Not to send my children to private school even though I can afford it

[AdamRyan]

I believe in comprehensive education and think children should all be educated together, to improve social mobility and prevent a "brain drain" where less privileged children go to some schools, and more privileged go to others.
Am I in the minority and being naive?

YANBU - comprehensive schools are the way to go
YABU - I'd send my children private if I could

@whodawhodaeho but perhaps you have left out the 'how' behind the 'just wealthy' riposte. How a person made the money to pay for school fees is as varied as the individuals writing the cheques. Some parents are successful professionals; some have inherited estates and titles, and others have inherited nothing and are paying from income, possibly topped up by grandparents' generosity. I knew of one lad who had received an inheritance, specifically identified for educational purposes only, from an elderly maiden aunt, and another family who presumed, unfortunately for them, that a superstar parent would lavish the spondulicks that would fund private education (didn't happen, most of the money went to charity). Intermittently, DC attended private schools and rubbed shoulders with the DC of builders and barristers. Some went because it was the most convenient wraparound school with good afterhours activities and decent results. DC eventually developed a subtler understanding, realising that our house is nice ordinary; from thinking we lived in a tiny house (compared with near stately homes), the understanding grew that other friends lived in houses that would almost have fitted into those houses' kitchens.

Most people who pay for independent schools, in the UK, beggar themselves to meet the fees because they want art, sport and music and no disruptions to learning.

a set percentage of kids at private schools near us are the kids of drug dealers. They have the sort of money needed.Just goes to show you’d be foolish to send your child to private school thinking that the kids will come from a ‘naice’ middle / upper class backgrounds where the parents all have respectable backgrounds etc. (And just as obviously you’d be just as foolish to think you could judge the children of drug dealers on the basis of their parent’s occupation).

Private school kids do tend to have the £££ to buy drugs, alcohol, have parents away, have the bigger houses for parties and space etc
some of the most off the rail kids I knew at Uni were the well off ones.

I do think MN must have a really high proportion of private educated families compared to most - given that there’s 6% or so of privately educated kids in the country and this rest go to normal schools ( where kids thrive, learns and, gasp, even manage to excel at sport and music) there’s always some rabid defenders of private school privilege.
Alongside the usual - ‘lots of children in DD class at Roedean have parents who are bin men and work PT at Tesco, they’ve just ‘prioritised‘ their child’s education’’

every stay on ‘independent’ schooling shows the same - they’re used by wealthy and very well off people. Bursaries are mainly given to MC families who could afford fees anyway, the percentage of children on actual scholarships is very low 1/2%
Which is fine - they are businesses, not charities. They are used by wealthy people.

@whodawhodaeho Bursaries are mainly given to MC families who could afford fees anyway

I know it's only anecdotal, but that is definitely not true at any of the private schools where I've worked. In my current place, bursaries are paid from a separate charity attached to the school which does its own fundraising, and not from school fees (to keep costs as low as possible for full-paying parents). We prefer to give fewer full-fees bursaries rather than more partial-fees ones, although it varies a bit from year to year.

‘@whodawhodaeho Bursaries are mainly given to MC families who could afford fees anyway

I know it's only anecdotal, but that is definitely not true at any of the private schools where I've worked. In my current place,’

yes - which is why statistics from private schools themselves show that bursaries are NOT means tested and therefore are not helping poorer children get into private schools. 10% off fees, of on average £20,500 per year per child a day school is not helping most ordinary families to get their child into school.

less than 1% of children 6,000 out of 650,000 private educated actually on a scholarship that allows them to attend for free.

so, private schools, are for the very well off. which is why many send their kids in the first place - they can afford to. They want to. They’re expected to - family ‘tradition’, family pressure to, expectation - ie everyone else in the office at the finance company, law firm, club, all the other consultants do…

Yes you are naive. I would not be sending my daughter to a mixed sex comp at the moment if I had a choice.

My DD14 goes to an all girls private school. She's thriving.

I honestly don’t know why people bother coming on here with the I knew a kid who’s mum was a single mother, PT nurse at our private school etc…

the statistics aren’t lying, I’m not pulling these numbers from The Guardian or my arse - they’re all publicly available.

Every conservative paper is reporting the same thing - fees are going up and up, Oxbridge admissions from these schools are going down, private schools are going back to the old, old days of being there for very wealthy people …

I've had three children go through state school. One primary (rated Ofsted Outstanding) , three conps (one rated Good, two Outstanding). They were in out-of-school sports with many children at private, so I got to chat to parents and observe differences in provision and opportunity at the various stages, including support during Covid.

