.. to think we should scrap private schools?

[katnyps]

How can we ever have an equal opportunities society when people with more money can pay for their children to have a better education?

I know that there are exceptions to the rule, and great teachers in publicly funded schools, but I get the impression that influential roles in society are disproportionately represented by people paid for education... or am I wrong about this too?

I believe that Finland has one of the best (internationally recognised) education system in the world and (apologies if I'm not quite right here, but broadly speaking) that it is actually illegal there to charge for education?

@CruCru

This is an interesting thread. I think part of the problem is an assumption that all private schools are like Eton.

A lot of them are specialist schools, places like the Royal Ballet School, Yehudi Menuhin or Westminster Cathedral Choir School. If all private schools are to be scrapped then it means the state will have to take on the job of intensive ballet, violin or choral coaching (several hours a day) for children at boarding school. I don't think that this is the job of the state.

You do realise that many of these schools are already part funded by the government? There's been a scheme in place for years to fund places at specialist music and dance schools. I'm not clear if you're saying you think that the Music and Dance Scheme is wrong, or that you just didn't know they had this funding already?

I don't have any issue at all with the govt funding these students where they are selected through talent rather than ability to pay. I don't see why the government shouldn't be supporting children from all backgrounds who have exceptional talent in these areas. Moving these schools into the state system shouldn't present any particular difficulties, because they'd probably carry on functioning much as they do now, providing specialist teaching, and boarding for children who need it.

"We will never see the end of inequality when it starts at age 4"

No, it doesn't start at 4. It could be argued that it begins in pregnancy for some, but certainly from birth.

Some private school parents would love for their DC’s school to become a state school because then they wouldn’t have to pay fees. If government scrapped private schools they would have to buy them out and keep DC who are already there. Maybe add a few more kids into the smaller class sizes. If you look at the former grammar schools in our area they are still the better performing comps too. People will then just move into catchment of those nationalised private schools. I think the fundamental problem in this country is that class sizes in primary are too big compared to other countries but the good schools have TAs that mitigate that disadvantage. From my experience, I can also confidently say that certain state schools are better than certain independent schools. Also if you look at all the educational research the problem is usually the parents, not the schools. An average child from a supportive background will do well in an average school. What you actually need is just more funded support for deprived children, nothing much to do with private schools because nationalising those would cost a fortune.

I was an assisted places child ( that ages me). The private school I attended did have really high expectations. I remember we were translating Virgil within a year or so of starting. It changed my life as a working class child. I am still the only person in my family to have attended university. I had a grammar school place on offer too but that was in the days before intensive tutoring. My teachers helped to prepare me and suggested to my parents that I be put forward.
Neither of these routes to social mobility are open now to working class children. Grammar is dominated by the middle classes ( I include my children in this group) and the assisted places scheme was scrapped. State schools are not offering social mobility and this is the issue that needs looking at. There is no real will to address this issue as the same people calling for the scrapping of private education are often those gaining from the inequality and ingrained ideologies of the state system.
I believe the issues are a lot more complex than some posters are suggesting . Private schools do offer more but some of the motivation to scrap them seems to be from people who are already doing very well ( private tutors etc). The cynical side of me believes it is another facet of the jostling for advantage and a worry that others have more as the above issues are not even on the agenda.
When we moved our son to a private school, there was definitely judgement from neighbours who thought our local state primary was fantastic. What they were unaware of was that they were having a completely different experience of the school. A long time ago, I posted about the issues, under a previous username, which I came to believe were due to institutional racism . Some posters understood while others suggested I was ‘ playing the race card’. I was right. He moved and left primary at level 6 in all subjects and in the top percentage group of grammar school applicants. Interestingly, the school he moved to has a very high percentage of black students and many parents told very similar stories. Many were running small businesses and play dates were at very normal houses in inner city areas. Also, tellingly, several parents were teachers and social workers and all were quite aware of likely outcomes for their children in these environments.
That was a very long post but essentially I think most parents try to do the best for their children. That is life and is a good thing really. We would be in quite a mess if they didn’t. Personally, I would have home schooled rather than put my son back into the environment he was in.
I could write another long chapter on corrupt contracts and waste in the state system but that’s another story ( and under a Labour not Tory council before people jump to conclusions).

You do realise that many of these schools are already part funded by the government? There's been a scheme in place for years to fund places at specialist music and dance schools. I'm not clear if you're saying you think that the Music and Dance Scheme is wrong, or that you just didn't know they had this funding already?

I must admit that I'd never heard of the Music and Dance Scheme.

@Blackberrycream

* Interestingly, the school he moved to has a very high percentage of black students and many parents told very similar stories. Many were running small businesses and play dates were at very normal houses in inner city areas. Also, tellingly, several parents were teachers and social workers and all were quite aware of likely outcomes for their children in these environments.*

Where in the UK is there a private school with a high percentage of black students with teachers and social workers for parents?

I swear the Labour party is canvassing MN for policy direction at the moment

I agree with blackberry. My twins' school (a day private school) has whites in a minority ( we are white) and lots of the non-white parents found the same thing and their children did well in the fee paying school.

