To wonder how one would go about abolishing private schools?

[Chuffin]

If anyone is following the @abolisheton campaign, they state their aim is to integrate private schools into the public sector and hope this to be included in Labours next manifesto.

My children are about to start independent school, having had a terrible time for a whole host of reasons in their state primary.

Aside from the moral argument for or against private schools, I am very interested in whether it would be legally possible to abolish private schools and how this would happen? Would this even be feasible realistically?

ErrolTheDragon
Ok - sorry!

I've always been a labour supporter but that has put me off. Mine go to an independent school, it works as my son works so much better in smaller classes. It seems that he's classed all private schools under the same brush.

Not that Giles Coren is always right, but sometimes he hits the mark.

RIP Eton? Don’t order the Edstone just yet

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/rip-eton-don-t-order-the-edstone-just-yet-jkhlfcxvk?shareToken=52920fff13f155d5c24e1015ee6d39e6

Coren has a point there but bloody hell thats quite harsh and personal

It's an interesting idea, but much like abolishing religious schools (which technically is all of them, but I believe most people mean schools actively supported by a religious institution), it ignores a lot of the legal and practical reality. It's an ideological position, by its nature it ignores the complexity of what is really happening for an ideal that may never be realistically possible. I think there are many great ideas to better support state schools so private schools are less needed, but the idea of abolishing them, as many previous posters have detailed, has to ignore so much for results that are likely never to meet the ideal expectations.

The internet would certainly reduce most of the practical challenges to expanding what was essentially a kind of state-supported autonomous home education.

But with the wonders of the Internet, there is no reason why education should take place only in school buildings.

While the idea of entirely restructuring society without schools (At least as they are not) is interesting and I think has some merit, I think the idea of replacing them with the internet (or Illich's idea of "learning networks" which would be a safety nightmare) is bullshit.

I'm a home educator and this erases practical reality for some sort of fuzzy ideal and almost insulting to the work educators - in school or otherwise - do. The internet cannot teach everything - or pretty much anything by itself. Just having access to information does nothing (particularly before one learns to read). It would be like putting kids in the room with a piano and expecting them to learn to play well or - more closely - giving them all of the Internet and expecting them to figure out fact and fiction & ignore the distractions. Many adults struggle with that. That's before getting into how to expand these libraries so they have sports halls, musical instruments, science labs, engineering equipment, or other practical spaces to learn things that require and how to deal with the whole kids need supervision and most adults need to work issue. That last part is one of the major reason why schools were invented and as they are in the first place and computers aren't going to solve that.

Its not going to happen, close private schools and the Politicians would be shooting themselves in the foot, as it's where their kids go.

Allocation of a % of private school places to state pupils is a totally different proposal. Whilst it's very beneficial to the individuals chosen, and also benefits the paying pupils by widening the diversity of their experience, it's not very socialist. They used to have this very thing - it was called the "direct grant" system. It was abolished in 1976.

But it doesn't benefit society as a whole because those left behind then have an even worse experience.

Sorry that was a reply to @Mad8NR1 which I wrote hours ago and has stayed on my screen as a preview without being posted.

Longer term, I wonder whether making entry into private school a 'one way street', committing any child who does so to pay for all their education from that point on (including the full cost of university, like overseas students) might work?

So e.g. a child who enters a private primary at 4 would either not be able to access, or would have to pay full private fees for, any state-run school that they later entered (so for example, the industry of coaching children in private primaries to take state grammar places would have the consequence either that such children couldn't enter such schools or would have to pay a private school fee equivalent to the secondary school).

Equally, anyone who had attended a private secondary or sixth form would have to pay the full cost of university as fees at the time, while those state educated throughout would have the current setup or even a more beneficial one.

Of course, those who were genuinely rich would have no problem with this, so the schools would stay open. But the current 'norm' - of parents paying for primary or secondary school, or both, to buy free places at selective schools or universities - would stop, and it would be a powerful disincentive to some as well as raising additional revenue.

I think it would be reasonable to except private special schools and a few named genuinely specialist schools in music and performing arts, perhaps ensuring that the costs of the former are covered by funding through the EHCP process, and of the latter by an equivalent to DADA-type audition processes.

[To make a further point - to avoid there being an incentive for universities or grammar schools to take additional privately educated students to boost their coffers, the fees would simply go straight into the main DfE coffers for distribution to all schools / universities equally]

(I am not sure whether I think this should happen - selection by ability or religion or proxies of income such as specific catchment should be abolished first. But I am just putting it forward as a possible model.)

How do you do it?

In our town there are a couple of private schools. The land they are on is maybe 6x the size of that of the state schools. They have their own theatre, sports facilities, huge libraries etc etc.

I suppose to make all schools state schools then you could open all their facilities to all the other schools in the area, share out the books and the equipment, the computers, etc. or perhaps

children from other schools in the region would use that one as a kind of hub of knowledge - use its fleet of minibuses to take classes there for sports activities, swimming, library use, drama productions, etc.

Local children could go there still, but the facilities would be properly shared with all other schools. Class sizes could go up to 25 to allow for the state schools with 35 children in them to get smaller classes.

