To think people have the wrong idea about the reason parents use private schools?

[ewloan]

I have found this from threads and in real life, whenever private school comes up there’s this attitude that it’s about ‘buying results’ or ‘if your child is academic they will do well anywhere.’

Do people not realise that most people who send their kids to private school actually don’t need to be thinking about exam results as the main factor? These are people who often own businesses and have huge family wealth so their child’s exam results are not the be all and end all. The main reason people use private schools is for the entirely different experience for the child, for them to enjoy school and learning in small classes with lots of amenities and focus on their development. Why do people seem to think the main reason is to ‘buy an exam result’?

The main reason English people use private schools is from social aspirationalism.

75% of their cost is staff ie teachers and support staff so cutting back unfortunately udislly means losing staff. As many indy schools are large employees in the local area (teachers, cleaners, groundstaff, SEN, catering, medical etc) then that has a knock on effect on the local employment market.

Why are we using the chronic underfunding of state schools as the ideal financial model for private schools to aim for? Why aren't we using the funding of private schools as the model for the state to base per pupil funding on in order to raise state education + facilities within state education? Why aren't we pressing the government to raise base funding to 10/11K+ per pupil instead of telling private schools to cut? It isn't the fault of private schools that state schools have been chronically underfunded.

We educated our eldest privately from Y7 to Y11 because he has high functioning autism. He’s very academic. Straight 9s at GCSE that he would have got anywhere, even if left to his own devices to teach himself. It wasn’t for the results. It was for a quieter, more flexible and less triggering environment. He is acutely sensitive to jarring sounds and he is a share peg who doesn’t cope well with arbitrary rules. State sixth form college has been fine because he is treated like an adult. He can choose what he wears. He turns up for commitments, but can got home when he doesn’t have any. His classmates are self-selecting, so want to be there. It is the best fit so for.

THIS and if I see one more parent claim that they ‘work hard’ as if everyone else who can’t afford private school is sat on their arse.

It’s a strange phenomenon that people paying for an advantage want sympathy for doing so. Pay for your school and own that choice.

I do know 2 people with children at private school, one paid very much for his child to have an advantage and not mingle with riff raff. The other is an older parent who thinks automatically it’s the best available, without having done any research about what else was available.
Neither of them can really afford it though.

I should probably add that he wouldn’t have lasted a term in our large state comprehensive. He might have managed a grammar school , but probably not if they were strict on uniform etc. He’d have ended up being one of the 2 millions on children not attending school.

YANBU. I send mine because the grandparents offered to pay right from the start. Why wouldn’t I? Most people would do the same in that situation.

As it turns out, it is good for him because, as one of those quiet, middle-of-the-road kids, he would probably be lost in a huge class in a state school. I don’t expect high grades, just a better learning experience.

@twistyizzy "Why aren't we using the funding of private schools as the model for the state to base per pupil funding on in order to raise state education + facilities within state education?"

Because people won't pay more taxes.

@twistyizzy ,

‘Why are we using the chronic underfunding of state schools as the ideal financial model for private schools to aim for?

That is a ridiculous statement!

State schools are government funded. They should get more funding, maybe a 25% uplift, but I doubt they will even get that. The idea of doubling the school budget isn’t realistic.

Private schools, on the other hand, are businesses in all but name. They provide a service for those who can afford and want to pay for it. Some cater for the super rich, some for the only moderately wealthy. And there is nothing wrong with that. Like all businesses, they will adjust to extra costs by either increasing revenue or cutting costs which, as I have explained, is easy to do.

If I told a good state school head that I could increase his income by 75%, he would think he had won the lottery and would create a stunning school, so cutting a private school budget to the same number really should be doable.

There is way too much drama about this.

O know most people don’t care, but there are lots of aspects of other people’s lives that don’t affect us, but which we might have an opinion on that is wider than our own experiences. I’m very glad not to have vast school fee bills looming, but I understand what a big stress it is for parents affected.

I find it odd that children eligible for DLA are not exempt from VAT unless they gave an EHCP. I find it odd that a government would want to punitively tax one of the most successful British sectors, for which we have global brand recognition. I find it odd that they would do this in a way that most impacts people already paying a lot of tax here at a time when they know everyone is struggling with the rising cost of living and the highest taxes in our history. I would have thought a more sensible approach would be to pressure these schools to make them more affordable for home students, a bit like universities have home and international fees. That way, more British children could access some of the best educational settings in the world.

I reckon a lot of the school fees for some of the more expensive schools go on maintaining grade 1 listed buildings, rather than on anything spent on the children.

Yet happy to spend other people's money? Forcing us to pay 20% more is fine but coughing up their own money to improve schools for their DC isn't acceptable?

You are right, for the more expensive and exclusive schools

@autel,

‘The main reason English people use private schools is from social aspirationalism.’

I don’t agree with that. Most of the parents are already successful and socially confident.

As I said, the vast majority do it to get the best possible education for their children. This, sadly, for the vast majority, but not all, means grades.

