School fees have risen by 19% in the space of 12 months

[Findingfactsaboutfees]

AIBU to think this is outrageous ?! Fees are exorbitant anyhow and in the last 12 months we have had an increase of 19% by way of 2 increases in a 12 month period. Fees per year for the senior school are £16690 per year and do not include state of the art facilities as other local schools do. The junior school fees aren't much less either! This is a school in the north of England. If you are paying for education, where are you based and how much do you pay? I wonder whether it is comparable.

Private education will only be for the ultra-rich if fees continue to rise at the rate that they are. It is unsustainable for most working professionals who are comfortable but not ultra-wealthy! Parents locally have tried to take their children out but can't as there are no state school places to be had within a 12 mile radius. The only other option is home schooling which isn't possible when the parents are working full time. We're not yet at the point where we are thinking of taking our child out of school but hearing the plight of those who are in the process of trying to is worrying. I've always been a labour voter but if they do go ahead with the introduction of VAT, I fear it's going to get even worse.

@Another76543 You are also deluded if you don't think that the privilege bought by attending private school does increase children's chances of top jobs.

This is an interesting article. If fees go up 20% overnight then a lot of the third of children in Camden who go to private school will be applying to those primaries and filling them right up again! It’s worth noting the point that Camden has the lowest birth rate in the country, it’s not typical of other places. Another thing to note is that rich people are not evenly distributed across the country, there will be hotspots where people decide they can’t afford fees or don’t want to pay and seek places in local schools - which will strain the system. Don’t be fooled, Labour are using this issue as vote bait and it will have consequences.

Yeah Hackney and Lambeth are having massive issues.

The peak year nationally is, I think, the kids who are starting Y7 this September (DS1's cohort, argh) so a lot of primaries are already seeing big declines.

I'm in one of the only two London boroughs that actually forecasts an increase over the next five years - largely because we're an outer borough that move to from the inner boroughs.

" If fees go up 20% overnight then a lot of the third of children in Camden who go to private school will be applying to those primaries and filling them right up again!"

Only if all of them move, which is unlikely. Fees have already increased at a fast rate over the last decade and a half and this mass movement hasn't been seen.

@Clairebairn there may be hotspots, but there won't be the predicted big movement.

It's not just a Camden issue, or even just a London issue. Inner London is feeling it first but it's a nearly everywhere issue.

My only point here is that the 'there's no space/money' issue is overplayed and probably increasingly irrelevant in this debate, given that the state population is going to fall by more than the entire private population.

In the short term though there is even more pressure on the sought after state primaries in inner London as people will be desperate to get into the top performing ones if they fear others may close?

Anyone following education closely may have already gone off private at primary level? If the top performing secondary private schools actually make it easier now to get in with a tutor pretending to come from a state background? There is that too.
Rich educated people who care about their kids success will always game the system one way or another.

The “privilege” my children will get from private school is being able to sit in a classroom with engaged children who don’t disrupt everyone else, with teachers who are happy to be there. They will not just walk into a job because of the school they went to; they will still need to work hard. Times have changed. You only have to read threads on here to know that people recruiting actively dislike the privately educated and would not recruit them. In reality, a lot of the privately educated will move abroad and take their skills elsewhere. This is already happening. Plenty of private school sixth formers are shunning UK universities in favour of international ones now.

@Mortimercat That's ludicrous. You are essentially saying that I can have the same income as I do now but not use private school and that suddenly changes me.

Choosing one school over another doesn't automatically change who we are, what we've been through or our values and beliefs.

Yes I use a private school. I also donate a minimum of 3% of my earnings to charity annually. I also sponsor a number of local sporting teams including sports that my kids have zero interest in- if you're wondering why, it's because I am very well aware that even basics like joining a football team which when I was young used to be a case of taking a walk to the local park and kicking a ball about is no longer that. It's a financial commitment which includes paying subscription, buying kit and travelling across the region to play matches. Before you make up more assumptions about the sponsorships- no it's not having a company logo or my name plastered everywhere for advertising. It's quietly buying equipment for clubs and sponsoring a certain number of children to cover the cost of their kit and subsidising travel for away games. Reading this thread would have anybody believe I'm a selfish person who only cares about a certain type of others in society. You know nothing about me.

This thread has become ridiculous and the question I originally asked has been lost in translation.

"The “privilege” my children will get from private school is being able to sit in a classroom with engaged children who don’t disrupt everyone else, with teachers who are happy to be there."

Ah yes cause this is sooo common in most normal schools. Making excuses.

" They will not just walk into a job because of the school they went to; they will still need to work hard."

Yes they still need to work hard, but not as hard as others, you bought that privilege.

"You only have to read threads on here to know that people recruiting actively dislike the privately educated and would not recruit them."

Yet even the research of recent graduates shows that private school students out earn their state school peers after 2 years, even when they have the same degree, with the same classification, from the same university.

"In reality, a lot of the privately educated will move abroad and take their skills elsewhere."

