In thinking it is simply unfair that the standard of education that your children received is based on your financial status.

[lucyellensmum]

Yeah yeah, this old chestnut, but i feel i have to vent.

Yesterday i had the opportunity to get some "teaching practise" in a private primary shcool. It was like a different world. Small school, small class sizes. Wonderfully behaved, active, bright and happy children. It was really lovely, certainly made me think i might want to persue a career in teaching.

BUT the one thing i couldnt get past is the fact that these children were receiving this education because their parents are in a financial position to provide this. I have never posted on these threads before because it stinks of sour grapes that i can't afford this for my child. Even my friend who teaches there cannot afford to send her children . Its not that at all, their parents clearly work very hard for what they have and i don't begrudge that for one second. I think its great.

However, why should it be that if your parents are poor, or just average, or even just above average financially that you have to take your chances in an overstretched, underfunded state system. Its fundamentally wrong imo. Even in the state system it is biased towards wealthier families because if there is a good school in that area, the property prices rocket. Leaving average families with the "rest" of the schools.

Yes, people work hard for their living and should be able to reap the rewards of their hard work. But CHILDREN don't have any choice as to what family they are born into. Surely a child of a Junkie parent who has no interest in her/his child and sponges off the state etc (to take an extreme) has the same right to a decent education as that of a child who's parents are lawyers and MDs of major businesses.

I'm actually quite lucky, our local primaries are all pretty good schools. The secondaries are OK too. And YES i would totally abandon my principles and send my child to private school if i could afford it. The school i am describing has a 100% GCSE grade C or above pass rate, compared to the 70% of my DDs old school, compared to the 50% at the local state secondary unselective school.

The schooling system in this country is blatantly unfair, however i wouldnt want to be the person charged with putting it right as i dont have the answers.

Life just isn't fair. It isn't wrong either - it is just as it is.

And it isn't just about private education either. State education isn't fair - not as it stands. In most areas, the good schools are where the expensive houses are - so you need money to get into the catchment, etc. But I can't see how that is going to change TBH.

And I can see things from both sides here. DD goes to a private school. We are lucky to have the finances available to make that choice. We were in the lovely position of being able to visit all the schools we liked, and to make a choice between all of them. AAnd I know not everyone has that choice.

But I also know that there is another side to all this,and that not everyone has that choice.

I wish everyone had access to a fantastic education - without the need to either pay for it direct or pay for it in housing premiums. But life isn;t like that; the system hasn't changes. It was like this when I was at school some 20-30 years ago.

GrapefruitMoon - I agree with you. Parental expectations can and does have a major impact on a child's success at whatever school they go to.

I was lucky. My parents really valued education; as a result me, my brother and my sister were all able to succeed at school

You're right Fio. Not everyone does have that choice. Not everyone can chose to pay directly in school fees. Not everyone can chose to pay for education via housing premiums in the right catchment.

And yes, some people who can afford to make either choice, chose to do netiher. And if that is what they believe is ight for them and their child, for whatever reason, then good on them . I would support their decision. Just as I would support anyone's decision to pay prvately or to pay to move into a catchment.

lem, wouldnt it be wonderful if we lived in utopia?

SM - You could see that as alreayd happening in some ways. I pay my taxes, but I do not use the state school service. I live in the catchment of a very good state school but do not use that place - the place goes o another child who may not have been able to get in otherwise.

sTitch, indeed it would

Ive opened a can of worms here, enjoy ladies, ive got a head ache

But I don't thing the stats would actually support that way of thinking. Only something like 8% of children go to private schools (may actually be a bit less; can't remember exact figure), meaning 92% are in the state system. Well, probably less actually due to those home edding (guess it is their fault too ) So I think the percentage is too low - and the percentage is pretty much the same as it has been for a long long time; and from well before the media reported declines in ststae edcuation.

And for what it is wrth - I don;t personally feel schools are much different to what they once were. Just that the media and league tables highlight academic side of things so muh. They do not look in depth into individual schools, and cincentrate on the good things many schools are doing, especially those working in more deprived areas or areas with high levels of ESOL or high levels of unemployment. And there is a lot schools are doing - but all the media care about are exam grades. Which makes the picture seem much worse than it really is.

