To wonder if our children would be the ‘poor’ ones at private school

[Changethefloorthroughout]

DH and I have a good joint income of over £100,000 and I’m seriously considering private school for our children.

A worry for me is if they are surrounded by children from much wealthier backgrounds if they would feel ‘poor’. I’m just posting for thoughts from people who know a bit more about the independent system than me.

@gattey

Our prep is in a bit of a London Bubble but I’m still stunned at how wealthy some ‘normal’ people are.

But unless the parents give it away themselves then no one would necessarily know.

[quote Motheroftigers]@Pumperthepumper is not a teacher. Teachers do not get involved in marketing models or projections.

Only the bursar will know about financial status and that's only if financial help is required. No teacher will be privy to that info. No run of the mill office staff would either.

If a school is doing targeted marketing to what car some one is likely to drive or what holiday the average family is going on they are really missing the mark with their potential reach. They are effectively cutting off huge swaths of demographs which is a shit business model.

I think you dug yourself a in hole with there pumper.

I would put money on it either you dont/havnt worked in a private school or you were office staff that held a grudge against wealthier people/held them in admiration. and gossiped about what car you thought they had or where they went on holiday.

I worked all last summer as I work with the NHS, my DH took the kids to alcudia for a week. Many many of my friends kids who's parents work within the NHS or in fact law where there is a huge back log - stayed in summer school camps - the entire time.

I also have a school mum friend who drives a covid bus - her child was in school all summer.

Where are your projections there? What car do we drive?[/quote]
You can feel free to advanced search me. You seem to find me fascinating.

If the school has a marketing department - which they will, in 2021 - they will spend a lot of money and time advertising their schools to the kind of people they know will be interested.

This isn’t rocket science, or any kind of psychic ability. It’s basic advertising.

Somewhere in the middle - ffs

Short answer, yes.

I went to private school, and my parents had a relatively modest income.

I felt like the poor child as I didn't have designer clothes, or go skiing. The children would often meet up at a particular very expensive ski resort during the holidays.

I'm guessing you are some distance from London/SE if you are even able to afford private school X2 on an income of £100k, so maybe it's different in the North.

My kids go to private school but granted not a particularly 'posh' or expensive one.

I don't know if this is usually the thing but honestly it's not like that at all, from my experience. Went for a night out with some girls from DS's class last night and just such a lovely bunch with a range of backgrounds and incomes. Mostly strong working mum types but definitely a mix and very inclusive.

Maybe I just got lucky!

Honestly yes. It's one of the reasons I wouldn't send my kids to private school. Some of the people who send their kids private would see £100k as a pittance.

Think it really depends on the school also. Some private schools are cheap compared to the big name schools and will attract a different clientele to the mega- wealthy.

@Merryoldgoat yes it's quite eye opening & agree it's not always obvious. Where my DH works some of his very normal looking colleagues earn 1m plus.

OP, I was the poor one at my private school and it was fine. The downsides were: 1) everyone else lived near each other in the posh end of town, whilst we lived further away in the rougher end of town - this meant I couldn’t hang out with everyone so easily after school or at the weekend. And 2) all my friends went away on fancy holidays every single school holiday so I was quite lonely at home on my own.

Other than that I didn’t have any problems making friends or with people being snobby. Some things the rich kids came out with were very unaware ( I remember a particular girl insisting that 90% of the population had walk-in wardrobes in their bedrooms at home and another one where a girl was crying because her parents had had to sell their house to pay off some debts, but it turned out she was talking about their second holiday home!).

I am very glad I went to the school and still have lots of friends from my time there (now late 30s)

They absolutely could be when you consider that some private schools are 30 grand plus a year per child and then boarding on top of that. 100 grand wouldn’t go far in some areas and how many children you are paying for.

@Changethefloorthroughout

To be fair to *@icedcoffees* she did say she misread the title.

Pumper is probably best ignored, I must admit I don’t know what the particular axe is but she definitely has one!

Poster you’re referring to has been told off by others on several threads for axe-grinding 😂😂and she’s still at it

When everyone around you says the same thing…

I went to private school on a full fees scholarship. I was from a single parent family and my mum had no money (3 kids to raise by herself on a low income!) at all! (Wow - a salary of £100,000 would have seemed wealthy to me then!!)

I have really mixed feelings about it. I made lots of friends and I found it really interesting seeing different kids homes - some friends had indoor swimming pools (that blew my mind!!) And to this day, I still value that I have met and mingled with people from all walks of life. My school experience gave me a chance to see how the other half live, and to feel at ease and confident mingling with the wealthy. It also showed me that having money doesn't make you happy or any less f*!ked up that the rest of us!!

I was never bullied. I don't recall.kids excluding me - but teachers did not.always treat me.fairly.(pretty sure rich kid whose dad donated to the school beat me to the part I wanted in the school.play. I got kicked out of jazz band when another kid with money wanted to play the drums ..... etc... that kind of thing)

Well don't I feel vindicated @TractorAndHeadphones 😆

@Changethefloorthroughout

These ‘how can you even think of private school, how can you afford it’ are absolutely baffling to me.

We can afford it because our salaries cover it, leaving around £80,000 spare. How can that not afford it?!

Such strange responses.

Of course you could afford private school. If you asked whether you were wealthy enough to be a SAHM with your husband on 75k, everyone would say of course. It's sort of the same given that your salary will pay school fees.

I went to a private school & wasn't the poorest or richest. Students do notice people at either end of the scale but it genuinely isnt a huge deal, especially at the type of private school you're referring to which is 14k/year.

@Pumperthepumper

No we don’t. We have a single marketing officer who does the newsletter and open day ads.

@gattey

Well don't I feel vindicated *@TractorAndHeadphones* 😆

You should join up. Make me properly (mumsnet) famous.

[quote Merryoldgoat]@Pumperthepumper

No we don’t. We have a single marketing officer who does the newsletter and open day ads.[/quote]
How does your school decide where to advertise?

😴

@Pumperthepumper

I dunno - I stay out of that as it’s nothing to do with me. I know nothing about marketing.

[quote Merryoldgoat]@Pumperthepumper

I dunno - I stay out of that as it’s nothing to do with me. I know nothing about marketing.[/quote]
So, my point was that there is a demographic for private schools usually compiled by their marketing dept. And from that we know the average salary, the type of car, the newspapers, the pets, loads of stuff.

It depends on the independent school. If you are thinking of an international school it is likely to not matter at all, particularly if the school offers plenty of scholarships. Most schools insist bursaries and scholarships are kept quiet. You will find particularly with boys that they like to keep up with the others in terms of high branded clothes and trainers - but I think that happens everywhere. My daughter didn’t find any competition at all. I think that a lot of international students come here to study but their standard of living at home isn’t necessarily that high.

@Pumperthepumper

Yeah. We don’t do that. We don’t have a marketing ‘strategy’.

We shove a banner up saying when open day is and a few magazines.

Our biggest marketing spend is our leavers yearbook.

Do factor in increases in fees. DD1’s school fees went up by over £12,000 over the course of four years.

DD1’s school, we were definitely the poorest family there. She was at school with footballers’ kids, Hollywood actors’ kids and was friends with the daughter of one of the Spice Girls. DD2’s school was much more normal, with a very mixed demographic and lots of kids on bursaries or scholarships. Pick your school carefully!

YANBU

The kids I know at these schools have parents with salaries of 200k