To scream, "Your Private School Children Are Not Being Discriminated Against at Uni"

[Triffid1]

Between work and social I seem to have a pretty diverse group of people who I engage with regularly but as my DC are at an age where we're thinking about high schools, there have been quite a few conversations around this recently. I have now had not one but THREE separate conversations with parents who are planning to send their children to private schools who have expressed concern that it might "disadvantage" them because the universities are prioritising state school children.

Clearly, every time someone says this, I immediately move them further down the pile of people I want to hang out with. But why is this so prevalent? Yesterday, talking with a client on Zoom, where he was ringing from his lovely home office in his leafy suburb of London I didn't actually know what to even say but I wanted to yell, "FFS, if there's a small shift so that the small number of private school children don't get the majority of places at the top universities, you'll have to live with it." Instead I simply changed the subject politely. Argh.

[libertyfarmboots]

Entitlement. I want, so I should get. The assumption that the private school child would or should automatically be more ‘deserving’ is front and centre.

[SunShinesBrightly]

@DrWhoNowww

Thing is, on a population level we absolutely should be prioritising equal and fair access to further education regardless off your parental and secondary education background.

But, if you happen to be the poor sod whose been slogging their guts out at private school for an oxbridge place and you lose out to someone with worse grades but they went to a worse school…it feels quite personal.

So I can also see why some parents feel for their “precious darlings”.

Really the solution is making sure primary and secondary education access is more fair and equitable - so all children have the same opportunities.

The educational disadvantage starts early, fixing it at university entrance punishes the wrong people.

It’s definitely an interesting debate.
I’m not sure the privately educated (poor little chickens) are being disadvantaged or are losing out in any shape or form but people are definitely getting a leg up undeservedly.

Example:
We live in a very diverse area. So diverse that the entire borough is classed as deprived because there are pockets of extreme poverty.
DD’s friend did very little work for A levels. She was out and about and said herself that she ‘couldn’t be arsed’. Her grades were consistently lower than her conditional offer grades.
She applied to several universities and when the results came out didn’t get the offer grades.

She appealed based on her hometown being classed as a deprived area. She was one of the ‘disadvantaged’ ones apparently.

Except she’s not. She lives in a good part of town, has parents who work and is as well off as we are. Yet on paper she qualified for special consideration.

The university- UCL - accepted her appeal and allowed her to join the course with significantly lower grades.

The system is a load of... whichever way you look at it.

[Dentistlakes]

The selection process should be based on ability and interview. Very bright kids who are interested in their subject will do well no matter where they come from. Selecting on the basis of private vs state is doing a disservice to the kids who deserve a place.

[Mercedes519]

@Plumtree391

People have funny ideas when it comes to their children's education. Those that I know in recent times have gone to good universities from state schools but they were generally grammar schools with high academic standards.

Just look around and find schools that suit your children, where they will blossom, and ignore everybody else.

"Just look around."

I look around. I see a school in catchment which has an attainment 8 of 19% and a terrible discipline record. I see every other school we won't get into because they are oversubscribed and we're too far away. I see a faith school which doesn't have a catchment because the distance is the last criteria and all the places are filled by then. I see a private school I can't afford.

I also see a lot of my DC's peers moving into catchment to get a good school - again something that is out of the reach of many.

While we don't have equity of education then at least there can be some balancing of context. Although I do agree with a PP that university is often too late for disadvantaged kids who have given up hope long before that.

[kitkatsky]

YANBU but this isn't a new thing. I went to Exeter nearly 20 years ago- they were known for being the 4th highest private school entry back then, behind Oxbridge and Bristol. I was often told by my privately educated peers that I'd probably only been accepted because of my comprehensive school education and deprived postcode. Never mind the fact I had better A Levels and eventually a degree to them. Privileged people usually need a reason to feel they're equal to everyone else so they can tell themselves their hard work alone got them to where they are

[OakPine]

The people with the sharpest middle class elbows I've seen aren't the private school parents. They are the middle class state school parents who pay for every tutor going and practically do their kids school work for them!

Never heard of any private school kids going to state school for S6.

[moch11]

It’s not always correct to say, ‘ Every single person in x school is extremely privileged, mostly by virtue of having rich and supportive parents.’ Things are changing in terms of the way too independents select as well. Google Latymer Upper School as an example. 25% on bursaries, I think? There is a much wider range of ‘privilege’ in some London independents than your average leafy suburban comp who just wander in from the surrounding avenues.

[CinnamonJellyBeans]

@QueeniesCroft has summed it the feelings of the rich perfectly: "equality feeling like oppression" .

@moch11 has made a massively good point: Oxbridge talk about widening state school participation, but most of their state school entrants do indeed come from selective grammars in wealthy enclaves. TBF, Oxbridge are bending over backwards to get LAC, state school, first generation uni and BAME kids in. The problem lies with parents and schools who are not identifying Oxbridge kids early enough to get them the supracurricular skills and experience they need for their chosen subject.

