to expect my local cancel to pay for transport to a private school

[tootyflooty]

My dd has been offered a place at a theatre school, it is fee paying but not local and they do not have scholerships. I asked the council if they would provide the cost of a train pass, but were told no, because it is not our local state school.My argument is that by funding my dd education for the next 5 years (not easily affordable for us)I am saving the local education authority vast sums of money as they will not be paying for her place at the local state school, it seems unfair that we are penalised for our decision, She would get a free pass if our local school was over 3 miles away.Sorry to ramble but we have never had handouts from anyone and this seems grossly unfair.

[The above was a momentous post for Xenia.... first time I got a web site on my phone on a train and posted on it... took an age and will never do it again but it shows it works I suppose]

The thing I really struggle with Xenia is your blanket assertion that private school is only ever the best possible choice for your child and everything else is an inferior second best (and I am speaking as someone whose first child is just about to start school and who is currently trying to decide which route to take). I have just finished watching the documentary on channel4 "Chosen" about boys who were sexually abused at private school. They are remarkable adults but I doubt whether they would agree. Surely there are shades of grey.

I can see many of your points about advantage (and very much agree about empowering women to look after themeselves financially) and yet it doesn't always seem to hold true to me. The most successful person I know - both in terms of earning power and personal happiness, is a QC who went to an average comprehensive in the North of England. I have known 3 people in my life who have comitted suicide, all of whom went to the same private school as me. Is life really as black and white as you make out?

Xenia feel free to comment tommorow - you might be at the limits of technology there. Also was more a philosophical pondering - I am struggling with this decision tbh.

and sorry for hijack, have lost track of this thread somewhat but I still cannot believe someone would think the council would pay for a child to travel to a private school. They don't have adequate funding for all the children who have to go to state school never mind anyone else.

Those who think they are doing everyone else such a huge favour by sending their children to private school, and should have money back should consider that if the 6% of children at private school reentered the state school system, it would make only a very marginal difference to costs. At present many schools struggle because they are under capacity due to falling birth rates over the decade or so, in fact in some areas schools are being closed because of this. If I consider my children's last UK school, it had 300 children, an extra 6% would be 18 children, or less than two per class. As they have never been in a class of over 25 this would make a marginal difference to the LEA, and a small positive difference to the school. The additional costs would be for stationary and text books, as the costs of buildings, teachers and other overheads would be paid anyway. If all the private school children originated in the same geographical area that might cause some problems, with moving children about, but not if it was done in a planned manner, similar to that which happens when a school is closed.

As for the disproportionate effect of those children in "society" it is highly likely that as bright, highly motivated children from (in general) wealthier backgrounds with high educational expectations they would do very well in any case. Evidence suggests that the educational achievements of children can be largely predicted by their mother's educational success. ie genetics plus aspiration. Oh, and contrary to Xenia's assertion, it has in fact been found that those children whose left leaning parents sent them to local "sink" schools as opposed to the private schools they could easily afford, actually did very well educationally. Showing that parental encouragement is the most important factor for early success.

I think it is very poor taste to go around crowing about how successful you are and how lazy and stupid therefore everyone else must be. My parents taught me to be grateful for being privileged. There but for the grace of God go I...

It's not like what we pay in is paid into an individual account. The beauty of the system (with all it's horrible flaws) is that no matter what you pay in, everyone gets access to a more than basic level of level of "support". OP, you may not get your child's bus pass paid for you because of the choice you've made, but if you or family ever need long term hospital care, it will be there for you (even if you haven't contributed enough to cover the costs.) And if your dd doesn't like the school or changes her mind, or if you decide you don't want to pay anymore, the local school, with the teachers, resources etc, will still be kept going so that she can go there.

Get some perspective - you have enough to choose to her to the school of her dreams - the money will be used to fund cancer treatment, a special baby unit, new books for the library.

