Private school vs private anything educational

[stopitstopitnooow]

If you have an issue with private schools, why? Do you have an issue with:

Buying houses in expensive catchment areas
Extracurricular activities such as music lessons, swimming, sports coaching
Tutors; language, 11+, GCSE

(Also, private healthcare, dentists, opticians)

I honestly don't understand the angst when it comes to private schools. Let people spend their money however they see fit.

Oh sorry, apologies if I tagged the wrong person.

But apparently the whole point of moving children out of the private sector is so that the children of high income parents don’t do too well at school. So why would the state sector be interested in my ideas / support as to how to make sure my sons and other children like them do well. They are basically there to keep them down and give other children a chance to catch up.

That's a weird and spurious logic. The theory is that high income parents would have a positive effect on the education of their own children but within a state environment. This might translate to increased involvement and support for that school which would benefit all.
I think you are confusing ability with access to opportunity. Having mixed abilities in the classroom does not necessarily mean that the best are brought down. I have x2 DC who did significantly better academically than their private school peers in such an environment.
What is different are the opportunities afforded by connections and informal networks via private school which probably means that, in the long term, their peers will have more career success.

@Spattergroit similar experience. DD's best friend's mother was adamant her daughter wasn't going to university; no one in the family ever had, and the logic was that they were doing ok. Me and my DH had been, and expected our children to do so if they wanted. This rubbed off on the friend, and voila, she's now in a great engineering role having down a degree. Now I can't say for sure it was DD's influence, but it helped.
We could have afforded to go elsewhere but don't believe private is right. My children definitely had an impact at at a school with families with low aspirations. And of course it went the other way too - my children learned a lot from their contemporaries and from being outside their bubble.

And I firmly believe that if more people in power sent their children to the local school then state schools would be better funded.

@inapropertyquandry

Just to counter your anecdote: I studied law at a red brick, my two closest friends a) worked in a supermarket and b) got pregnant in year 11 and sat their GCSEs in hospital. My aspirations didn't rub off.

@inapropertyquandry but the people "in power" by which I assume you mean our current crop of mostly super Uber wealthy politicians won't go to state no matter what you do, including abolishing Eton. They'd go abroad. The people who'd have to take their kids out of the private sector if a huge change came are the ones who have perfectly normal professional jobs in the mid 40k range with no more clout than anyone else. Hundreds of thousands of those kinds of people already send their kids to state and, as seen on here, even if they are governors can't do anything to change things. It's an absolute fallacy.

Go abroad or hire private tutors as in days of old with schoolrooms in the home and "governesses". The idea that they'd send them to the local comp to somehow "improve" it is ludicrous.

A lot of the issues like results in state schools are due to their families. This will not get better with a private school take in or more money from VAT. After all education is compulsory otherwise those troubled families would not even send the kids.

@Understated32 I appreciate the honesty about buying away from disruptive kids. Ifs refreshing to see someone just be honest rather than pedalling the line of doing a favour to state schools as though it's some kind of altruism. If I could afford its and I thought paying would give my child the best, of course I would.

@PhoneChargerCable they dont just take the brightest kids though. A relative put her kids in private school and one was assessed as being at least a school year behind. But that was primary school so maybe not as stringent. All you need to do is look at the current system to see that schools would be the no1 priority if politicians had to send their own kids there. Same as abolishing private healthcare. If you're in power and it affects you and you have policy and voting power, it makes a difference.

I can afford to do private schooling, kids small so undecided at present. I would prefer everyone to go to the same school so it reflects society locally and builds understanding and cooperation. Without private schooling the public schooling would be better quality

How would public schooling be better quality? In areas that there is no private schooling are state schools better than areas that do have private schools? How and why?

Lots of strong feelings on this thread.

I know it is to do with ideology at its core.There’s no doubt state schools would be better if everyone including the richest and most powerful had to use them. But on an individual family level, if you have the choice to send your kids to a nicer school, to avoid daily misery (and no, I’m not exaggerating- there have been plenty of threads about the absolute dire state of some secondary schools, where kids aren’t afforded basic human rights like going to the toilet), then you choose the option that doesn’t involve daily misery.

We’re not rich. We both work full-time and have a joint income of around £90k. School fees are gradually eating away all our savings. But the state schools round here are horrific. I don’t feel guilty for paying to protect my children from that.

I’m not paying because I want better results or I’m trying to engineer a better network of connections. It’s literally about the daily reality of the here and now.

What is different are the opportunities afforded by connections and informal networks via private school which probably means that, in the long term, their peers will have more career success.

Completely this.
There was a research study done in Ireland looking at whether private schools were any better than state schools. The conclusions were that in general no they weren't in terms of actual teaching and academic achievement but the kids (and parents) of private schools were able to make better connections and networks which benefitted their careers and opportunities. So basically it's all down to who you know...

It also concluded that children who attended state schools in affluent areas did pretty much the same as those from that area that attended a private school. So the socio economic profile of your state school plays a big part too. In saying all that Irish private schools are not as expensive as UK ones so a lot more affordable for middle income earners so not as exclusive. My sister's kids attend a UK private school and I am shocked at the fees. Here most private schools cost anything from €5 to 10k a year, my sister pays more per term in the UK.

