taught me beyond anything else:

match school and child

in some families it is the best fit for one to go private, and one state, or any combination - there is no rule which says that any one is better or worse - even when a school appears to be better, it might not be so good a match for that child...

not everyone has the choice, but when you do, it should be totally led by what will build that child into the best shaped adult to suit them - their character, their ways of learning, their aspirations, their drive, etc.

Do you mean like me, Bert? A child from a sink council estate, homeless for years as a teenager and housed in emergency accommodation? A child from a background of domestic violence, and the first in my family to get to university (possibly thanks to the private education I received?)

Or maybe you mean a child like my dd1? Who is severely disabled and attends a private school (they come in all shapes and sizes) which is giving her her best chance at living even a semi-independent life?

No, our education system is not ideal, and there is much inequality in it. But there are chances still there - not as many as there should be, and not as many as there used to be, but they are still there.

So many people here speaking as if the state system is guaranteed to fail children. Given that a teeny tiny percentage of kids each year are privately educated I cannot really believe that those posters hold that 93% of kids are failures compared to the 7%.

Streetcar - Yes, you can argue that you went to university but there are always some success stories.

You do realise the majority of kids at university went to state schools don't you? Yes even amongst Oxbridge...

To imply that a state school kid getting to university is a rare thing is bonkers!

gracegrape there is absolutely no evidence that young people from independent school find tertiary education harder than those from state school.

Indeed, they are over represented on the most selective courses where drop out rates are coincidentally the lowest.

By all means don't choose private education, but not for spurious reasons.

titchy of course most students in university are state educated, but it cannot be denied that that those young people who are independently schooled are over represented on the most competitive courses.

I struggle with the argument that people are against private education on principal, but if their children are bullied/state schools aren't up to scratch and they can afford it, then they just have to do it. I had an old friend who told me if I could afford it I would. I really wouldn't. I was bullied in a state run junior school, my son has been bullied in a secondary that turned into an academy. I know what it's like to be scared of going to school. It's how it's dealt with that matters.

I think a lot of parents judge state schools by their OFSTED results, which shouldn't be the case.

There's bullying everywhere - state and private. So saying you'll move your child to a private school to escape bullying doesn't make sense to me, as your children can be bullied anywhere.

If all parents sent their children to their local comprehensive, where there's a whole mixture of backgrounds things could be very very different. But so many people think that private = better and that's not true for a lot of people.

To the poster that 1st replied to me - I'm glad your DD is doing better now, I really am. But I'm also sad for all the other children in the UK who are unhappy with their school for whatever reason who do not have any alternative - their parents can't afford to move to be in a certain catchment area for example. Again, if parents sent their kids to their local state school I think a lot of things would improve.

flowery, I mean no offence when I say this, but I think it is hypocritical. I know you're okay with that, but I wouldn't be. I don't want to live in a society where we can't take into consideration everyone's kids as well as our own. It's such an unfair, priviledged system that deprives so many, so that only a few benefit and keep hold of their riches.

Of course kids from private and grammar schools are over represented in the most competitive courses- they are more likely to be privileged and to have affluent, aware parents. If you know how to jump through one set of academic hoops, you are going to know how to jump through another set.

That is a factor in the over representation bert but certainly not the only or most important factor.

mycat If all parents sent their children to their local comprehensive, where there's a whole mixture of backgrounds things could be very very different

This is what my State school was like. The kids from the privately owned homes with the parents with white collar jobs were in the minority (which accurately reflected the catchment area of 3 feeder estates being council and 2 being private in an area receiving European Cat1 funding due to economic deprivation. All the kids like me (there were probably about a dozen of us) were utterly miserable. I'm not sure what very very different utopia you are seeking but I've been part of the social experiment. It doesn't work. 2 kids from my feeder primary went to the private school, i can almost guarantee than no kids from the council estate primaries went private (because we all knew each other, no judgement call).

So what is the 'very very different' utopia that you are seeking?

The evidence from UCAS is that the over-representation of private school kids on the most competitive courses isn't in fact due to the type of school they went to at all. There are three factors: degree course, A Level grades and A Level subjects.

If you just look at applicants to the most competitive courses who have the right grades and right subject combination, you'll find there is no difference whatsoever in offer rate or acceptance rate between those from private schools and those from state schools.

So for instance 60% of RG Law applicants with the desired subject and grades are from private schools, so they get 60% of the offers, but not proportionally more.

Your PIL are not offering this for YOU, they are offering it for YOUR CHILDREN

Therefore any decision to refuse or accept should be done with their needs uppermost in your mind.

To decide on any other basis would be utterly selfish.

Marianne that's nice for your daughter (it's often said it's easier to get into Oxbridge from the State sector as it ups the State quotas, so barriers to entry are lower. There's a known tactic of moving to State for 6th form to maximise this chance). She'd be wise to keep that view of her superior social understanding to herself though....

Just to clarify. My daughter was state educated throughout her education. No tactical moving about. The offer made to her was A*AA, which she exceeded. So the barriers to entry weren't lowered - but they were attainable for her.

She felt that some of her fellow-students who were privately educated have a more 'limited' social understanding as they have only ever mingled with other people from affluent backgrounds. She has had friends who have been hard-up as well as those who were comfortable off, so has more of an understanding about the obstacles and challenges that many people face.

I couldn't be beholden to my in laws in that way. And they'd have to be saints not to think it allowed them certain interfering rights in your family life/affairs.