I just quite liked the argument that by sacrificing things to pay fees society benefits from children who in general turn out well. We can all produce exceptions of children abused at boarding schools (most children in private schools don't board anyway and boarding schools except a rare few don't tend to get particularly good exam results compared to schools like Manchester Grammar, Haberdashers etc which are day schools rather like the grammar school model for obvious reasons) or children who went to state schools and did well but the important point is that children from fee paying schools on average do do much better and do rise to positions of power. I don't think that's entirely nepotism today. I know heaps of people my age in the city who went to state schools and have done very well. I'm certainly no denying it but the fee paying school ethos etc if it's a good such school does seem to be one of the easiest ways you can help a child to make that process easier later.

Much more interesting than that is the question of what women earn, why they pick work they do and whether all people, male or female, could earn more and better themselves if they chose. In the recession lots of people will lose their jobs and many women will be scouring round the supermarkets for lowest priced beans etc and they may be better employed taking on a second job at weekends or starting a business. I wonder what makes some people do those kinds of things - hold three cleaning jobs or work all the hours there are like the poster above who raised herself through hard work out of poverty or even me - I've had something in me which made me work much harder than I needed which hasn't obviously raised me out of poverty because I was never in it but made me earn more than my siblings. It might simply be that I had a very unhappy marriage of course but I don't think so. In my teens I even always had various scheme and plans. It may be because I'm the oldest child - they tend to do better. It may just be balance of hormones in the body - more testosterone (never been tested so can't know). I really don't think it's greed. I sit here enjoying what I do, loving the fun of seeing what work I can generate. Had Ii not divorced I wouldn't have any mortage by now and indeed we paid off the first one before 1997 in the previous house entirely but even if I had not I would still do what I do. In other words I don't think it's the £1.3m of debt and 5 children to support alone that drives me. It's the fun of the work, the adrenalin etc.

On the comment above a recent survey of chidlren of very left wing famous labour poliitcians and activists who went to a sink school got absolutely masses of teacher attention as the teachers were absolutely delighted to have a different kind of child in the school and it also showed they tended not to mix with the thick disaffected rest of the school in spare time nor even during lunch breaks so it didn't really mix them in and benefit the others very much and many children made to be educated like that resent it for the rest of their lives.

I accept the point about marginal costs in state schools although masses of private sector parents are moving to the state sector at present due to the credit crunch and some schools can't cope with the numbers moving over so that argument may change. In a case Pepper and Hart the house of lords said private schools can charge teachers marginal cost of the child being in the school without there being tax on the benefit in kind whinch was set at 15% so we paid 15% of fees for our son for 7 years which was pretty good.

Some of us are just not motivated by money and status. You need enough to be able to afford food, shelter and to pay the bills, but beyond that I would much rather earn less at a job that I find interesting. I think museum curator, as mentioned by Provinciallady, would be fascinating; whereas banking and the world of finance would bore me rigid-so regardless of how much I might earn doing it, I don't want to know. If I didn't like my local state schools I might try to work all hours to afford the independent sector but I would be more inclined to move house or find other ways around it.

Pieces it's all very well not being motivated by money but then people can't cry to the government when you can't pay for the better things in life or complain that rock stars have 2nd homes bigger than your only home.
I'm not motivated by posessions but I realised pretty early on in life money buys you choices, the choice of putting up with tooothache until an NHS dentist can treat you or having it sorted immediately, the choice of moving house to gain entry to better schools etc etc.
It's no good stamping your feet and saying it should be available to everyone, yes it should but it isn't so you have to make the system work for you or suck it up.

What Provinciallady and Piscesmoon have been saying. Money is not the only measure of success. Bettering yourself doesn't necessarily mean earning 5k extra, not to everybody. People have different value systems.

Sometimes it's about idealism, about feeling you are making a difference to the world. Sometimes it's just about having another value system, not necessarily any more idealistic, just different.

In the academic world, money is not the measure of success: your work is there on display and that is what you get judged on. I have never been to a conference where people nudge each other and whisper: that's professor X, he earns 500 grand. What they will say is: that's Dr Y who wrote the article on Z. And if they admired the article, then it won't matter if Dr Y is head of his department at Harvard or a supply teacher at the local comprehensives doing research in his spare time. It is the work that is valued, not the remuneration.

