To be annoyed that private school parents are demonised?

[Imsorryyoufeelthatway]

Starting this threat to vent and as an antidote to the Closing all private schools would benefit state schools thread. In short, I'm a bit fed up with private school parents being bashed for buying a better education for their children, while parents who 'don't believe in private education' and spend a fortune on homes/second homes/rental properties in catchment areas for 'good' state schools then another fortune on tutors seem to get off scot free.

I'm also fed up with private school parents all being lumped in the same category. We're not all selfish, mega-wealthy, Bullingdon Club (or female equivalent, if there was one...) alumni; many of us are ordinary people (I'm a working class lass from a council estate whose parents worked as cleaners and in warehouses) who've worked bloody hard to be able to afford a better start in life for our children than we had. We were the first people in our families to go to university (on full grants, when they existed), the first to have careers not just jobs, and the first to own our own homes. No-one has ever handed us a penny – my DH got the train to university with £4.50 in his pocket and had to get a job straight away to buy food. No bank account, no trust fund, no-one paying his rent. We've managed to achieve social mobility against the odds, yet we're not allowed to celebrate this because we've chosen to invest in our children's future rather than over-priced property in 'good' state school catchment areas.

Yes, we all know that private schools are a major cause of inequality. Parents like us have literally lived and breathed that inequality our whole lives and we'd do anything to prevent our children having to do the same. We think that all children should have access to high quality education in safe, inspirational environments where they can achieve their potential, not just ours. But most state schools in the UK just cannot meet this requirement. We also know that if catchment areas for state schools were mixed-up, and the schools in deprived areas had an influx of children from more affluent areas and vice versa, then this would likely make things more equal over time. But our children are not part of a social experiment. In short, if those of us who had difficult starts in life and went to terrible schools choose to work our arses off so our children don't have to, can't we be given some credit?

So please, the next time you're tempted to lump a private school parents into the same category and give them a bashing, take a moment to consider their reasons and background. Rant over.

This was an issue for me. I began to genuinely feel a level of guilt at taking up a place in our outstanding local primary school when I knew we were going to go private at some point. If you have the money, why mess the state schools about?

I'm from and living in Ireland married to an English man and have a sister with kids in a private school in the UK and my husband's nephews in private UK schools. I could not believe the private school fees my sister was paying. We have fee paying schools here but the fees would average €5 to 10k a year no where near your fees. Most are also in the cities so very little option for fee paying outside the cities unless they're boarding schools.

What I do query reading this thread is are your state schools really as bad as your making out? The difference in education between our state and fee paying is really down to smaller classroom size but not by much and maybe better sports facilities but educationally there's very little difference so it is often imo chosen for status rather than much else. Studies here have shown that kids from middle class and affluent areas will do just as well in their local state school as their privately educated peers living in the same area. In other words both have an advantage over their peers from disadvantaged communities and the school they go to has very little to do with it.

I was also wondering do you have "grind" schools? They have become very popular here and they are basically exam factories. You may send them for one or two years leading up to their Leaving cert (A levels). They do academics and nothing else and basically train kids to do exams from what I can see. Good option if you have a kid that needs high grades for their career choice but extremely academic. Again appear really unfair but are a more affordable option than paying school fees for 6 years which is the length of secondary school cycle

'Would you really automatically exclude that whole group from being considered for employment '

We're stuffed at the seams with generations of privately educated and their offspring, so would absolutely take a state candidate over a privately educated one any day of the week.
So long as they fit the criteria - and they will.

'What I do query reading this thread is are your state schools really as bad as your making out? '

No. They aren't as good in general I think as Irish schools or even Scottish ones but I think it's because they are much bigger, and generally not academically selective ( in N.Ireland for example there are still loads of grammars) so it really is all ability.
But what you do get is brillant teachers, diverse people and experiences and a wealth of talent and ability.
All the secondaries, bar one are rated the same - Good by Ofsted - but people are clamouring for private school places mainly I think because of the status for many MC, UMC families.

In my city, that is. My kids go to 'good' state schools and are thriving. The schools not perfect but it pretty good giving they take kids from every kind of background

Our friends who have gone private have done so because the schools almost guarantee 9's in every subject as GCSE - it's buying grades.
But because private schools have that reputation and everyone is realising that these kids are not extraordinary, just being tutored to death and trained to pass exams - along with a healthy dose of being given +++ marks whenever the school is involved in grading anything - it's not worth what it was anymore.

