To think that there would be less anti private school

[Poopoolittlekitten]

sentiment or threads on MN if people using private school were a tiny bit more self aware and didn’t ask for sympathy for rising fees or possible rising fees if Labour take away their false ‘charity’ status?

send your kid private if you want, just don’t come moaning about the costs or claim than anyone can go private if they ‘prioritise’ their child’s education they way you do. Particularly at a time when state school teachers are striking over pay and conditions.
And many, many people are working their socks off just to keep a roof over their family’s head.

YANBU - stop whining and looking for sympathy about your fees!

YABU - my milkman sends his 4 kids private by ‘prioritising’ their education so it’s not just for whiny poshos….

Difficult situation. Good luck.
My friend considering online education for similar reasons.

‘People are anti private school because the establishment is anti private school.’

The establishment who overwhelmingly went to private schools are now anti- private school? Which is why they now send their kids to the same private schools?
that post absolutely makes sense 😅

Posted this on a thread about someone complaining that teachers at their DCs private’s school got a discount in fees for their own kids… just as relevant here re charity status:

Interesting article in today’s TImes regarding the claims that private schools should have charity status because they share facilities with state schools and are a ‘benefit’ …

However instead of asking the private schools - they surveyed the state schools instead…

spoiler - they don’t. They rent out some facilities for ££ or use things like a shared Xmas concert or football match to claim they ‘work’ with local
schools.

I have experienced this - kids did a music concert with local private school at a local church and the photos ended up in a newsletter heralding the ‘partnership’ between our schools. There is no partnership. This is the only time there was ever a joint event. Our choir went, their choir went, everyone performed separately..

also have a very famous private school invite our girls to play a football match - a friendly as we play other state schools in the county league, they only play other private schools.
Afterwards they wanted photos etc of the kids all together, we declined.
we don’t do it for other matches and we certainly weren’t going to do it so they could pop that one in their next prospectus either as proof of ‘community’ involvement.

@Lessonstobe so you've extrapolated from your experience of what one school does to assert that "they don't" in relation to charity status. If I post the long list of what my school does with local state schools for free can I then say "yes they do"? Every single thread on this topic just ends up being a mass of anecdata and individual experiences used to try and prove some sort of objective point.

Exactly. Some people are very quick to say that private schools don’t share facilities/teachers etc when this is categorically untrue for some private schools (obviously I can’t speak for all private schools - and in case, many private schools aren’t charities anyway).

Of course some private schools take their charitable status very seriously indeed. But many do not. And there is no obligation to make their activities public. This is obviously easily fixed. I can't imagine why schools might be reluctant.

I wouldn't.

@Lessonstobe frankly, I don't care. As far as I'm concerned education is a charitable aim in its own right.

‘ so you've extrapolated from your experience ‘

er, no. It’s one of those really boring study things that says it. Where state schools have called Bullshit.

Afterwards they wanted photos etc of the kids all together, we declined. we don’t do it for other matches and we certainly weren’t going to do it so they could pop that one in their next prospectus either as proof of ‘community’ involvement.

In their defence, it was most probably for a weekly school magazine rather than making a big point about community involvement. Ours has a match report for every team with photos where possible.

We play Eton, Harrow and Charterhouse. We also play local state schools. There's photos of both, there's no deeper message beyond here's some kids playing sport.

As PP have said, anecdotes aren't that helpful. But at any given time, there's loads of local clubs and schools using our facilities. Though not all users are that gracious, Alastair Campbell swam in our lake last year (which is open to the public) and posted a snarky tweet afterwards.

Prívate school parents are often paying huge amounts of taxes and not even using the system

Elsewhere on the site a mother's looking for help finding a school place as the private school's gone bust. So you're taxes are covering you for insurance despite not "using the system".

@DdraigGoch
As far as I'm concerned education is a charitable aim in its own right."

Yes, the education of the rich is such a worthy charitable aim! I think I might go and set up a standing order.🤣

Having gone to both state and private schools ( much preferred state....hated my exclusive school) and taught at both. ( kids awful behaviour in private too) , I have concluded that private schools are a massive waste of money anyway. So pour your cash down the drain if it makes you feel better.

