....to be unsurprised the BBC called the London Oratory a "prestigious private school" when it isn't?

[doorkeeper]

The London Oratory school is in the news because there's been a minor blaze there (nobody hurt) and a pupil has been taken in for questioning.

I was idly listening to PM on Radio 4, and they described the school as a "prestigious private school". Except it isn't, of course. It's a state-funded school. Except, again, it's functionally a free private school for posh and/or famous people that most ordinary mortals couldn't hope to get their kids into. I found this burst of accidental honesty from the BBC quite refreshing.

I'm sick of the posh London schools that are state-funded but that are effectively free private schools because of the way they massage their admissions. The now-disgraced former head of Holland Park School was taking HPS firmly in that direction, I know that a few other West London schools operate in the same way. I would love to see Ofsted - who were useless re the HPS scandal until it was too late - address this in some way. All children, even the ones whose parents aren't rich or famous, should have equal access to local schools, regardless of income, religion or parental connections.

AIBU to enjoy this bit of accidental honesty from the BBC?

Perhaps OP. But people buy superior educations and privilege day in day out. We don’t live in a meritocratic society.

It's going to be incredibly interesting to see how the church education authorities are going to deal with the huge pupil population shift over the next decade, as they won't always have the same suite of options as the maintained sector have in terms of merging, etc. I think it will raise some really tricky issues for some of them - although of course it's going to be really hard for most schools.

Sigh. They are disproportionately well off based on the main proxy for deprivation, which is eligibility for free school meals.

I'm in no way disputing that schools that are able to apply selection criteria - whether faith, academic or house price - outperform (as a whole) schools that cannot. I've shared some of the evidence base on this upthread. The fact that the schools are able to filter out parents who don't have the values you describe via the selection system gives them a head start.

I attended the Oratory, class of 2002. Parents poor, immigrants but Catholic. Lived in Lewisham then, thus its not all stereotypes.

Ah, you are making the mistake of making up motivations for other people's contributions, rather than engaging on substance.

I'm sure it's a lovely school. I'm sure it makes a big difference to the children who attend and I know children who are enjoying their time there, as well as some who are less happy. It takes a lot less kids eligible for free school meals than almost all the surrounding secondaries and the norm for both H&F and K&C. According to its own statistics, it's KS4 population has very few children of low prior attainment and an unusually high number with high prior attainment.

All those things can be true at the same time.

Which data in particular do you think are incorrect?

If you’re not Catholic, your chances are non-existent. If you are Catholic but not practicing enough, you are unlikely to get a place. The additional oddities are siblings of former pupils and children of former pupils. Plus the one feeder primary and its own primary department. While I know little of the social strata, the admissions policy does effectively filter out lower ability children and this is publicly available.

@JassyRadlett that link is grouping all faith schools together in the main though?

Although it does say “Other faith’ and Roman Catholic schools at both primary and secondary levels have particularly high proportions of pupils from non-white British backgrounds when compared with non-faith schools, and other faith schools.” which matches my experience & the info I linked from TES as opposed to being full of white middle classes as a pp said. And certainly the data shows immigrants are highly invested in their dcs education.

And it looks like catholic secondaries have 11.8% fsm vs 13.8% nationally which I don’t think means that families who use catholic schools are well off?

Which link? The EPI one? The annexes break it down further, including from memory (don't have in front of me) into those who have a selective cohort and those who don't.

And you'll note that in all my posts I've talked about proportional differences, not absolutes.

Sorry, in that screed of irrelevancies I missed which data supplied by the school you think are incorrect?

Sorry that actual facts are so dull. And you a teacher! Shocking.

Agree with your points @Mumofthreedogsandaboy. It’s really odd how angry people get about schools like the Oratory and Cardinal Vaughan.

People who moan about how “unfair” they are don’t understand the current admissions procedure and are basing their whinges either on out of date info or, in some cases, completely incorrect info.

In addition, the schools were built and funded by the Catholic Church. The state then decided to piggyback on what the church had already set up. The church still supports the funding of schools. So it is absolutely fair that children from Catholic families should take priority.

If faith schools do better than non-faith schools, maybe it’s because there’s something special about them…

Our local faith schools are over subscribed every year. The kids attending now will be raising the next generation and are also likely to attend church to get the kids into school even if they don't believe. I don't believe (husband is Catholic) but do believe it is a good life to live based on teaching and reflections. The only non-Catholic kids on DS school live within 200-300m of the school in an affluent area.

This thread prompted me to look up the percentage of children entitled to FSM. It's 24%. Because you can earn only a small amount and still be entitled to FSM that means 24% of children are mainly living on benefits.

It seems crazy that so many are in this position and unsustainable for the government to be funding so many families. I wonder how many are single parents where the absent parent isn't contributing? Or is contributing but it doesn't count towards the total for FSM.

Anyway a bit off topic.

@Alligator456 the threshold is ridiculous. You can be very much disadvantaged & not qualify for FSMs but yes shocking how much do qualify.

The thing is, if you don’t live close by, there is actually a cost to getting to the Oratory - the tube and train aren’t free. Buses are, but they aren’t practical for getting to Fulham from, say, Leyton. So I wonder whether the cost of getting there puts off the very poorest (and FSM families are the very poorest - it is perfectly possible, sadly, to be very disadvantaged and still not poor enough for free school meals).

In my experience, those attracted to the Oratory are people who want a rigorous, disciplined, traditional education and aren’t put off by the very strict atmosphere and lack of pupil/parent voice, seeing it as worthwhile for the academic results. There’s also a lot of rugby. It really isn’t for everyone and a lot of families really aren’t up for that, so am baffled as to why anyone expects it to exactly match the demographics of H&F, W/SW London Catholic schools or London as a whole.