@ChunkaMunkaBoomBoom - I disagree. You can’t guarantee grade 9s unless you are just hugely selective like some of the very competitive grammars. I’ve been teaching for 27 years both state and independent and my perspective is that in recent years with Ofsted, MATs and an obsession with league tables it is the state schools that have become exam factories.

I don't really understand the obsession on thus thread with 'status'. I don't know any patent who chooses a school thinking it's going to guide their child 'status' just by going there!

I think it's important for those deciding to go private to weigh up all the pros and cons - and cons that weren't there before. Will your privately educated kids be 'discriminated' against more and more. Yes.
Do you care? The really wealthy won't, they'll use their money, connections to bulldoze every obstacle out of their children's way. But MC may want to think about whether or not it's really worth the 'investment'.

You say that, but...when our daughter was taking her GCSEs, she needed maths at grade B or above to get the scholarship to the local private school (there is no other sixth form provision in our area). Her government-predicted grade (which we discovered was based entirely on demographics, and nothing to do with her work) was a D. She got a C, and asked if she could retake it. The answer, from all the teachers, the deputy head and the head was, "No. Our job is to get her to the government predicted grade, and we've exceeded that target.".

Basically, a slippery-shoulders "not our problem" from every single member of staff at her school. The same school that had a 32% A-C pass rate at GCSE level, yet was judged to be satisfactory...because the demographic-based predicted grades were even lower than that. Far from being brilliant teachers and a wealth of talent, that school was staffed almost exclusively by teachers who just didn't give a damn.

The argument that school has always put forward is that the private school is wrecking their pass rates by taking 20 scholarship kids out of every year based on academic ability, so effectively the top 20. Almost all of those kids get 100% A-C, year in year out. Fair enough, except...there are roughly 140 kids in each year in this town. Even if you assumed that those kids would also get 100% pass rates at the state school, the 32% pass rate would only climb to roughly 42%. Would you send your kids to a school which can't even get half of the exam results to a passing level?

Even worse, they can't even claim lack of funding. They had millions poured into the school to outfit the place with all the latest tech so it could transition to being a "technology college". The result was a ton of computers with an over-complicated network that none of the teachers had the skills to use, despite going on endless training courses...and it didn't even move the needle on the pass rates. They also hired year group managers, year mentors, wellbeing managers...and behaviour and bullying at the school got worse.

Basically, the focus was on anything but the teaching, and the teachers couldn't give a shit and were just phoning it in. I was actually going to work there as a combined network admin and IT and maths teacher - I sat in on their best classes, and I was shocked at the poor knowledge and quality of the teaching. The three maths teachers had to refer to the book solutions to solve simple statistics problems, and the IT teachers were a PE teacher and a music teacher looking to earn a bit of extra cash by doubling up and just telling kids to fire up a CBT course at the beginning of the lesson and browsing the web until the bell went.

No, there were no brilliant teachers or talent of any kind on display. I don't live in an inner city, mind. This is one of the most affluent small towns in the country.

The real trend is towards blind hiring not ‘anti-private schooling’. Increasingly that means removing all school detail off of resumes, and as someone who regularly interviews for entry level consulting roles, I have never asked (or even wondered) about where they went to school before university. Increasingly we are also being asked to keep university names blind so you just focus on the candidate in front of you.

most people aren’t paying for private because of ‘status’ - we genuinely believe our children are getting a better education. That might not always mean top grades - as long as I feel my child is achieving to the best of their potential then it is money well spent. I believe a supportive, challenging, well rounded education confers benefits in and of itself regardless of later educational or professional pathways

@Notellinganyone completely agree - we felt the same about our local (‘outstanding’) state option. The non selective private achieves similar results (slightly better, but would put it down to demographics), but offer a much more balanced, well-rounded whole-child education

as someone who regularly interviews for entry level consulting roles, I have never asked (or even wondered) about where they went to school before university

There was a long thread on the education boards about this recently. The general consensus was very much what you are saying here @Labraradabrador in that most recruiters of young graduates weren't interested in what school the applicant went to, or what grades they got at A level (law firms seeming to be the main exception).

FWIW the vast majority of universities also do not ask for A level grades when you apply for a Masters. They are only interested in your most recent academic qualification, namely your degree.

I've always thought that private schools should be abolished.

If those in power had no option but to send their own children/grandchildren to state schools, then they would work far harder to make sure that every state school was at a high standard.

Exactly - even if those details are present, I'm not about to go and look up their school to see if it's posh enough.

