to think boarding schools are no longer ok...

[BaklavaRocks]

Inspired by another thread, and some old YouTube documentaries I've recently watched, I can't help but feel boarding schools for under 13's (i.e. boarding prep schools) have had their time.

Maybe they used to be an acceptable option, but with all the research we now have available, showing the damage done by separation of young children from their parents, do you think boarding for v young kids (8/9/10/11) will eventually be banned except in v exceptional circumstances?

And if our politicians including past PMs like Johnson and Cameron were not a product of boarding schools, do you think they'd have more compassion and be less cut off from emotion and feelings? and better able to relate to us common folk?

@StandingSideBySide which school is that infographic for?

The Kings School Canterbury

@StandingSideBySide Thanks. The website is illuminating. Full boarding offered from 8 years old. Also read the safeguarding statement. Given the schools history of staff and sexual abuse, I would have thought it would be better.

At no point have we, as parents, or the children as day pupils, felt that we are being encouraged to go down the boarding route.

Well yes, that's how good marketing works. They don't 'encourage'. They just make an implicit narrative in the minds of children every single day that boarding is good. That's why kids in schools like yours don't walk around horrified by the dozens of institutionalised children being raised without parents side by side with them. It's all normalised and encouraged. That's my point (and no doubt why the boarding house was full).

Look at any website for an independent school that is viewed as good. They all push the narrative repeated throughout this thread. Encouraging independence, having fun with friends, sports and extra curricular activities, beautiful buildings and grounds.

They just make an implicit narrative in the minds of children every single day that boarding is good.

This simply isn’t the case at our school. It’s not even an issue. Everyone mixes, the vast majority of children are happy with their situation, be that day or boarding. My children don’t want to board. Perhaps it’s an issue at schools struggling to fill boarding places, where they need to market themselves. For those schools with long waiting lists for boarding spaces, they really don’t want or need to be persuading day pupils to switch. It probably varies across schools.

Good try
So Disappointed the school still puts so much into the local community even after the reductions
you’ve Decided to change the subject now

Those things are highlighted as being available to both day and boarding at our school. In fact there’s specific mention of day pupils having those benefits whilst being able to return home each night. Merits of either choice are recognised. Admittedly this was different a generation ago, where boarding was very much seen as “better”, at many schools. Times have changed.

@StandingSideBySide Other people have mentioned on this thread the real risk of sexual abuse at boarding schools. For example, at Kings School Canterbury an assistant teacher of French and German between September 1980 and September 2020, was accused of engaging in sexual activity with a boy, observing him through a keyhole undressing or bathing, etc etc.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/65699c2bcc1ec5000d8eeff1/REDACTEDMilesMartinSoSdecision.pdf

The document shows alarming practices. The member of staff admits meeting with the boy and other boys in staff quarters and giving them alcohol during meetings. He alleges that meeting boys in staff quarters was normal practice at the time.

The panel noted evidence that it was common practice for housemasters to allow pupils to consume alcohol on specific occasions but it was not accepted that this would include spirits. And it gets much worse.

I personally can not understand why any parent would send their child to board in a school like this however beautiful their buildings and grounds.

This is all from 96/97
For a school that’s been going since 597AD I’m sure there’s lots of dirt to dish.
For state schools that haven’t been around for very long at all I’m sure there’s lots too.
Parents send there kids to schools with current abuse, knife crime, appalling behaviour and terrible grade outcomes, I can’t understand why they do that either.

@StandingSideBySide He was employed until September 2020.
I understand people supporting boarding schools minimising the sexual abuse that takes place though.

I agree with you. We are obsessed with separating children from their parents in this country. Free childcare from 9 months old etc. the vitriol about co-sleeping. Boarding school is a very small fraction of the population im more concerned about babies in nurseries 8-6 5 days a week (and I’m a full time working mum)

@Yourcatisnotsorry maybe comment on the other thread about that then? This thread is about boarding schools.

Neil Foden was seen by teachers with pupils in his car and putting his arms around them.

In a state school and it was only when the dc disclosed what was happening that anything was done.
Paedophiles are everywhere, you probably know at least one.

Of course. But in boarding schools and children's homes (the equivalent for poor children I guess) , children are uniquely vulnerable because they are there over night and for weeks on end

https://www.hampshirechronicle.co.uk/news/24729639.winchester-college-cover-up-let-john-smyth-continue-abuse/

www.itv.com/news/calendar/2023-09-25/ex-deputy-head-of-boarding-school-jailed-for-abusing-20-pupils

There are so many examples, in fact there are other fairly recent ones just relating to those two schools. I don't know why people are uncomfortable to have discussions about the risks of boarding schools and keep trying to divert onto other things.

And because boarding schools rely on their reputation, there is a tendency to cover up sexual abuse. We have seen that happening again and again.
Do those who send their children to boarding school not worry about this?

I guess once people have made the decision to send their children they would rather not think about the risks so they try and squish any discussion (as witnessed on this thread)

These stories hit the papers because they are news worthy.
People love to bash private schools and especially boarding schools.

That’s why threads like this exist.

And yet no one has pointed out the harm to kids of state schools as a parallel.
Who then is squishing discussion……

If MNs make a choice to use state then that is their choice, no one is here pointing out what a terrible choice they have made because that is rude and judgemental ( Irrespective of the state of state at the moment.).

To say people don’t look at the schools they chose and throw their kids to the wolves is disgusting!

@StandingSideBySide these stories hit the papers when it happens in children's homes. I think the sexual abuse scandals in boarding schools have got fairly low coverage given how terrible some of them are and how the signs were ignored.

Just squishing some state school abuse there
Pot kettle black

I think you may find that some of us on here are anti Boarding school not anti private school. My DC go to Private school and I am very anti boarding

Think away.
Engaging in this and suggesting parents ignore abuse and dump their kids in boarding schools anyway is a disgusting thing to accuse parents of

So think away.
These thoughts are in themselves abusive.

Appreciate that hopping.
Im pro choice.

One of the reasons that private/boarding schools might reduce the free use of sports facilities by state schools is so that they can then rent these facilities out in the same manner that a private gym does. It’s not through spite or bloody mindedness. No teacher (to the best of my knowledge) gets up in the morning and decides to “stick it” to a bunch of kids they’ve never met. If however the schools are treated as businesses legally, politically, and financially, they must act like businesses to survive.