If I'd had the funds (and hindsight!), I'd have done private for all three at the primary stage to give them more individual attention and confidence.

Then definitely private instead of the comp rated Ofsted good . The DC attending that one just marked time for five years, learning difficulties were not identified or catered for. Very little sport or activity provision, or rather there was on paper, but very little delivered and few competitive opportunities.

I feel children in middle groups are probably the most likely to benefit from private school class sizes and more engaged teachers. If I had the cash to pay I would. One of my DC has very different outcomes at 16 from similar children who attended private school.

@whodawhodaeho I believe you on the statistics. My own experience hasn't been like that, but obviously I only have direct experience of a handful of schools. That does paint a bleak and worrying picture, but research would dig out the schools which do provide significant bursaries.

We no longer offer scholarships. That sounds nit-picky, but there is a technical difference; a bursary is based on ability to pay (at least in theory) and a scholarship is based on academic or sporting or musical ability (etc).

'My DD14 goes to an all girls private school. She's thriving.'

You do you, love! My DS and DD are in a state secondary and thriving.

This was posted in response to those posters who gave precisely this as the reason to send their children to state schools although of course they can afford private.
it appears that some teachers find such people funny. So do I, I must admit.

Perhaps Labour should bring back the assisted places scheme, abolished in one of its fits of spite in 1997.
to my shame I voted labour in that election, despite having attended a school which had about two thirds of its pupils on assisted places, and which was therefore truly diverse. Still disgusted with myself now.

Well in fact they are charities. Hence the VAT exemption and various tax perks.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/private-school-charity-status-labour/

I mean, in my opinion they are rubbish charities using the status as a tax dodge, rather than

The VAT exemption is not due to the charitable status, I believe, but because education is an “exempt supply” ie the VAT legislation lists it as a service exempt from VAT.
there used to be quite a few tax experts on MN so I hope someone will say if I have that wrong.
if you have any evidence that any school is claiming charitable status improperly you should send it to the Charity Commission and HMRC so they can investigate. Because I’m sure you wouldn’t make such a claim without evidence, would you …

The point here re VAT is an important one because of course if labour decides that education should no longer be an exempt supply that will affect a much broader range of education providers than the ones they are chippy about. Babies and bath water again

How has Labour stress tested the figures from VAT

Listening to R4

God he’s bad, so hopeless

They can’t “stress test” any figures until they define with more precision who they are going to draw into the VAT net and how. I can’t believe they would want to make education provided by special schools a chargeable supply for example. But they don’t say.
And yes, starmer is a complete tool bag.

I mean basically, on this, they are just lying. There is no way they can have any clue how much this will raise, if anything. They haven’t done the work.
this is 350 million for the NHS on a bus stuff

That's correct.

Profit making businesses supplying educational services (eg the computer coding camp my DC is going on in summer) also don't charge VAT - VAT is generally charged on "luxuries" and things that are the "basic necessities of life" are VAT free (don't get me started on why tampons are a "luxury") - and up till now all kinds of education are seen as "basic"

When VAT is charged, the business can reclaim the VAT they paid to buy whatever items (computers, stationery&office supplies etc) they bought to supply the service, so the school's costs wouldn't go up much if they had to start charging VAT.

There's enough nuance in the VAT system to categorise similar things differently depending on whether specific varieties are "basic" or "luxury" (eg a rich tea biscuit is vat-free but if you double-dip it in chocolate you have to charge VAT) so it would be feasible to say that "basic" educational activities (which would include after-school tuition, music lessons, some kinds of holiday club) and that the more "luxury" end of the education market does attract VAT.

Some private schools aren't providing a luxury or premium service at all, just a good sensible standard of education, sometimes with an additional specialism not available at state schools, and as a genuinely not-for-profit charity, there might be a way to make those VAT free or lower VAT.

I suspect that when the VAT rules are formulated the big "luxury" schools will change their fee structure so that instead of charging £50,000 per year as "school fees" that all incur VAT the fee is suddenly only £20,000 for "school fees" and £30,000 for other (compulsory) services that still qualify as VAT exempt.

It really is.

Someone needs to ask him what the stress testing involved

More bluster but he has to come up with the goods

This is ridiculous

A VAT expert who can explain it in terms a non expert can understand! If I wasn’t already married I’d ask you to marry me 😍

He’s Boris, but more boring.
god we are in for a bad time

The legal definition of charity is different to the one most commonly understood. The tribunal decision for the ISC versus the Charity Commission Charity is worth reading as it goes into great detail regarding this, but put simply charity doesn’t in fact have the benefit only the poor, unless the purpose of the charity is poverty relief.