To wonder if Private School parents think we can’t read?

[Captainmycaptains]

Work/volunteer in Education so following the whole VAT debate.

SM is full of private parent groups ‘organising’ to get the proposed VAT on fees cancelled - fine you would, wouldn’t you esp.if you’re used to getting your own way.

They’re advocating hassling local schools, councils, demanding stats and figures that don’t exist, wiring to MPs - telling people to ‘claim’ their state place to ‘disrupt’ the ‘system’ while also saying ‘ Obvs we won’t be taking Charlotte and Hugo out of school, we’ll find the money’ etc strive harder, getting granny to chip in’ but this might make the council ‘panic’.

Do they think that people in support of the VAT aren’t seeing/hearing/reading all of these plans???

the funniest one yet is the poster who said ‘ well going to claim our state school places then! See how they like that! We’ll going holiday, pay the mortgage down, shop at Waitrose and save £700k in the process, ha!’
I. no you aren’t 2. Okay - go for it! Who on earth would think £700k is worth it?? Behave like a normal person then…

YANBU - yeah, they’re noisy as expected but the rest of us are as think/ concerned as they seem to think. Also - it’s too late for Sept - waiting lists only…

YABU - applying for school places you have no intention of using is daft, and of course everyone can see what they’re trying to do.

As you thought what?
You don't believe that in my area private school fees are 16-18K therefore don't have huge surplus?
OK

Sorry, I know your post was meant for another poster, but do you mind taking a look at these?

register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk/charity-details/?regid=312720&subid=0

register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk/charity-search/-/charity-details/312737

I have no links to these schools and my DD doesn't go to either. But they are smallish and both schools are valued highly by people whose DC go there.

I have been curious why independent schools fees are so high, even tor those without large campuses and facilities.

Have also gone through some school accounts but not having worked in this sector doesn't help.

So appreciate any insight you can give.

Also, I find your posts here informative and
insightful. So thanks for that!

@twistyizzy ,

‘As you thought what? ‘

I totally believe that some fees are that level. I thought that you wouldn’t actually want the accounts to be scrutinised and places found for fairly easy savings to be made…..

So if fees are 16K you can see how these schools aren't sitting on huge fortunes/surplus. No big endowments and all bursaries/scholarships come out of the surplus. Your comment about schools being able to trim excess SLT fat is disingenuous to those schools which aren't in that position.

@twistyizzy ,

I have been on the finance committee of a school as governor, and understand school budgets.

Out of the two schools I taught at, the areas I suggested are the most obvious. Different schools will have different areas. I offered to look at specific schools and make specific suggestions, that is the polar opposite to being disingenuous.

Clearly those fees are low for private, but the costs will be lower too. Teachers won’t get London weighting and all the other costs will be lower in the NE too. I don’t know where they can make savings but at well over half the state school per pupil spending and in a cheap area of the uk, there will be savings to be made.

Cutting staff and selling playing fields is not really balancing the books as much as starting a death spiral. Risking extra pupils popping out of private into these death spirals seems mad right now.

Why not wait until the lower birth rate has filtered through? Bulge classes all over the shop in the state schools here currently.

Oh come on, don't be so disingenuous. She's obviously not going to name her school when she's shared things about her family: it risks making her and her children identifiable to anyone who knows her.

She's shared that she's in a small private school in the NE. If you really want to look for savings to prove a point, why don't you select a random small NE private school and do that?

You really are patronising. You understand budgets but I couldn't possibly.

@justanotherdaduser ,

The first school you linked to is tiny, 170 pupils! That is, presumably, a one form entry over junior and senior.

It is very niche. It sounds lovely but those 170 fees will have to share buildings and SLT cost and, I am guessing, class sizes are 15-20.

The general rule of thumb now is senior schools are optimised at 500 pupils plus (years 7 to 13).

I think it is a real ‘luxury’ school. They could merge with another school or increase class sizes if they can’t fill their classes by adding VAT on existing fees.

The mansplaining is real.

Every single post he writes is like this. Patting us all on the head and asserting that we don't know what we are talking about but he is the supreme authority cos he works in a school.

@strawberrybubblegum ,

she said ‘schools’, not school. She could name any random school that she thought fitted with her argument,

@twistyizzy ,

‘You really are patronising. You understand budgets but I couldn't possibly.’

Come on, let’s not resort to ad hominem attacks. I suggested we go from the general to the specific so that we could have a proper drill down into the budget together and discuss it.

I know! I 'shouted' at him as he said as a mother there was no way I'd move my kids from private to state and mention my tax as a reason. Super culturally patriarchal and sexist.

Again with it
I am not going to name them because that would be outing.
Stop mansplaining to the little women on mumsnet.
Seriously read your posts back and reflect on whether you would speak to a man like that.

Amazing!

You don’t want to refute my evidence backed arguments, so you decide to try and attack me personally instead.

There are plenty of women in this thread who totally agree with me, amazing ply many who work or have worked in the private school sector. Have you worked out how you are going to discredit them?

I sometimes feel that I am arguing with a lot of AI splaining. Maybe that neologism will stick…

@twistyizzy ,

I have no idea who is a man or a woman on this thread, so of course I would speak to a man identically,

I am discussing/arguing with black typeface, not an individual.

Thanks for looking.

They are both small, less than 200 pupils. Neither are 'luxury school' in the sense people understand luxury - they don't have any fancy buildings, facilities or such. The school premises are small and quite ordinary. Both produce good results however.