I think society in general would benefit hugely if people came out of their own bubbles. I live in what is classed as an affluent area in Dublin. I work in community/ family support in a disadvantaged area about 3km from where I live. I sometimes feel I'm living in an alternative universe, the difference in people's daily lives of is unbelievable

I'm quite open when I say that if I went private in future a key reason would be that I wouldn't want any kids of mine to have to put up with the sort of little shits I went to school with. The other reason would be that I don't really trust the policies of the Welsh government in a few key areas.

On your other point, the boarding school nearest me doesn't select on academic grounds, they interview instead to see who's a good fit. By the sounds of it they do have quite a number of pupils who were struggling in a mainstream setting.

I’ve recently posted on the thread about behaviour in schools being out of control. Honestly, anyone who could buy their child out of that sort of daily misery but chooses not to is very strange in my view.

This.

Paying for extra curricular stuff isn't comparable at all. Some kids need additional help due to SEN. That's just to correct their disadvantage not to get ahead.

It's incredibly narrow-minded and judgemental to assume that anyone who actively chooses state over private must be "strange". People will have many and varied reasons for not wanting their child to attend a private school.

I have two children with SEND. Both are academically bright but need support and flexibility to be successful and happy in school. Having looked at all the local schools and spoken to staff and parents it was clear that provision for and attitudes towards SEND at both private schools in our town was not good enough. Money and resources are not necessarily as important as inclusive policies and willingness to make reasonable adjustments, so that heavily influenced our decision.

My choice was also influenced by my own experience. I went to a private school. The behaviour there would never be described as "out of control" because it was hidden, but "daily misery" would be accurate for many children. Sexual harassment, bullying (including racist and homophobic incidents) and drugs were all rife but adults were happy to turn a blind eye as long as the kids didn't make it too obvious. I have heard similar from friends who were privately educated at different schools, and friends who are currently teaching in the private sector so I don't think my school was an anomaly.

I don't think taking these things into account makes me "very strange". Other people will have different priorities, different circumstances and different options available to them. But I think it is a mistake to assume that sending your children to a private school means they will not encounter, or be affected by any risky or challenging behaviour.

@sistermichaelseyeroll

It's incredibly narrow-minded and judgemental to assume that anyone who actively chooses state over private must be "strange".

Fair enough, but that isn’t what I said. If you have found a good state school that meets your children’s needs, it would be strange not to choose that. What I was saying was more that if the schools near you are as bad as the ones frequently cited on MN threads, then it would be strange to pass up the opportunity to buy a way out for your children.

But my point is that by doing so you could be buying your way out of one problem, and inadvertently swapping it for another. The boys I went to school with weren't fighting on the playground or swearing at Teachers, but many of them were arrogant, entitled and thought that they could make the world bend to their will. Those attitudes led to other more insidious behaviours behind closed doors, but it was all hidden behind a veneer of respectability.

@sistermichaelseyeroll I take your point. I’m interested in your experience tbh. Did you go to boarding school? Your words remind me of some other people’s experience at that sort of school.

I know many private schools now are a million miles away from that though - they are day schools where the main differences from state schools are smaller classes, greater parental support (and criticism!), more extra-curricular opportunities and better classroom behaviour.

The problem is when you say “private school” many people instantly think of places like Eton which really are the preserve of the Uber wealthy. Schools like that will be totally unaffected by the proposed change in VAT and will continue to churn out large numbers of future politicians, bankers etc.

The schools that will be affected the most are the smaller private schools where the majority of pupils come from professional families. We are near Cambridge and have looked at a few options for our kids who are currently in state primary. The overwhelmingly majority of pupils have parents who work locally as Drs, in the pharmaceutical or IT industries.

The school we are most interested in for DD is not academically selective and the fees are £18k per year. We like it because it is highly regarded for its pastoral care and ethos of producing a well rounded individual, rather than academic high achievers.

It’s all well and good saying people should support their local state school, but what if said state school is dire? No one can honestly say that given the choice they would prefer to send their child to an awful school on a matter of principal. I went to a horrific secondary school because it was my only option. It was in the bottom ten in the country for truancy and the year I took my GCSEs had an 8% pass rate. I was lucky that against those odds I managed to achieve well, but given better opportunities I could have done so much better and who knows where I’d be today. I am not prepared to take the same risk with my own children’s education when I have the opportunity to do something about it.

Bully for you. No-one's taking your school away. You'll be taxed in exercising your privilege.

It’s all well and good saying people should support their local state school, but what if said state school is dire?

Elite parents taking their children out of the state sector leaves it more vulnerable to neglect. 65% of the Cabinet went to private school: https://www.itv.com/news/2022-10-26/majority-of-rishi-sunaks-new-cabinet-went-to-private-school

That still doesn't mean anyone should feel they have to send their child to a dire school if they have the choice not to. The only thing that would even vaguely remove that unfairness would be if people didn't have the choice to send their dc privately. Isolated highly principled individuals choosing the dire school instead of private will make no difference to anyone except a detrimental one to their own child.

It's an individualist versus collective problem.

The individualist response to unfarness is to do what works best for you. That includes buying your way out of the problem, either through private school or buying a home in a location with good state schools.

It's reasonable for the collective response of the vast majority who can't/don't send their kids private to say, through their elective representatives, "that's unfair. Can we not at least refuse to subsidise that choice through taxation?"

Yes, I see what you’re saying if you mean that private schools shouldn’t be able to avoid VAT.

But do you have these same moral qualms about people paying their way out of the shit show that is the NHS? I don’t actually have private health cover but would do it if I could afford it.