To which Utopia are they going to move to? Not the EU now.

"Plenty of private school sixth formers are shunning UK universities in favour of international ones now."

And yet they are still over represented at the top universities?

Very possibly; it's a built in feature of the funding model.

However, the desirability or demand for individual schools is separate from the no money/no space argument, particularly in boroughs like Camden.

It is strange how so many who send their children to private schools want to deny the privilege their children are receiving as a result. Why else would you send your children?

They will not just walk into a job because of the school they went to; they will still need to work hard. Times have changed.

Unfortunately the Sutton Trust report from 2019 found that 40% of what they call the elite group come from private schools, when only 25% of the brightest people do. I doubt times have changed that much since then.

Plenty of private school sixth formers are shunning UK universities in favour of international ones now.

This is one of my favourites, particularly prevalent around Oxbridge offer time - private sixth formers "shunning" universities who have wised up to the state school talent they are missing out on and no longer want them 😂

(Much as I keep "shunning" Chris Hemsworth and Ryan Reynolds.)

The VAT and abolishing charitable status is not about extra tax revenue though is it?

It is about creating equality… supposedly. If we actually want equality then we do have to get rid of all selective schooling, make sure all catchments are now lottery places (let’s stick that rich lot that overpaid for that whilst we are at it - although obviously there won’t be any tax take there either) and get rid of church schools (that will never happen - Labour cannot touch any Jewish schools with a barge pole at this point).

So it is a divisive entirely pointless envy policy stressing those with DC in private schools who are already probably paying the most tax on a country basis out of income. The very rich in those schools don’t care.
Now these are a minority of people anyway, those who might get stressed about this. So who cares? Well I care. Not personally because it does not affect me one bit. But because the lives of actual children are involved. Sure their parents could get divorced, lose their jobs and they would have to take them out too. And yes of course, those schools have been increasing fees unchecked too. But how can I get on board with a policy that might harm children however few that may be if I am a Labour voter? How can I support a policy where a government actually deliberately harms some kids (however few) who have SEN? (They could offer to fund places for those automatically for example - which they won’t do because people will again came the system somehow).
I don’t want to harm any children or old people or disabled people. So I cannot support this policy. Ever.

@hillaryswankfan I’m not sure I understand what you are trying to say in your last post.

You are saying that parents with DC at independent school have bought a privilege - presumably you mean by this a better educational environment, more support, better facilities and less disruption. So a child with 3 A’s from that school has had to work less hard than a child at a state school - and definitely less hard than a child at a more challenging state school to achieve the same result.

Having achieved that result you’re saying that more of those children go on to university than the equivalent proportion of children from the state sector who achieved the same result. I’m assuming that the data showing that independently schooled children are over represented at unis shows that this is reflected even if you filter the intake so that you only look at those with a parity of results. (Incidentally are there any studies looking at the number of selective schools (so grammar schools, partially selective schools, faith schools etc) compared to those schools who do not select - to see if similar trends of over representation apply)?

but then you say that even when people leave university, with the same degree - which on the basis of the prior arguments, the state school educated child has worked harder for/is brighter as the independently educated child has had their privilege handed to them on a plate, within two years employers who employed what was to that two parable candidates are paying the independently educated ones more.

since a lot of jobs (unless vocational) have little to do with degrees and a levels, one has to wonder then why are those employers are doing that? They will be doing it for the good of their business - after all they want their business to succeed. Are they inherently biased so as doing this to the detriment of their business (and will any inherent bias be helped by reducing the number of independently educated pupils for them to be less able to be biased).

Or is it that an independent education provides rounder soft skills that they value and see as beneficial to the business.

If it’s the latter, the better course of action would be to focus on giving all pupils those skills. Taking them away from the independent school pupils by making it harder to obtain an independent education won’t give those skills to others.

@Gloaming23 , the Sutton Trust report mentioned above answers quite a few of the questions on the likely drivers of this effect, which include the effect of informal networks in gaining unadvertised entry level jobs and internships, the financial ability to take unpaid internships (which is correlative with private education but clearly not a causal link; that effect would likely continue if those students were in the state sector), a university entry system that contains an unusually high degree of subjectivity and an employment system that prefers 'elite' universities over others. All of these will support a PLU (people like us) effect where candidates are selected on perceived characteristics that are similar to the recruiter (the Sutton Trust refers to intangibles such as 'polish' and 'gravitas' that are perceived to be more in evidence in some socioeconomic groups than others - and there is plenty of research on the effect of things like accent on perceptions of talent and competence.

Thanks @JassyRadlett , but I thought that @hillaryswankfan was saying that once people are in jobs - so have been selected - and are showing what they can do by working,
the acceleration then happens. So they have already been recruited at that stage.

Since 93% of the population are not privately educated surely there must be a significant proportion of people recruiting (even if you hold the
view that privately educated take up a disproportionate level of top jobs, as at graduate entry they wouldn’t be doing the interviewing) that would not have been privately educated.

