School calling children piglets?

[GoToSleepBabyPlease]

Came across this on another thread but felt discussing it there would constitute a derail, so bringing it up here.

On a school website (link below):

'To make table manners fun at Hanford we have devised the ‘Manners Table’, a ranking system of eleven different levels with ‘Piglet’ at the bottom and ‘Royal Guest’ at the top. Each level has a different name to describe the behaviour, for example, a messy eater will be a ‘Panda’ or even ‘Cave Lady’ whereas those girls who have mastered dining rather than merely eating will be a ‘Favourite Auntie’ or ‘Best Granny’. When new girls join they start somewhere in the middle with the aim of working their way up as quickly as possible. If they should become a ‘Royal Guest’ they are allowed to bring their own jam to breakfast. Every Friday after lunch, Miss Morrey reads out the week’s manners rankings. If a girl is moved up then they are given a sweet while others may be warned or some even moved down.

1. Royal Guest (allowed to bring their own jam or other spread and can also move people up and down)
2. Best Granny (allowed to move people up and down in manners)
3. Favourite Aunty
4. Primrose
5. Panda
6. Cat (can go to Tuck Shop on Sunday)
7. Squirrel
8. Hyena
9. Boa Constrictor
10. Cave Lady

10. Piglet'

AIBU to think that referring to children as piglets doesn't exactly model good manners?

hanfordschool.co.uk/wellbeing/manners/

Certainly not an April fool.

@Randomname85

What's the problem with 5 lessons? Our secondary has 4 x 1 hour before lunch. My old school had 5 x 40 mins before lunch iirc.

Plus the bedtime again doesn't seem too weird for a boarding school.

God there's fees for Learning Support and all. Christ. Really not a place you'd want to have additional needs at.

Cute ponies though!

Do people PAY THOUSANDS to have their children subjected to that specious crap?

So weird. If you bring your own jam but aren't at the top ranking will they wrestle it off you?

Very weird and old fashioned, but then so is sending your child to board at age 7 so perhaps it appeals to the demographic? (Can see Jacob Rees Mogg finding no fault with it, for example).

sionnach read the council name. READ IT AND UNDERSTAND IT.

It's a very good school for people who want what they offer, it is private, boarding, rural, old-fashioned, and girls only. I LOVED my time there, as did my friends - we spent a lot of time climbing trees and riding ponies and building houses out of sticks, but it is also academically excellent, excels at art and music, and I never saw any bullying there - it is a very 'family' environment where the older girls look out for the younger girls.

What happens if you don't like jam? If you turned up with a tub of Nutella or peanut butter, will they take it off you?

I presume they would but just trying to tease it all out

@Soontobe60 my son went to a school that had the original Victorian school building, plus newer classrooms. The staff room was upstairs in the Victorian part. There would be no access to the staff room for a member of staff who had mobility issues and no means of putting in a lift.

I love it!! I would have adored something like this as a child who was obsessed with Enid Blyton.

It's not pc, but I was really shy as a kid and yes, a role like "hold this tray and go round all the groups" would have worked for me.

Also, with regard to the "just adapt the building" that may well be impossible due to either the listed status of the building or the structural engineering involved. They can't work miracles and won't have unlimited funds - if it's the sort of historic setting where lifting a brick requires a 20k spend on archaeology before you are even allowed to get started, it just wouldn't be possible.

@SionnachRua

God there's fees for Learning Support and all. Christ. Really not a place you'd want to have additional needs at.

Cute ponies though!

That's fairly normal for a prep school.

@Puffykins

I went to this school! (and ended up a Best Grannie) - it's actually really well done, and yes it is about manners but it's also about thinking of others, asking if they'd like more water, eating tidily to minimise clearing up etc. And it's a small school so it's not hard to do. There is no bullying involved. And it's very, VERY rare that anyone is made a piglet - I was there for 5 years and I think that it happened once (and that girl is fine. And one of my in real life best friends.) I try to teach my own children the same manners that we were taught to have at school (though I don't move them up and down a chart!) DD wants to go here though, so . . .

I'm glad you had a good experience (kudos on making Best Grannie), but to my mind it's all a bit problematic.

Do you think you'll send your daughter there?

The point of the 'own jam' is that you can indeed turn up with Nutella! Which was considered the greatest luxury (30 years ago, anyway. The other great thing we all wanted was Primula fish paste, so . . . )

@HeronLanyon

sionnach read the council name. READ IT AND UNDERSTAND IT.

You win the thread

Urgent message for sionnach. Mine to you above was an in joke Re the infamous ‘Jackie weaver’ handforth p.c meeting. I was not being rude. Alan had that covered.

I would have thought paying for LSA is quite common in Private schools

That's fairly normal for a prep school.

I've worked in a couple of private schools in my country and that's not how we do it here, I find it a bit repulsive tbqh. But maybe it's different in the UK, I wouldn't know.

Op thanks - am worried a non U.K. innocent poster now thinks I have shouted (like a piglet?!) at her

I think my dc would rather be boa constrictors than primroses.
The top two levels can move other children up and down? It does seem like something for Harriet Flashman?

@HeronLanyon

Urgent message for sionnach. Mine to you above was an in joke Re the infamous ‘Jackie weaver’ handforth p.c meeting. I was not being rude. Alan had that covered.

I got it my friend, don't worry Tbh to me Hanford and Handforth are almost interchangeable. In fact when typing this, I wrote Handford originally which I think is wrong for both!

This is a really interesting insight into English private schools anyway. Though I presume this one is a bit niche.

@HeronLanyon

Op thanks - am worried a non U.K. innocent poster now thinks I have shouted (like a piglet?!) at her

A cave lady at the very least, I shouldn't wonder.

@gotosleepbabyplease I'd love to send DD there, and she really wants to go. I'm not sending her to boarding school at 7 (she's already 8 for a start) which is the age I was, but I would totally send her at 9/ 10. I'm trying to juggle some things to work out if we can afford the fees. For what it's worth, I would not be doing this for any other school - I realise that Hanford might seem extraordinary judging by the website, but I had the most magical time - partly for all the reasons that everyone else thinks extraordinary! - and it is for that reason that I would love DD to go.

Sooo Posh with a capital P.

This has got to be an April Fool joke - I hope.