To start gratuitous board school thread

[PettyContractor]

Prompted by George Monbiot article in the guardian, which I found moving. (I'm not a lefty and therefore not usually a fan of his output, but I did go to boarding school...)

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/nov/07/boarding-schools-boris-johnson-bullies

The psychotherapist Joy Schaverien lists a set of symptoms that she calls “boarding school syndrome”. Early boarding, she finds, has similar effects to being taken into care, but with the added twist that your parents have demanded it. Premature separation from your family “can cause profound developmental damage”.

The justification for early boarding is based on a massive but common misconception. Because physical hardship in childhood makes you physically tough, the founders of the system believed that emotional hardship must make you emotionally tough. It does the opposite. It causes psychological damage that only years of love and therapy can later repair. But if there are two things that being sent to boarding school teach you, they are that love cannot be trusted, and that you should never admit to needing help.

On my first night at boarding school, I felt entirely alone. I was shocked, frightened and intensely homesick, but I soon discovered that expressing these emotions, instead of bringing help and consolation, attracted a gloating, predatory fascination.

The older boys, being vulnerable themselves, knew exactly where to find your weaknesses. There was one night of grace, and thereafter the bullying was relentless, by day and night. It was devastating. There was no pastoral care at all. Staff looked on with indifference as the lives of the small children entrusted to them fell apart. They believed we should sink or swim. (The same philosophy applied to swimming, by the way: non-swimmers were thrown into the deep end of an unheated pool in March.)

Someone will be along shortly to say it's not like that nowadays. How do they know? Do they think parents knew what went on in Monbiots time? Perhaps they did. I remember two characters in "Another Country" discussing this exact issue. One says something like, "If only the parents knew what goes on..." to which the other replies something like. "They do know. At least the fathers do."

I was a day pupil at a boarding school. A number of the boarders where pupils who chose to continue to board after parents returned to the area. I know a lot of them as adults and they have a close relationship with their parents too.

I know a lady who boarded from 5yo. That was because her parents were imprisoned by the Japanese in WWII, and she was evacuated out as the Japanese advanced. She made such a close group of friends they still meet up a few times a year, and they drop everything if one of them is in need of help.
She does think her relationship with her parents was effected, but she speaks about them with real affection and love.

According to 2019 figures there are 4460 primary school age UK boarders. Half of them were full boarding. So not 'hardly any' as a poster up thread stated
I remember as a child parents saying 'oh boarding isn't anything like it used to be!' and posters on here still saying it

My experience is to some extent you have to either bully or be bullied. If you do not recognise any bullying from your bs days then you were probably in the bullying camp. School is a jungle and boarding even more so. It has always been the same and always will be because human nature is human nature
Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose

TVstar I don’t think it was that stark re bullying. There were a lot of us that just were homesick and we’d get upset on a Sunday night. But still friends. There was a hierarchy though, that I remember we all kind of knew that.

It probably has changed in a few ways, but it’s still the bit being at home when you want to be that is the same. I think adults like to be at home too it’s not that unusual as a want.

People who send young children are cruel imo

I actually think this concept is the source of Prince Harry's difficulties

Went at 7, and at a later stage school holidays were split between parents, so he hardly saw his mother prior to her death

Is on record as having hated Eton

I think it depends WHY a hild is sent to boarding school. I grew up in a Christian group where a lot of people sent their children to boarding school at age 6 because they were missionaries. Almost all of them had negative experiences and trauma as a result. We have friends working in Tokyo who were so insistent that their boys had a "British" education that they could rejoin in furlough years that they have sent them to India to boarding school from age 6. The older one was fine, but the younger one has had tons of problems and they are now essentially forcing him, while their daughters are at Japanese school and live with their parents. How do you explain to a ten year old that he has to suck it up and endure years of emotional trauma while his sisters can stay at home, happy with mum and dad? It really makes my blood boil.

Completely agree with you Vanya re PH. Just look how dysfunctional the royal family are. Not hard to see why..

Went at 7, and at a later stage school holidays were split between parents, so he hardly saw his mother prior to her death

Harry was sent to boarding school at 13, not 7.

@HoldMyLobster . Did he not go to Ludgrove as a boarder?

He went at 7, as did William, to Ludgrove.

They went to Wetherby before that for Infants

Ah maybe he did. Poor guy.

My view is that arguably the children who are damaged by boarding school would be damaged by something else in their lives and outcomes would be no different, or differing set of problems. You only need to see all the issues, threads on here to see that.

No. Some people have been traumatised as a result of being sent away from home too young. Psychologists have warned that it is detrimental to the long term mental health of children. The fact that some children would have MH issues anyway is true but some are only damaged by being away from home so young.

Day schools can be brutal too but the difference there is that kids get to escape every evening. They have adults on hand who love them and support them. Importantly they have the opportunity to socialise and engage in activities outside of school so aren't limited in their social outlook.

According to 2019 figures there are 4460 primary school age UK boarders. Half of them were full boarding. So not 'hardly any' as a poster up thread stated

Not sure what the source of your stats is @Tvstar.

The authoritative source for boarding numbers is the annual ISC census which shows that there was a total of 3129 primary school boarders in UK schools in 2019 .(table 3 4 p 34) ‘Boarders’ are defined as children who have spent at least one night at school in the term the census was taken. This is a long way from your figure of 4460

Many of these children - and the vast majority of the younger ones- will be children who have done the odd night flexiboarding. Most of the full boarders are children from overseas - mainland China and Russia - who want their children to learn English before going on to a small number of highly selective public schools, boarding choristers, children in special schools and children from very complicated family backgrounds ( think siblings with severe disabilities, parents with terminal illnesses etc). The boarding prep sector is in freefall and has been for the last five years or so.

www.isc.co.uk/media/5479/isc_census_2019_report.pdf

lucozade The ISC report you linked to indicates that there are 4459 boarders at junior level which is up to Year 8, age 13. I suspect that's where the figure comes from.

Also, not all boarding schools are in the ISC; there are 40-odd state schools offering boarding, of which at least a couple take under 11s.