You don't need money to gain a good education, Private schooling does not guarantee success.
If you have a child that is naturally driven and interested in learning, they will succeed no matter what.

@hillaryswankfan I went to what was meant to be a top performing comprehensive. I was driven to attempted suicide because of the bullying which all related to me being a high achiever. Being top of the class put a target on my back. And class disruption was a daily issue, not so much for the subjects where we were in sets (maths and science) but for the others it was a nightmare. I made a decision back then that my children would have a different experience. They certainly do!

And as for people moving abroad, so you really think it’s all about passports?! No, it’s skills. If you’ve got the right skills you can move anywhere. That’s why we have a big problem with doctors moving abroad. My DC’s private school has many children who parents didn’t have a British passport but who had the right skills to get in this country. They can easily go somewhere else. I was talking to one parent last week whose teenager wants to follow the same profession (medicine) as the parents. They have told them that there is no future in medicine in the UK but to move abroad (like their parents did) if they are really set on it. The parents came from a war torn country and certainly didn’t have the right passport but their skills got them into the UK. The same skills can get them out again.

In my profession it is easy for me to re-qualify in some other countries. A simple
test. It’s not just the professions either. I know many people in trades such as electricians and plumbers who have moved to Australia.

I actually work for a U.S. company. I’ve been told that it’s likely that I would be eligible for a visa to work for them out of the US. I have no desire to move there at the moment but your assumption that you can only move abroad if you’ve got another passport is completely wrong.

As far as the demographics of universities, contextualisation is becoming less relevant anyway. More and more employers are using blind recruitment.

The report is worth a read on both the over representation in certain professions and fields, and on the effect where even non-privately educated people see some of the 'soft' results of private education and in particular attendance Oxbridge/Russell Group (Oxbridge in particular where private schools are heavily over represented) as an advantage.

I don't think it's really possible to disaggregate the over representation in elite universities with the early career impacts, from the data I've seen.

Dibblydoodahdah

EU has to take EU residents first to fill
jobs.The EU is huge and highly skilled. There are Lang issues too. In the US it’s extremely hard to be able to work over there for the same reasons( companies have to prove an American couldn’t do the same job) and as for getting a Green card, almost impossible. You may be able to work there temporarily for your company under transfer but thinking you can work anywhere because of your private education just isn’t correct.

"No, it’s skills. If you’ve got the right skills you can move anywhere. "

No you can't. To the US they have to prove that a US citizen cannot do the job that you have applied for before they give you a visa for that job. Which is why many people find it difficult to move permanently.

EU workers have significant advantage over UK workers due to freedom of movement of Labour.

The idea that people are just internationally mobile because of their skills is laughable ( and as someone who is working internationally I know what the difficulties are).

The UK may be a destination country for many others, but there are not that many possible destination countries for UK citizens that do not face serious challenges on getting employment.

It does rather make a mockery of the : " we will leave" point.

@Gloaming23 - so have been selected - and are showing what they can do by working."

But it is the selection process, and the barriers to entry to get to the selection process in which private school students have an advantage. This is also due to the fact that they are from the top earning households in the country, not only do their parents have connections that lead to the unpaid internships etc, but the schools do too, and the "old school tie" network also is important here.

@Dibblydoodahdah "your assumption that you can only move abroad if you’ve got another passport is completely wrong." Didn't say you couldn't, misrepresenting my point again, it is more that it is much more challenging as a UK citizen ( which the vast majority of private school parents are), than it is with dual nationality ( which only 1% of UK citizens hold).

@LampL1ght are you actually denying that if you have the right skills you can’t leave the country?! You’re denying that we’re not losing doctors to other countries? I’m not talking about the EU. That’s not where we’re losing highling skilled professionals to. The people that I know that have moved abroad for work have gone to Australia, Middle East, Switzerland, Singapore, US….those that have moved to the EU have gone there to retire. Still happening, my neighbour just retired to France. They’ve got a visa. If you’ve got enough money, visas aren’t a problem!

I am quite aware of the rules regarding the US. I work for a U.S. company. We have many people that move to the US from the UK, EU and beyond. We do a huge amount of cross boarder work and have a specialist immigration team in-house. People with the right skills move around the World for work. Even many of the white British children at my DC’s private school were born overseas whilst their parents were working abroad.

@hillaryswankfan I wasn’t mispresenting anything. You were the one focusing on passports and representing that as something that would stop people on this thread leaving the UK. Independent schools are full of children whose parents are highly skilled workers. Highly skilled people move around the globe.

"are you actually denying that if you have the right skills you can’t leave the country?"

No, I was saying that for UK nationals it is now harder. It is possible if you are a Doctor.

You'd also be hard pressed to find people that were willing to up and move everything because of a change to the VAT status of private schools. I know what a move internationally costs.

As said, those who use the " We will leave" argument make way too many assumptions about the ability to leave, the competition for jobs and visas if there is an increase in the number leaving, and the costs associated with leaving.

It's not likely.