If I'm hiring, I want to know a) that they're not a dick, and b) what they know. Where they learned it is completely irrelevant to me, because it'll never be remotely useful to me.

Yep, same here. Institution blind is the way to go. Then we can really assess people on their character, knowledge and skill without and ridiculous preconceived notions about how what their parents did or did not do to try and do their best for thier kids makes them automatically a dick. Unlike, say, Kier Starmer who lies about being privately educated.

If you read any thread about the teachers’ strike, the state sector is in big trouble. No money for stationery, school roofs leaking, class sizes unmanageable and unhappy teachers leaving in their hundreds. It’s odd that that narrative disappears in threads about private school.

I have no issue with blind recruitment. The kids I know here (London) who went to private day and grammar schools are phenomenally bright. Genuinely so, not just tutored and hothoused as some
like to think.

They have taken up places at magic circle firms anyway, regardless of their private school ‘disadvantage’, blind recruitment etc. So perhaps the bright and best will continue to get the top jobs regardless of their school, which is a good thing. We do need a level playing field though.

I agree. Everyone has opinions; who cares what someone else thinks??

We don't pay for private school for our children even though we could afford to, as we don't believe it's what's best for them or for society and because we're not ultra rich, we prefer to use our money to travel and have real world learning experiences and spend time with them.

I have had people tell me that I'm not caring about my children's future or educations enough. To those people I say, "Who the F asked you?"

Because it's not of their business and their opinion means about as much to me as the next person's or maybe even less if they rudely offer it unsolicited or in obvious judgment of me.

You choose to give your children a private education and that's your prerogative so I'm fine with that and even if I wasn't, I would never butt in and tell you my useless opinion unless maybe you asked, because then I'd be the one looking like an idiot. But really who am I to say how other people should educate their own children? Why would I care unless I wasn't comfortable with my own choice?

So, I too wonder why OP would care so much. It seems to me they are not truly comfortable with their choice like you are.

Some parents are really good at getting the best out of their kids themselves. Get them into reading, take them places, get them to do their homework etc. I would never tell somebody they didn't care about their kids education because they didn't use private school. How rude!

The real trend is towards blind hiring not ‘anti-private schooling’. Increasingly that means removing all school detail off of resumes

I have never put my secondary school on any CV as an adult (over 18), possibly as a teenager looking for summer jobs. I have also sat on countless interview panels and never saw secondary school listed, maybe exam results and further education but not the actual school name. The fact that this was or is a thing in the UK does explain a lot about the obsession with private schooling. Our third level institutions also don't interview for courses, places are accessed solely by exam results so they do not know what schools their students were in.

To my knowledge, it was only ever really a thing in case anything needed to be verified with the school. Same for university. No different to the employment history, really.

Blind recruitment isn't equitable though.

Those young people you describe have had every advantage. It's not as simple as tutoring or hothousing. They've had stable home lives, never had to worry about food on the table, they haven't had to become young carers, they haven't been moved around from one area to another within the care system, they haven't been chucked out of the care system aged 18 with no support network, they have money for interview outfits, flexibility to attend interviews whenever, confidence in themselves and the way they interact with people, they understand professional jobs and how to speak to people in those environments

The advantages that they have are HUGE. HUGE.

True. I am not sure how you design a system that does away completely with advantage.

Automatic, I agree. Whether recruiting university blind the best people from whatever sector seem to come through.
I don't think the MN comments about law are always particularly fair. If you are recruiting an undergrade before they start very difficult law exams where 50% fail them and you will be paying for 1.5 years of more of very expensive law courses and exams and then train them for 2 years whilst paying them £40k a year you are probably putting about £250k on each student - quite a punt if you were betting on someone very likely to fail the law exams which is why looking at not only A level grades but first year exams in every module etc is required before they get offers. Same with medicine - the exams are very hard so you only want to admit to university courses those who are likely to pass.

I don't think most parents pay school fees for "status". I certainly never did. I just wanted a good school as did my parents for me and my siblings

The suggestion irish school fees are up to £10k - well yes, in England I have a sibling in Yorkshire and those fees are about £12k, not too different. Not eveyrone is at expensive London fee paying day schools or £40k a year boarding schools - although of course even £10,000 a year is a vast and impossible sum for most families.

Nor would most private school parents say a parent who could pay but chooses not to is damaging or taking the wrong decision for their child. Even our late Queen did not go to private school - she was educated at home - her parents' choice and a choice plenty of UK parents take too.