Education of anyone is always a good thing. And it's been pointed out several times in this thread that not everyone at a private school is the son of an oligarch.

Your definition of charity is quite different to the legal one. Something does not have to predominantly benefit the poor in order for it to be defined as such.

What folk do is their business. If you can afford private go for it but don't spend your life whining about the cost and sacrifices you make. Or expect thanks or expect your kids to do better than others at the local comp. They might not.

People are allowed to complain about whatever they want. If you're not keen on a thread then jog on.

‘Your definition of charity is quite different to the legal one. Something does not have to predominantly benefit the poor in order for it to be defined as such.’

Yup! I have more respect for the people who just say, we’ve loads of ££ and can afford it, than the ones who claim their school is some kind of benefit to the local community and deserve fake tax breaks.

‘Prívate school parents are often paying huge amounts of taxes and not even using the system’

Or they’re using other tax dodging methods to avoid paying anything. Most wealthy people have very good financial advice…

but that aside, I pay for lots of things I don’t use - that’s how tax works. Childless people contribute towards schools, I’ve never been sick a day in my life, barely bother the NHS yet my tax money goes into that, I’ve never claimed a benefit … and on and on.

Perhaps if we had been led by competent Old Etonians instead of 'call me Dave' and the serial killer and industrial scale liar that followed him in 2019, there might be less hostility towards private education.

Having gone to both state and private schools ( much preferred state....hated my exclusive school) and taught at both. ( kids awful behaviour in private too) , I have concluded that private schools are a massive waste of money anyway. So pour your cash down the drain if it makes you feel better

hmmm….I work in an independent and I previously worked at the school my children attend. The independent is better. Worth bankrupting yourself for? Probably not. But if you can afford it, the small class sizes alone make learning easier. There are opportunities galore and professionally, I am able to be massively more creative than in the state system and we do more competitions, clubs etc that all give a value added you don’t get in state schools. The biggest positive is that the more quirky children, the ones who would be picked on and left out in state generally thrive and those with Sen get a chance with less people for the teacher to get round.

Of course, there are poor independent schools. But a blanket ‘waste of money’ is very much not true.

‘Perhaps if we had been led by competent Old Etonians instead of 'call me Dave' and the serial killer and industrial scale liar that followed him in 2019, there might be less hostility towards private education.’

It would be nice to be led by people who actually have some real life experience - where they know what it’s like to need to work for money, to not have everything handed to them on a silver platter at birth, to have some empathy for the people they claim to represent.
In my experience those people
don’t go to private school…

@Lessonstobe then you must have a very narrow experience of private schools . Many of the ones I have taught in and my own kids certainly are nowhere near "silver platter" territory. As ever, 28 pages in people are still viewing private schools and the children and parents that use them in an incredibly one dimensional way. If the same lazy assumptions and generalisations were made about all state schools and the kids that attend them there'd be uproar but it always seems like private schools are "fair game" despite dozens of posters giving their experiences of much more modest incomes (as in graduate professional, or self employed trades) managing it. They and their kids perfectly well know what the "real world" and "hard work" is. Or are you only "real" if you are absolutely at the very bottom on a sink estate?

I don’t know why Eton keeps getting the blame when most of them went to Oxford university too? Also, Blair went to Fettes which is the Scottish Eton.

The PM of England and Wales needs to represent the country internationally so an “elite” education helps, it need not be independent schooling but an intelligent person who went to a very good university is surely a must? How many G countries would have leaders who didn’t go to top unis in their countries? Unlikely surely?

‘The PM of England and Wales needs to represent the country internationally so an “elite” education helps,’

oh, so we plebs, going to state schools and universities that aren’t Oxbridge are somehow unfit to govern or rule or represent ‘internationally’ even if we have experience as doctors, engineers, councillors, professors, governors, lawyers, financiers, public servants, in local politics, work in the public sector, teach.
Is that the deal? We’re better off lead by toffs who have absolutely zero experience of working, actually working, to support a family or themselves? Zero experience of living in the real world?
wise the fuck up.