A note of caution: Oxbrige do NOT accept students with less than the standard offer (typical AAA or AAA). A contextual offer just means a guttersnipe A is far more valuable than a Hampstead Heath A*, so the state school kids are more likely to be offered a place.

[TableFlowerss]

YANBU

I’m not surprised universities are starting to realise that children from state schools with similar grades to their privately educated peers, are likely to be academically more able.

Had they had the same opportunities, as the private school students they would have probably gained higher grades and equally, the private school students would have likely done worse academically, if they went to state school.

That’s why people send they’re children to private schools as they generally get better grades, therefore offered more opportunities.

All things equal and this wouldn’t be the case. Children from private schools aren’t naturally smarter than state school children but they have a significant advantage. This advantage is what would put me off if I had two students with equal scores. I’d take on the state school pupil in a heartbeat.

[MandyMotherOfBrian]

@notanothertakeaway

I don’t think we can pretend that state schools will ever be able to compete on a level playing field with schools that can raise so much money in fees from wealthy parents

*@Nesbo* That's quite a generalisation. In my city, one of the state schools has excellent sporting facilities, better exam results and better pastoral support than the closest two private schools

Either we live in the same city, or it’s more common than people might think then. However, I’ll wager that, if they are different, your city’s state schools have the same thing in common with mine - IE de facto selection by post code. The excellent state schools are slap bang in the middle of the wide leafy roads with enormous detached houses. The shittiest, is in the middle of the shittiest estate, not that far away but where deprivation prevails and lack of local authority financial input is writ large.

[girljulian]

[quote BFrazzled]@girljulian What you write is factually correct but I disagree with your conclusion. Every single person in Westminster school is extremely privileged, mostly by virtue of having rich and supportive parents. They are also bright, but really the level of brightness varies (it is generally not possible to capture brightness by A level results...). Same is more or less true for every selective school with high results. As such I would indeed expect much better performance from students coming from such schools than from a student who went to regular comprehensive. The exception to this would be a rare student on full scholarship.

Of course you could game the system by sending your child to a local school and prepping him at home, but most people don't do it which is quite telling.[/quote]
Are you sure you meant to reply to me? I completely agree wiht all of this and never said otherwise!

[Boulshired]

Rich people will eventually get around it, state school with private tutors or home schooling with a group of wealthy parents hiring tutors. Homeschooling is getting more popular here, especially among the wealthy.

[Foxyloxy1plus1]

I wish we could in some way alter the notion that the only successful way through life is school, university, well paid white collar job.

Not all children can or should be going to university. Some should be using their skills and talents in practical ways.

When it was decided that up to 50% of students should or could go to university , a number of courses became available, which it seems, had less academic rigour than traditional subjects. I think many of those who focused on them have had and will have more difficulty in securing the higher paid careers that might be the expectation of former years, when fewer university places were available and a degree more or less automatically ensured a career.

I wonder how people feel when their offsprings expensive education leaves them unable to find work in their degree subject, or, in fact, any work that they couldn’t have done without spending megabucks.

[MandyMotherOfBrian]

Never heard of any private school kids going to state school for S6
They do here. As per my post above, the A Level results are better for one thing, and they only have to mix outside their circle for two years. Also, I’ve actually had it straight from the horses mouth that ‘it’ll do them good to see a bit of the real world before they go to university’.

[Caplin]

@notanothertakeaway

But I learned that lots of private school parents in Scotland take their kids out on S6 and put them into state secondary as they are more likely to get a spot in a decent uni!

*@Caplin* I live in Scotland, and have never heard of people doing this

I hadn't either until I was talking to another parent with Uni age kids a few months ago. My jaw hit the floor.

[2bazookas]

@Plumtree391

People have funny ideas when it comes to their children's education. Those that I know in recent times have gone to good universities from state schools but they were generally grammar schools with high academic standards.

Just look around and find schools that suit your children, where they will blossom, and ignore everybody else.

In Scotland, there are no selective state secondary schools. The entire state system of secondary education is Comprehensive. Many of which obviously have high academic standards as their pupils enter "good" universities all over UK.

[Itsnotdeep]

6% of school children are educated in private schools, but the top universities (excluding Oxbridge, which is much higher) have anything from 25-40% of pupils from private schools, and some courses (law eg) are much higher. I think the figures are getting worse not better for state educated children.

There is no way that universities are discriminating against private school children. There is no way that a B at a private school is the same as a B at a state school. Universities should be taking 94% of their entrants from state schools. And just because your parents are wealthy enough to pay for private school should not stop children from having an equal right to university based on their intelligence and potential rather than their parents' wealth.