So it would never occur to me to get up in the morning and say: how can I earn more money? What I would say is: how can I make my next book really, really good and useful to other scholars? That to me is the measure of success. And it is a well known fact in the academic world that economic success will not necessarily follow. The greatest books are not necessarily written by the people in the top paying bracket.

If I worked in the caring professions, then I would have other measures of success, that again could not be measured in money. Taking time to cheer up a sick child on the hospital ward is not necessarily going to earn you promotion, but it might just be making a difference to the world.

Katie, there is a difference between stamping your feet because you can't live like a rock star (have you ever caught me or piscesmoon doing this?) or wanting a society where basic health care and education is available to everybody.

"It's no good stamping your feet and saying it should be available to everyone, yes it should but it isn't so you have to make the system work for you or suck it up."

Really? I thought we lived in a democracy where everybody has the right to try to change society in the direction they think it ought to go. If enough people want it, we will have to try to make it work.

A health system that does not work is a danger to everybody, even those who can afford to pay for private healthcare. Basci infrastructure is a necessity if anyone is to be safe. Look at Zimbabwe. Once cholera gets established in a country, that puts everybody at risk. Or TB for that matter. The poverty diseases.

And chances are, one of these days you will need one of those long-suffering NHS nurses who don't have the initiative to find themselves a better paid job. Be grateful if they're still around!

As for Xenia, has it ever occurred that not everybody who has the initiative to do 3 jobs at once is actually going to be doing any of those 3 jobs very well. I admire my students, who do a degree and then work all hours supporting themselves. But it does mean they are a lot more tired in my classes and standards are suffering. I can no longer ask for as much work as I could have done 20 years ago. And often they are quite simply tired and muddle-headed because they are juggling too many balls at once.

There have been studies made that suggest that working longer hours makes you less efficient.

Cory I completely take that on board I really do, my FIL was an excellent teacher, had he been prepared to go the extra mile and move from head of department to becoming a deputy head my DH might not have found himself at Uni in Hull with no coat, that's the the only point I'm making, we all make choices and our action have consequences.
You can also cheer up sick children in your spare time if that is what is going to make a difference to your day or when you've retired.

sometimes the choices are made for us

I take it he was not a British head of department if he was earning so little that his son couldn't afford a coat from the charity shop? I would have thought the university would have had funds for this kind of occasion anyway. This sounds very Victorian; my Granddad went to college without a coat (in Sweden!), but that was a long time ago.

I was very poor in the 80s in this country, but charity shops were cheap.

I agree with cory, it is having the work valued not the remuneration that is important. I am not going to stamp my feet because I can't live like a rock star! Firstly I would hate to live like a rock star; but if I did then I would do my utmost to earn that sort of money-I wouldn't expect it handed to me on a plate!

He was a British head of department in the 80's. I wasn't there so I don't know the in's and out's but I do know my DH is not the type to exaggerate or spend money on beer rather than a coat so if he didn't have one it was because one wasn't available or affordable to his father at the time for whatever reason.
At the end of the day we all have to pay taxes like it or not, so we're all doing our bit and anything over and above that I will spend ensuring my child doesn't have to walk to college or be cold. Everybody else can worry about their own.

Oh Lord, Xenia's post has made me feel like everything I shall ever do will be a complete waste of time!

But then I remembered that those people who made a difference, those people who changed the world, who worked for humanitarian causes, those people were never priviledged people.

Martin Luther King - working class background went to state school; Anita Roddick - good catholic girl! State education; John Lennon, working class, state education; Eleanor Roosevelt - dysfunctional family, poor education; Nelson Mandela - local methodist school, expelled from college; Jimmy Carter, state education, etc etc.