I wouldn't say they are unusually small though.

Out of the nearly 1,400 schools that are members of Independent School Council, half have less than 290 pupils. A quarter have under 155 pupils. Only 7% have more than 1,000 pupils.

From what you are saying, after VAT change, most such schools will become unviable? If so, that will decimate the sector and cause numerous redundancies probably.

St Margaret's (the first school) has existed for over a century and it's hardly a bastion of privilege (take a look at the school building!). So it's clearly meeting a need and viable. If government action forces its closure, in my mind that will be a tragedy (I appreciate of course others may not think so).

The Labour Party want to get cracking on house building immediately. Maybe they actively want small preps to go bust so those lands can be scooped up by their mates in the house building sector.

It’s completely accurate. Obviously the public schools and some of the very big, prestigious schools turn round huge profits but your average day independent doesn’t, Half of them are charities for starters and aren’t actually allowed to make a profit. Some are SEN specialists and have the high overheads that go with having the appropriate facilities. Nearly all have highly qualified staff, many of whom have been in the same school for decades and so are far more expensive than the NQTs which state schools are stuffed with. It’s mostly the very old boys’ schools which have endowments for bursaries; the others have to provide that money from fees. Unlike state schools, private schools can’t currently claw back VAT from purchases either. In addition, they’re often in old buildings which are very inefficient and high maintenance. Most secondary private schools charge 14-18k and have only around 100 kids per year group so yes, the fees are all used up.

‘Cutting staff and selling playing fields is not really balancing the books as much as starting a death spiral. Risking extra pupils popping out of private into these death spirals seems mad right now.’

Death spiral?? Alright there drama llama?
Businesses that don’t adapt become insulate and these schools are businesses.

The problem is - private parents don’t want anything to change in any way despite the cost of living crisis and the state of the economy, and that just isn’t realistic.
For years now private schools have been putting fees up well above inflation, and it’s all coming to a head.
Even papers like the Telegraph are printing articles on whether or not private school is ‘worth’ it… or asking if it may even be a DISADVANTAGE to send your kids, what with all this tricky DEI stuff in the world.

Each school will work out the best way forward for themselves, and quite a few will use VAT as a way to save face and printed that’s the reason they’re downsizing or restricting or closing rather than admitting that they’re slowly becoming obsolete in the modern world. Their status as something for the wealthy, privileged upper classes is finally being see as a disadvantage not something to aspire to.

Not a bad idea at all. Or perhaps the land sold could be used for community sports clubs instead? So who doesn’t the money when private school buildings and land is sold anyway?
Schools that are part of a group could really have an advantage here, close the smaller facility, and use the money to give out the scholarships and bursaries to local kids - as private parents are always claiming happens.

With a dwindling child population there’s really only a few options - close schools and amalgamate or drop fees to encourage more to ‘strive’ to send kids to private school. I can’t see private schools dropping fees anytime soon- not after a decade of almost doubling them, in some cases.

Do you honestly think the state schools that will ‘benefit’ from the influx of these kids and their parents are the ones that need it???

We chose private (different schools) as one has SEN needs not being properly met by the state sector and one plays sport at a high competitive level. I know a family who have paid from primary age because they were only offered a faith primary and refused a place at the nearest non denominational school. I get this completely. That situation is a disgrace.

Our local state school is extremely high achieving. Catchment houses average around 900k but many are 2m+ and we’re not in the SE. Those parents using our catchment school don’t need either my sporty kid or my child with SEN to ‘improve’ their school. They’re affluent and savvy and expect their kids to achieve offers for Oxbridge or Medicine or Law if they so choose. They don’t need anything from local fee paying parents. Do you honestly think private school parents will suddenly send their kids to struggling school that could do with their input? This is naive at best.

@Captainmycaptains

*With a dwindling child population there’s really only a few options - close schools and amalgamate or drop fees to encourage more to ‘strive’ to send kids to private school. I can’t see private schools dropping fees anytime soon- not after a decade of almost doubling them, in some cases.
*
Correct me if I am wrong, but from a number of your posts it seems your preferred outcome from the policy is that many (all?) such schools close as a result?

This is contrary to the policy's intended outcome though.

The intention is to raise funds for state sector. On that basis, I support the policy.

If VAT change ends up killing off hundreds of independent schools, then it serves no practical purpose - it will raise no net additional funds, and create misery for a lot of people. No one gains, plenty of people lose.

the stated intention is to tax to a level where enough parents continue to pay for independent schools, not to destroy the sector.

It assumes a price inelasticity among private sector parents that may not be valid (one off 20% price surge has different impact from slow steady rise). I guess we will have to wait and see if that assumption is valid.

No not 'suddenly' - it would be an organic process over time. But the whole idea behind comprehensive education is that socially diverse schools benefit everyone. It's really not a controversial point.

And it doesn't really matter if people here disagree. My point is that those of us who are advocates of comprehensive state education generally believe this, so 'threatening' people with sending kids to local schools is sort of ridiculous when that is exactly what we would hope for.

Well for a start, the predicted increase in prices is 15% due to private schools being able to claim back VAT on some of their costs.

PED for private educations is highly inelastic though, far more than even the IFS estimates. The MN myth of the parents who live in a tumbledown house in the catchment area of an awful school, and who live on foraged food whilst privately educating their kids is just that, a myth.

The overwhelming majority of children come from households in the top income decile.