I would gently challenge this assumption. My children go to the local state which has better resourcing than many of the city privates because it is big and benefits from those economies of scale. It also attracts excellent teachers and excels in the arts and sport. Many of the children who go there come out with straight 9s (more than 10 per cent of kids got 10 grade 8s or above in GCSE this year) and are just as confident as their privately educated peers who live on the same street. Similarly, there are kids from both sides of the fence who struggle, don’t thrive in their chosen setting and can’t have a conversation with an adult by 16. so it’s a much more nuanced position than you suggest.
we chose not to privately educate on political (small p) grounds but appreciate that we have clever kids with thick skins and strong socials. They have thrived at state. My friends’ kids have been sent to private because of various reasons such as neurodiversity, failure to thrive, bullying etc and I completely understand why. If it were in my child’s next interests I would absolutely do it and stuff the politics.
one thing I particularly value about state school is that my kids are around the more ‘gritty’ life experiences that link back to my own childhood: poverty, crime, drug abuse, neglect, etc. They share classes with struggling kids and have learned to be empathetic to other people’s life experiences (which after all is what creates the ‘bad behaviour’ in class) whilst learning to concentrate amid minor chaos. That’s a very important life skill - none of us will have the opportunity to work only in complete silence.
however, they are also around friends who are advantaged and snobby and have what I would call ‘small world’ views and have learned to challenge that too. I feel they have seen a decent spread of what life throws at people, providing a very deep life-skills type enrichment outside of academics.
these discussions can become very rude as people try to justify their own positions. It’s always emotional because the system is unfair - those with money are perceived to get a better education. But for my part I would gently challenge what ‘better’ looks like.
Two different schooling choices can be perfectly reasonable at the same time. Let’s share views but appreciate that in denigrating someone else’s we weaken our own.