I particularly find it annoying or amusing when you get leftist fairly well off people - who we used to call champagne socialists - who are in groups of friends who would never use a fee paying school and they go on about hating private schools and yet they have just about all bought houses in very expensive areas or with really good state schools so it is pretty easy for them to make those choices and then they seem to think they are so virtuous because they are using the state system. Funnily enough they never choose the worst local comprehensive for their children. In a sense they are less honest than those who choose to pay fees. you could say by taking a state place when they could afford school fees they are taking money out of the state system in an unfair way that parents who pay school fees do not.

[quote Sethy38]@Blackberrycream

* Interestingly, the school he moved to has a very high percentage of black students and many parents told very similar stories. Many were running small businesses and play dates were at very normal houses in inner city areas. Also, tellingly, several parents were teachers and social workers and all were quite aware of likely outcomes for their children in these environments.*

Where in the UK is there a private school with a high percentage of black students with teachers and social workers for parents?[/quote]
Manchester
You may not like what I have written because it doesn’t fit with pre conceptions but that is my point.

Get more parents to take responsibility for the education of their children and not just teachers. If all parents did that then the level of education would increase.

I would also spend my money on private tutoring and private extra curricular classes.

Presumably these would also be banned under the new dictat, as would encouraging one's children to read, watch documentaries, taking them to places of educational value, in fact everything that made any effort to lift one's children off the bottom of the pond.

Our local prep has higher ethnic diversity than the state primaries near us too. Mainly children of doctors and other healthcare professionals, people with their own businesses, teachers. Rural county with underfunded state schools and fees are not ridiculously high compared to other places in the country. House prices around the 'best' state schools are hugely inflated in our nearest town so some choose to go private, have a cheaper but better house more rurally or in a less expensive location. Buying an expensive house near an outstanding state school is just a different way of paying for education and it is hypocritical of people who think they are superior when they've done that.

Maybe this is a different answer
Eton partner the first state boarding free school (there are other state boarding schools but this is the first free school)
www.holyportcollege.org.uk/about-us/the-eton-partnership

I asked a question
And you jump to daft conclusions

I don’t give a hoot! I was curious

Our prep was ethnically diverse and my non Christian children weren’t at the back of the queue for places unlike our nearest primary school (CofE).

But would you agree that a black majority student base with teachers and social works as parents is most certainly not the norm for private schooling in this country?

Surely?!

Where in the UK is there a private school with a high percentage of black students with teachers and social workers for parents?

My kids school. Also Greater Manchester. I am a social worker, DCs best friends parent is a teacher. There is a higher BAME presence in the school than in the local state school we viewed.

Xenia,

These “Champagne Socialists” are not just amusing. They are very dangerous. Their good intentions are very often misguided.

Sethy38

I think that when people think of private schools, they think of Eton and Harrow, Cheltenham Ladies college etc. They don't think of the unassuming pre down the road that they probably didn't even realise was there.

In my local area there are 3 private primaries - one is a converted house, one is a group of 60s prefabs and one is a Victorian school type building. They mainly have tarmac play grounds and fairly small grounds - very similar to the local primaries, just with a smaller pupil intake. The secondaries are similar, they aren't these fabulous gothic buildings with ultra modern facilities and huge sports fields and dedicated theatres. They are all under £10k a year, the primaries under £7k - achievable for lots of families with 2 working professional parents, which is most of them.

I think lots of people make assumptions about who sends their kids to private schools, what private schools are like and how much they cost. The reality is quite different.

Sethy38

And I don't know about the rest of the country, but the schools we viewed had an overwhelmingly high BAME presence compared to the surrounding state schools, which I think indicates that state schools are failing our BAME students!

*Sethy", I think it was unusual for a private school at in one year my white (and blonde) son was the only white boy in his class at all. However even back in about 1994 I remember my daughter at Haberdashers of all the year she was in - 4 classes - was only one of two who had four British born grandparents.

The above is the South Easter. My sibling has children at private school in Yorkshire and I am pretty sure most are white and the same at my old school (day private, Newcastle)

it is a thread theme change a bit but it is actually quite an interesting dynamic to go to school in where you are the "other" because you are white and most people are not white. I think it is a great way to be a teenager in a multi cultural City like London .

YY @Blackberrycream I’ve spent two years going through a very similar situation with dc before I finally moved them into prep, to great rumour mongering and general bitchyness from a few primary school parents, anyone would have thought I had murdered their child.

Outcomes for Black children remain statistically worse than their white peers. So I will do everything I can to provide dc with a head start.

Bemused by some of the responses here. Every choice you make is an unfair advantage over someone, somewhere. You do what is best for your child. And for your family.

I swear the Labour party is canvassing MN for policy direction at the moment

Fairly sure that their researchers are here all the time DoubleTweenQueen.

My children are in a very large prep in SE
I think I can count on one hand the number of BAME

Hence me asking where

@Sethy38

I asked a question And you jump to daft conclusions

I don’t give a hoot! I was curious

I’m sorry. I thought you were questioning the facts. I don’t think it is as unusual as you think.People focus on Etonian and Harrow. Fees are around 10, 000. for private schools in this area. We lived really close to the bone on one salary and we weren’t alone. In this. For us the stakes were quite high. It’s a route out of chronic low expectation. The schools in the more expensive parts of this city have a lesser ethnic mix and what you would call a more middle class intake ( professional parents),. These parents may claim to support a more egalitarian system but they are segregated themselves very nicely and are used to receiving the best that state has to offer.. Having it both ways if you like. As Xenia said, there is huge hypocrisy around these issues.