AIBU to discuss A level success without private school spending?

[Absorbthecost]

Parents/carers who have not spent a penny on Educating their children and they have just received great A level results.

The sacrifices made all the struggle,

I’m interested to discuss families where the child has succeeded without need for private school

https://www.gbnews.com/money/private-school-fees-soar-vat

https://www.ft.com/content/091b214d-231b-414a-8f3e-9ef9fc021926?syn-25a6b1a6=1

Those who did pay,

presumably to secure great results at A level

The same kids off to Uni, placements easier to secure as less international competition. Uni the playing field evens.

And now time to pay for Uni,

https://inews.co.uk/news/education/university-tuition-fees-11000-2030-4705197?srsltid=AfmBOorss52PSHD6xJzisWMdeNxcXDen3IrCGS49nnGH1ZyDnmvTOh_k

A child who did outstanding (without spending a penny) the same result as a family who spent £250k + The above article is a low estimation for a selective U.K. day/ boarding.

The kids holding the same result off to the same Uni, How are families feeling!?…. Did you save to help towards the Uni Fees/accomodation.

It’s called levelling the playing field not bringing down the wealthiest 6%.

A £250k price tag per child.

One third of the independent sector living in financial ‘hardship’ and receiving internal benefits.

Those families coming through looking to transition points in education. What do you believe the graph will show next year? Or in five years time?

This goes back to OP.

My local college did better the local private. Private schools cherry pick their students so it makes them look better. Of course if you only take the top achievers they would get higher grades. State don't do that they cater for every ability. Private are not the best schools. they just select the high achievers from the start.

💯

Ah, but I'm sure @Poppinpoppinpopcorn is just as happy if/when private kids do well as we are if/when state kids do well.

That's just the kind of decent person she is. Not being a 😈 Conservative

I expect the gap to widen as every £ of investment made by private school parents is sought to be maximised and returned.

Are you blind? How is it 'levelled up'? What about the most precious, school years? Privately educated children live in an oasis compared to the state school jungle, what levelling up are you talking about? How is a pupil from a truly awful state school going to 'erase' this experience and start learning languages or music when it is too late? No true levelling up will be achieved until all private schools are banned and until PMs and MPs children go to a bad postcode state school, not the best state one. We erroneously think that by allowing a few extra UCAS point to an under-privileged child to get to uni will miraculously make up for the school years, spent in horrible establishments? I am state-educated, but send my dc private, and I think private schools should be banned.

Well @Sidedoors - I did. I said there should be no self funding of SEND, all forms of SEND in mainstream should get immediate extra funding and an acknowledgment that early intervention makes a huge difference. And all services working together from the get go, from nursery seeing a lot of it is state funded now too anyway. And there is already an early years curriculum so build on delays there straight away and automatic additional funding.

I completely agree with you. Im talking about the levelling up of state school children of equal intelligence of private are able to get into the best universities. That didn't used to be the case private parents used to buy there way in.

48.6%

You stopped short with your quote.

Please come back to us with full context.

For £250k per child,

it has risen to 48.6% from ……….. [X]?

Give the accurate information so we can all judge Value for money. We have read the same article. Maybe others haven’t.

https://www.ft.com/content/c8b5605f-209c-4513-9111-1ccc00f3a07e?syn-25a6b1a6=1

£250k per child =

Trail blazing.

No, you are actually pushing for more sinister discrimination, that is all. State school children who achieved good results are not in any way discriminated - they must have somebody (parents, teachers, relatives) advocating for them in a state school environment. So you propose to give them a push-up to university via contextual offers. OK. What do you propose to do with those children in state schools, who have fuck-all going for them and nobody advocating for them? What do you propose to do with them? Should they just be happy for their fellow pupils who were given a push-up and admire them going off to university? It can't be that those who are underperforming, doing it only due to their laziness. And those state school children who achieved their results - like fuck they achieved it by themselves - they had parental support, even if only in the form of a plate of thin soup or by virtue of not having drug-addled alkie parents or a demented grandma, needed watched. Your proposals are nowhere near good enough.

Private are not the best schools. they just select the high achievers from the start.

@Poppinpoppinpopcorn if state schools are superior to private schools then why do you object to private schools?
If parents are wasting their money on private schools which provide an inferior education to the free alternative then surely that’s up to them.

My child plays a few instruments. Nothing to do with school. All arranged out of school since they were little. Never actually done anything musical at their school as don’t play orchestral instrument.

how would whether they went state or private affected that? Are you suggesting all children should be prevented from learning an instrument as well as banning private schools? Struggling to se connection.

If you go to a top quintile comprehensive school you are 23 times more likely to go to Oxbridge than if you go to a bottom quintile comprehensive school.

That's what Labour should look at, if they actually cared about fair opportunity.

The schools they are responsible for.

Who is that buying their way into University @Poppinpoppinpopcorn ?

Unis are targeting exactly those schools you are discussing. The schools in the poorest areas with the lowest uptake for uni, families with no prior uni experience, high PP numbers etc. All sorts of measures are utilised.

Unis won’t care re musical instruments.

So now it isn’t good enough that private schools shouldn’t get places at universities, it isn’t fair that pupils at top comprehensives get places either?

🎻

By the time kids get to 18, it's far too late.

Actual education is the problem - and the solution.

The chip on your shoulder is pure fantasy.

to a point - the poster was saying that it is unfair that some pupils get this experience from a Young age and the others can’t catch up. For those pupils who can do musical instruments it is for sure another string to their bow (so to speak) so will obviously give them more to talk about and give them an advantage in interviews, say.

but unless you ban all children from doing any extra curriculars that would be impossible.

It doesn’t give them an advantage. Personal
statements have changed and are now fairer.They aren’t interested and focus on your interest in your subject, why you want to study it and how
you have prepared.Universities do not prioritise general extracurricular activities like sports or school clubs because they select candidates based strictly on academic readiness and subject-specific potential. They want proof that you can study your chosen subject for three or more years. Hobbies like riding horses, playing rare instruments, or jetting off on global volunteer trips depend on wealth and background. Applications focus tightly on academic suitability rather than general personal growth. Universities prefer super
curricular actions—like reading extra books, watching science lectures, or doing independent projects related to your subject. Playing an instrument only matters if you apply for music.

i thought Oxford/Cambridge etc interview people? I’m a bit out of the loop. Sorry! If they still do that is where these sort of things might come up as you perhaps talk a bit about yourself.

Employers do care about creative thinking and outside the box thinking, very much so, and plenty do value foreign language skills.

Playing a musical instrument builds neural pathways executive function, focus and possibly in a very long term manner for memory and creative thinking. It may improve numeracy too and make it more instinctive. Sport can have very good long term impacts on the body and life expectancy, builds team work skills. The benefits are numerous. Oracy skills invaluable in many jobs. The list goes on and on. Nobody in the real world is going to say I am not going to expose my kids to positive stuff that may even increase their IQ because Oxford doesn’t care about it. They can’t take it into account, but most of it may well make someone think far better and argue far better at an interview.