Then everyone is in a smaller class, everyone has access to top-class facilities and up to date technology, and everyone benefits - as in Finland.

Alternatively, if that's all too complicated, you could build a brand new state school on part of the land, sell of the rest for development, and with the huge income from that, fund that new school and all the others in the area.

(I am not sure whether I think this should happen - selection by ability or religion or proxies of income such as specific catchment should be abolished first. But I am just putting it forward as a possible model.)

I think your first comment here is key.

We ended up in the private system for primary (in a prep with no senior school) due to losing out on a school shutting and selection by faith together with various unethical practices going on by other parents.

It would seem harsh that the options open to us were:-

Travel an hour round trip to a school in special measures in order to stay in the state system or commit to private at 4 for 14 years?

Alternatively, if that's all too complicated, you could build a brand new state school on part of the land, sell of the rest for development,

What if the private school doesn’t want to sell? Would you insist on compulsory purchase?

Local children could go there still, but the facilities would be properly shared with all other schools. Class sizes could go up to 25 to allow for the state schools with 35 children in them to get smaller classes.

So some of the parents would pay and some wouldn’t? I think the paying parents would stop paying any fees pretty promptly if the same service was offered for free.

Oh and in response to the "What Communism is this?!!" posters -
at the moment, the system we have means that a child goes to school and has facilities, opportunities and future networks based on their parents' income.

If affluent parents had only state schools to attend, then they could use part of the £15 per annum they currently spend in fees to plough into schools which don't have that kind of support. Standards and opportunities would go up across the board, and they would reflect accurately each child's skills.

At the moment, a child who could be a top chemist and find a cure for cancers is more likely to have those skills developed early if they're in a school with a huge science lab with cutting edge equipment, rather than if they're in a school sharing 1 book and 1 bunsen burner between three children.
Saying that, a child from an exclusive public school, who is used to tiny class sizes, next to no interaction with other social classes, and every opportunity laid at their feet, is then more likely to become a politician and make decisions about all the everyday things they have never experienced, than someone who has actually used the public services like transport and the NHS, or has known poverty, and so who has insight into laws that would be effective for everyone.

As a society, we need children to reach their full potential so that we as a society reach our full potential. Giving a minority of children vastly more resources is unfair and also stupid, as it doesn't make sense for the wider population.

"So some of the parents would pay and some wouldn’t? I think the paying parents would stop paying any fees pretty promptly if the same service was offered for free".

No, that would be the whole point of abolishing the private schools. Parents currently paying would no longer pay fees because their children would be in state schools.
But because the state schools would have equal access to previous private school facilities and amenities, they would still benefit.

"What if the private school doesn’t want to sell? Would you insist on compulsory purchase?"

It would have to be discussed very carefully, with all of the benefits to society laid out.
They still would not be able to charge for places, so it would be up to them what they do. Selling or sharing resources would work.

On a fundamental level, this would never make it through Parliament. Thank god our parliamentary system isn’t actually representative of the general population-we’d be screwed otherwise.

@duffeldaisy a lot of parents in the state system already de facto pay through various charitable donations, over inflated charges for trips, uniforms etc, ‘optional’ contributions, volunteering, out of school tuition and clubs etc. That’s how the government gets away with so woefully underfunding the system-the middle class parents who are ostensibly anti private school pay up anyway to ensure that their little darlings don’t suffer for their apparent social conscience.

"Thank god our parliamentary system isn’t actually representative of the general population-we’d be screwed otherwise."

Well we wouldn't. People currently paying huge fees wouldn't have to any more, there would be much greater equality of opportunity, all children would benefit (those currently at private schools would still be able to use those facilities, they'd have more of a social mix in their classes, and more people to discuss with in lessons), and we'd have more freedom in society to follow our strengths. It's a win-win situation.

@TeenTimesTwo they are already trying to remove charitable status and it’s looking highly likely to happen soon.

@cantkeepawayforever that seems a bit arbitrary. Surely it would be better to means test education so that anyone who uses the state system pays however much they can afford to do so?

No, that would be the whole point of abolishing the private schools. Parents currently paying would no longer pay fees because their children would be in state schools.
But because the state schools would have equal access to previous private school facilities and amenities, they would still benefit.

Private schools have those facilities and amenities because they are paid for; not just the one-off up front cost of building and equipping a new science block but the annual on-going cost of maintenance, replacing equipment and consumables. How long do you think the excellent facilities are going to last?

@duffeldaisy I meant that in a more general sense. At any rate. I would prefer to continue to pay the fees we do so that my children can continue to be educated with sufficient resources independently of the ridiculous obsession with results that seems so prevalent in the state sector. Of course their classes would also become less diverse in the event of a state take over-we live in a predominantly white area. Our eldest is one of three children that aren’t white in a class of fifteen. From what people with kids in state schools tell me, the rate seems to be closer to 3 in 30 in state schools in the area. Currently half of families in our schools are international in some way so everyone is quite tolerant and we aren’t othered in any way. Unfortunately that’s not true of the wider community in the area.