Yes if you have a private education you can grown up with this aggressive desire to get to the top of the ladder, to network, to make money, to become 'someone'. But that's not what I want for my kids, I want them to make a difference, I want them to have a passion, a belief, a hope that they can make things better. For me, all the money and status in the world don't mean shit when you're dead. We're all equal in death. For me the best thing you can do in this world is to make it a better place for others. These people didn't have brilliant educations or even very good childhoods, but they had someone who believed in them, and they had ambition, and self-belief and determination. They saw something beyond status and money and they achieved that.

My dh will be out of work come February. I'll have to give up my part time job of supporting children with learning problems, and get a soul destroying 9-5 job that serves no other purpose than to shuffle papers, just so we can afford the rent. I'm happy doing this job, I'm making a difference to the children I'm with and that makes me far happier than the measley pay cheque every month. I live in a pretty working class area now, I used to live in a very middle class village where no-one spoke to you and bullies in the little village school were rife. Here it's a great community, neighbours help each other, people talk to each other on the school run, we all know each other.

I know where I'd rather be. For me it is a choice, and I'm happy that I've made the right one. I think Xenia, you have a different set of priorities to me and you make the mistake of thinking that everyone's priorities should be the same. Well they're not. Some of us don't want a high flying career or a second home in the sun. We're happy with what we have thanks very much.

yes but xenia's suggestion that instead of women penny-pinching by searching for the cheapest baked beans they should instead get a 2nd p/t job (haven't they already if they're on the breadline? probably) or start up a business (yeah, like the banks are reeaallly lending atm) is nonsense

congratulations on theatre school place but certainly not council responsibility that you incurr travel costs

your logic is flawed

universal tax deduction means all pay in the pot for the greater good.redistribution of monies levied

childless pepole still pay for everyone child to be educatee,they dont get discount on basis of they dont use school education provision

KatieDD on Tue 16-Dec-08 10:50:08
"He was a British head of department in the 80's. I wasn't there so I don't know the in's and out's but I do know my DH is not the type to exaggerate or spend money on beer rather than a coat so if he didn't have one it was because one wasn't available or affordable to his father at the time for whatever reason."

I wouldn't use this story to try to prove anything, Katie, as it is quite an odd one. I did live in England in the 80s and it was not such a poor country that teachers' families of heads of departments were walking around without winter clothes as a general rule. These were the days of cheap charity shops. I may have worn a donkey jacket to my graduation, but it kept me warm.

Personally, I see nothing wrong in walking to college. We wouldn't have all these problems with obesity if more students did.

And I don't want to just look after my own children, because their lives will be affected by how other people's children are looked after, how much hope they have of making a life for themselves and not turning to crime, how many infectious diseases there are out there etc etc.

Not much point in my ds getting the best education in the world if he is shot dead in his teens by somebody else's disaffected son.

I want a world that is as safe as possible for everybody to grow up in because that's going to benefit my children too.

It may depend on where you live and if you're prepared to get on your bike and move where the work is as many of our own ancestors have always done, but in genreal I do think it's easier to do a few more hours' work than fiddle around looking for cheaper power or insurance on line.

There's a massive difference between walking to school to avoid getting fat and walking in the pissing rain because you can't afford bus fare.

At the end of the day Dh did go without as a teenager, I went without and didn't steal/rob or shoot anybody else as a result so if you're trying to justify that sort of behaviour because of poverty forget it.

I don't think she was trying to justify anything ofthe sort.

I think she was just trying to point out that those of us who were adults in the 1980's find the story you have relayed quite extraordinary.

My FIL is a head of dept. When I met him in 1987 he had a very nice home and also a flat in Spain - all paid for out of his and MIL earnings as they have no family money.MIL was a primary school teacher at the time.
Dh seemed perfectly well equiped too .

The idea of a dept head unable to afford a coat does not sit with anything from my experience in Britain at that time.
I think that is all Cory was trying to express.
Certainly to me it sounds really really odd.

Well there lies several immediate difference in your FIL and mines lifestyle then because DH's father was divorced from his mother and lived in a caravan for a few years, met and moved in with somebody else but it certainly wasn't his house, very much hers (and rightly so). He never seems to have a pot to pee in tbh and who knows what the real reason for that is but DH wasn't his priority it would seem.