A vast number, also, have no experience of any other type of school. They move in circles where the question ‘which schools are you thinking about’ implicitly means which private school. They know nothing else and would, frankly, consider they were letting their child down if they were forced to send them to a state school.

Another factor is delegating parenting to the school. It is pretty much true that a good private school will sort hobbies, sports and wrap around care all on the same site. Many parents have no idea what their children’s hobbies or interests are but that is fine, as the school does (that isn’t my idea of great parenting but at least they have delegated it, so it could be worse).

There are some whom my parents would have rather snobbily called ‘nouveaux riches’, who are buying social cachet and a nice accent for their children. As a teacher, these can be really tricky to deal with, as they feel they are buying their children a service in the same way as they might buy a business class ticket, and they are unafraid to criticise any small aspect of it that they feel may not be up to scratch (such as their child not being predicted a particular grade at GCSE!). This is the only set who are socially aspirational and, in my experience, they are a small minority.

@CurlewKate I haven't said private schools are necessarily better and I wouldn't assume that. But the private my kids go to is better than the state one I took them out of. It's smaller, quieter, more flexible, any bullying is dealt with fast and effectively. As I said previously, it's resources are old and somewhat shabby and it's non selective so results aren't stellar. But it's the right place for my kids. I get help from my parents but if I only had one child I could actually afford it on my high 30k salary. I'm not minted by any stretch. I get tired of seeing posts that lump all private school parents as one.

Can you please explain what this means? I’m baffled. I send my child to a private school. What sort of advantage might they get from ‘contacts’ from doing so? I don’t get it.

I work in finance. Most big finance companies have a set recruitment process which new starts have to go through. The CVs will be whittled down, some remove details such as what university the person went to as they went to make it as fair as possible. Pretty much all would remove the name of the school. The days of someone handing a job to their child’s schoolfriend for instance are long gone!

@Genevieva ,

‘I reckon a lot of the school fees for some of the more expensive schools go on maintaining grade 1 listed buildings, rather than on anything spent on the children.’

I was curious and dubious about this so I had a look at Eton college as an exemplar.

They have income of about £100 million (!), a lot of it from investments. They spend about 32% on buildings, including depreciation. I suspect most of that will be upgraded and new building, rather than maintenance.

It is a lot, but the majority is still staff and teaching.

Are you for real?
Contacts can mean all sorts from knowing people who can give you the time of day, work shadowing, putting you in touch with people who might know of a job that's coming up, having a conversation about the role in advance, a meeting over coffee to help prep for interviews, the ability to do unpaid work shadowing and gain skills and experience to assist with getting a crucial first paid role etc.

Eton is not an exemplar FFS. Most are nothing like that. Most private schools are far more akin to a leafy comp on a nice hit of the home counties than Eton.

And if me or my friends (and I’m sure there were people at my school who were) were in those categories, we would still have gone to the same school as we were all from extremely working class backgrounds and had no hope of even getting to a private school if part funded by bursary. Many of us couldn’t even afford school dinners at a state school so relied on the state to provide that to us too.

The problem here isn’t VAT on school fees, it’s the state of state schools. Anger is just in totally the wrong place, it absolutely shouldn’t be the case that those who are wealthier get their needs met while others don’t. And if you’re a beneficiary of that system but about to lose that benefit - then rally for better conditions for the many millions of kids who never had a better chance.

I’m sure you are right. I also know that maintaining ancient buildings, often with carved stone decoration, decoratively moulded Victorian guttering, copper roofing and all these other beautiful features requires the sorts of specialists employed by the National Trust. Doing even the smallest thing costs an arm and a leg.

We wouldn’t be allowed to let someone workshadow without going through the proper HR protocol which offers these opportunities to all young people. And state school parents can do all of these things fgs! It’s hardly all private school parents are captains of industry, and all state school parents are workshy benefit jockeys.

How do you know I'm not???

Do you really think that someone from an inner school that is on HAF has parents who are best friends from University with owners of companies with multi million turnover?

I'm curious now. Why do you think deprivation is such a predictor for poorer outcomes?

To those who think that private schools should just cut their costs a bit, I would suggest that they try running a school first. The largest proportion of cost is the staff and there isn’t much that can be done about that. In addition, the amount of extra cost that is incurred by factors that are required to meet inspection requirements just grows, with little extra revenue to balance this out. It’s a competitive market and so fees can’t just be increased to take account of regulation-related cost.

I’d imagine deprivation is an indicator because you might live in a chaotic household, you might be moving from temporary housing to temporary housing when you are trying to revise, you might be a career, your parents might not appreciate an education, your parents might not be able to afford the revision guides, your parents might be stressing about how to pay the bills.

But I know from sure that many, many finance companies actively try to recruit from deprived backgrounds to ensure they don’t exist in an echo chamber and appeal to as wide a range of clients as possible. And as many from a deprived background are clever and keen to get a good job straight from school rather than university, and these candidates really appeal.

Your ideas of ‘contacts’ seem really out of touch. They were applicable in the 1970s for such, and at a push the 1980s, but in the present day? Of course not!