[Dentistlakes]

@Foxyloxy1plus1

I wish we could in some way alter the notion that the only successful way through life is school, university, well paid white collar job.

Not all children can or should be going to university. Some should be using their skills and talents in practical ways.

When it was decided that up to 50% of students should or could go to university , a number of courses became available, which it seems, had less academic rigour than traditional subjects. I think many of those who focused on them have had and will have more difficulty in securing the higher paid careers that might be the expectation of former years, when fewer university places were available and a degree more or less automatically ensured a career.

I wonder how people feel when their offsprings expensive education leaves them unable to find work in their degree subject, or, in fact, any work that they couldn’t have done without spending megabucks.

Exactly. There’s more than one way to crack a nut and given how expensive it is now to attend university, I will be encouraging my kids to look at all the options. Whilst it’s nice to go to uni for the experience, it’s not the be all and end all and professional qualifications gained on the job can get you where you want to be quicker than spending several years in higher education, only to go in towards the bottom anyway.

[cookingisoverrated]

@QueeniesCroft

It sounds like a classic case of equality feeling like oppression when someone previously had privilege. I don't for one moment believe that independent schools are being discriminated against, but I do believe that the extra "weight" that was previously added to an application by going to a "good" (ie private) school is lessening.

This. They're bemoaning the fact that they're losing their privilege. I have no time for any such complaints.

[RedMarauder]

@MandyMotherOfBrian it's very common.

Some state schools do a lottery to select all their pupils. Others deliberately include a deprived area as part of their local catchment distance so you live in that postcode you are counted as living as near the school. The latter can still be gamed.

[terrywynne]

[quote Pipsquiggle]@terrywynne

I am hoping you would go for the 2nd, not as polished applicant[/quote]
I was never in a position to get a deciding vote but the academics I worked with were very good at detecting when someone had a very polished and trained manner of speaking but lacked depth of understanding. And equally could tell when someone was struggling because of nerves and feeling overwhelmed by an unfamiliar environment.

Oxbridge gets a bad rep in some quarters for its interviews but in my experience (and I am sure it is not universal and some would disagree), the tutors went out of their way go be be understanding of nerves. And if an applicant seemed to be underperforming at interview compared with their written work/tests, there would be efforts to get the another interview at the same college or another to see if a different interviewer/location or just more experience would help their performance.

Contextual seems to be beingused if different ways on this thread so to clarify I meant contextual as in Oxbridge college know post code information, performance compared to school average, care status etc and there are circumstances in which that has to be borne in mind. Not contextual in that they will give a lower offer to a state school pupil.

[MandyMotherOfBrian]

@BungleandGeorge

My child is at state school and the contextual offers thing seems to be very unfair to me as it’s such a blunt instrument. I can be rich living in a deprived postcode and qualify or I can be poor living in a rich postcode and not qualify. Some of the most disadvantaged edu action ally are those with SEN but that doesn’t figure at all. Replacing one unfair system with another unfair system isn’t progress. Academically I’m not convinced that many independents are superior to state schools, the intake is different

Yes, I couldn’t quite believe that my elder DD would have benefited from a contextual offer from her chosen university (she didn’t need to rely on it, her grades were more than enough), given our circumstances, just because our postcode - the area which it covers being everything from the wealthiest farming families to the poorest in the county - dictated it. Otoh, my youngest DD won’t in anyway benefit from any kind of contextual offer, particularly not given her SEN which she has struggled with all throughout her years in school - presumably the thinking is SEN students will have been uplifted to an equal platform through their primary and secondary education, and therefore had equal chance via exam access arrangements etc to achieve accordingly, which obviously is not always the case. Seems like a good system in general but could be modified to be better.

[wellards]

The thing I find interesting is that plenty never admit choosing private for an advantage instead it was the facilities or suits the child. Now it turns out it was the advantage they wanted.

[Flyingantday]

@kitkatsky

YANBU but this isn't a new thing. I went to Exeter nearly 20 years ago- they were known for being the 4th highest private school entry back then, behind Oxbridge and Bristol. I was often told by my privately educated peers that I'd probably only been accepted because of my comprehensive school education and deprived postcode. Never mind the fact I had better A Levels and eventually a degree to them. Privileged people usually need a reason to feel they're equal to everyone else so they can tell themselves their hard work alone got them to where they are

Gosh yes, I remember this too… apparently comprehensive schools sit easier exam boards and do modular exams so my A in maths wasn’t a real one.

[Dentistlakes]

@wellards

The thing I find interesting is that plenty never admit choosing private for an advantage instead it was the facilities or suits the child. Now it turns out it was the advantage they wanted.

It’s no different to those who move to get into a particular catchment or tutor to get their child into a grammar. Parents do what they can to help their child access the best education. The only thing that differs is how they go about it, but access to money is always the limiting factor be it spent on a more expensive house, tutors or school fees.