I have no guilt with using an alternative to the state system. I have my reasons. But also I gave nearly 10 years of my life to teaching in the state sector, and now give my working time to working in a state run prison, within education. I think I give plenty back to counter balance my 6 year old not gong to a state school

"From the little I know about it, - state school teachers are far better at 'teaching', because they have to be. Private school teachers don't have to put as much energy into stimulating the children to learn because they know the parents will beat the children if they don't do their boring homework! "

IME - not true. There are good and bad teachers in both sectors, in equal measure.Priavte school teachers and state school teachers may have idfferent pressures, just as state school teachers in different types of state school have different pressures. Have worked at one very good state school, and one failing state school - I was assessed as being an very good/excellent teacher in both - yes I achieved differet things with my students, in no way comparable. But I didn;t change because of where I worked if that makes sense. I still put the same effort into my work and teaching in both aeas. Just like do now in prison ed, and that I do when I go into my DD's private school one day a week.

"They should put a higher tax of school fee payers to increase the funding of state schools!"

Why? I expect that we will send our DS's to private school at some point as we get funding via DH's job to do so. But we will still have to contribute some of the money. So as Hulababy says, we are effectively going to be paying twice, once for the private element, and once for our contribution in taxes to the state schooling system.

We are not contributing to the problem with state schools becoming 'ghettos' as SM puts it, because we actually live in an area with very good schools. I just want the very best for the DS's that we can afford, and wouldn't put my principles before their education. If they get any advantage from going to private school, then I want them to have it.

I don't feel like private schooling is just about the actual 'education'. I went to a state-funded grammar boarding school. I had a very good education. However, my sister has just finished at a private school, which although had equally good educational facilities (actually much better), also had much better non-academic facilities than I ever experienced. She's had a great time, done some fantastic things (school hockey trip to Barbados!), and I want my children to look back on their school days in the same way.

My parents gave me the best education they could - they gave me aspirations and a desire to succeed, and they gave me respect for education. With those tools, I was better equipped to actually go out there and do well.

The saddest thing I saw in some of my pupils, especially those from the school that was "failing" and even more so in my clients in the prison education system, is a complete lack of aspiration. Too many have no goals, nothing to aim towards. And the main over riding influence who can give a child that is a parent, not a school.

As other posters have said - life is not fair, and as i say to my kids when they whine about'its not fair' - no it isn't and if it was WE would be starving in Africa, that a whole lot unfairer than ANYTHING we have here in this country. If some people choose to spend their money on what they percve to be better education for their chldren, or faster cars or yachts thats how it is. At least in this country everyone can have an education, and mostly they get out what they put in effort-wise.

I think that one of the most worrying things about education atm is the fact that schools find it almost ipossible to exclude children who are persistantly highly distruptive (and I'm talking about NT kids here)

When a child is excluded from a school because their behaviour disrupts the learning of others, the school is expected to pick up another excluded child.

While I have sympathy for these children, I also have sympathy for the others in the class who cannot learn, because their lessons are wrecked by the poor behavior of a small group of children.

Time was when there were EBD schools where these chidren could be taght, but trained professionals, in smaller groups. But to same funding many of these places have been shut

I teach in a private school but my mother has always tasught in deprived inner city schools with dedicated hard working collegues (maybe more so than in my school???) but you can't overcome parental and peer influence I am afraid. I think that is the 1st thing to change rather than schools to really give every child a chance.

I think the thing that makes me most cross is the sweeping assumption that private schools are 'good' or 'better' than state schools.

It's also not always true, LEM, that state schools are underfunded. As an example, the two local secondary schools both enjoyed an investment of £9m each 5 years ago. My dcs school has fantastic ICT equipment/suites.

There are some great state schools and some poor ones. And some great private schools and some poor ones.

I'm also of the belief that my children will get a more rounded education from being in the state system. They are not mixing just with more affluent children - and will encounter a much wider racial/cultural mix.

It was a real eye-opener for DS1 when he discovered (in primary school) that one of his friends didn't have a garden, and that the whole family slept in the same room.

That taught him a lot about life and how fortunate he is.