to think private schools having charitable status is taking the piss

[zanz1bar]

Most private schools have their charitable status as an accident of history. Does a school like Eton really deserve the same financial status as the NSPCC.

Can it really be justified by a few subsidized places.

Ah AppleandMoses, working in admin you obviously know much more about what goes on in a state school than anyone who actually works in one as a teacher.

So zanz1bar, what is the beef?

Sorry hit return too fast - so "21 year old, straight out of university, to teach Latin. What did she know about lesson planning, learning styles or teaching skills? Nothing. She cheerfully admitted as much to us - she was our contemporary at university, you see."

The point being at our school she wouldn't need to know anything about lesson planning, that's done by administrators, we leaving the teachers in the classroom, teaching.
As for learning styles and teaching techniques with respect so much time is spent covering PPA, sickness etc with teaching assistants and helpful parents in some schools that I'd still say the private school with the latin graduate has the upper hand.

YorkshireRose - you can cut the financial statistics up in different ways though, can't you?
If you removed the education element from your taxes paid and put what you pay for private education into the state pot - and all other pr'-ed' parents did the same, the education system in the country would probably be better off. 2 economists could probably make the stats work either way!

Personally I don't like the "I'm paying taxes for this and don't use it..." argument. I'm hoping I don't need cancer treatment, invalidity benefit, a care home for senile dementia or a prison cell... can I cross those off my tax bill please?
But I do drive and have babies, so I'm happy to pay for traffic lights and maternity hospitals!

Re school places - (apologies for repeating..) in some parts of the country private schools have just simply been absorbed into the state system by becoming academies. Nothing collapsed!

Good job you're not a teacher too with your spelling and grammar.

I actually attend more meetings and conferences than your average teacher does yes, so I feel perfectly qualified to comment.

Read OP. In 2009 should a private school have charitable status.
Not should there be private schools or how fair university admissions are, or how hard somepeople find paying school fees, that they choose to pay.

Bit cheap King, surely you can manage better than that, am disappointed

"No it wasn't MIFLAW. The council made its plans based on estimates of how many places would be required. And those calculations include estimates of how many local children will be privately educated and so would not need to be paid for by the council."

Quite correct. But you seem to want it both ways -now you are talking about ALL parents, in one go, without warning, hitting the state system, whereas previously you were talking about just you feeling hard done by because of one school place.

If you fell on hard times and needed to put your child into state education in a hurry, the place would be there, and it would be paid for, because the planning is on an estimates basis rather than actually counting, year on year, the number of people who want it and then recruiting teachers and building classrooms accordingly.

I'd like to know how a teacher can teach a lesson without planning it. Please enlighten me. I only have a PGCE.

With all respect appleandmosesmummy, you are talking out of your backside and clearly know nothing about teaching.

Teachers in the state sector teach lessons all the time without planning it, £400,000 a year is spent on supply teachers who walk through the door and get on with the plan written by somebody else, it's not difficult.

Apple - you surely don't mean that teachers are given their lesson plans by administrators? I would find it very worrying for my children to be taught by someone who hadn't planned their lesson or didn't know how to. (I'm sure that's not what you meant??)

Apple

Do you actually know what lesson planning is?

It's not the same as time-tabling - it's about what happens during the lesson and what happens if plan A doesn't work.

how can administrators do that?

Unless they've all got degrees in Latin too.

Am I going off on a bit of a tangent to say that I think bursaries are a terrible idea. It irritates me to think of private schools cherry picking a few of the very brightest kids from state schools and thinking this makes them paragons of philanthropy.
They should take a certain percentage from state schools, but not the v brightest, but the ones that have been excluded and with behaviorial issues. If private schools are so amazing and have such small class sizes etc then surely these children would really benefit. That way they could really claim to be doing something for the good of society and at the same time unburden the state schools of some of the most difficult children. It's brilliant, I can't see why nobody else is suggesting this. I should run the country.

Zanz - charitable status is about tax status.

If school fees go up to compensate for extra tax paid by schools, some middle income parents will be forced to opt out and state educate their DCs. Providing a state school place for these children is more expensive than providing the tax breaks which enabled these parents to just about afford the fees. So the revenue forks out more cash and taxes for EVERYONE go up.

My point is that it is cheaper for everyone to provide this charitable status than to provide state education for all these previously privately educated kids.

So it is not a free handout to the rich, it is a way of keeping everyone's tax bill down.

Simple maths. No ideology involved.

Of course, if you want to pay more tax just to make an ideological point, that is up to you.

"£400,000 a year is spent on supply teachers who walk through the door and get on with the plan written by somebody else, it's not difficult."

of course it's not. You should give it a go. I'm sure your school will let you, what with all the conferences you've been on and the lack of need for a PGCE.

Hmmm...maybe allowing the charitable status but ensuring that private schools offer things like Extra curricular activities affordable/free to the children of the community might be a good idea?
That way more children can afford sports/music/etc...and maybe are kept of the streets etc...

Apple with all due respect you are talking utter rubbish, of all the teachers i know and thats a fair few, i don't know a single one who's lesson plans are done by an administrator and how on earth would a teacher teach in that scenario? The only time my DH, (who's a teacher with 4 A's at a level, a 2.1 from a Russell Group Uni and a PCGE) works from someone else's lesson plan is on the rare occasion he covers someone else's lessons. and as for your statement

"State schools are full of teachers who are paid by the state because frankly they couldn't cut it any other walk of life IME."

i hope you're school administrative duties are in the private sector because with an attitude like that i doubt any state sector colleagues would want to work with you.

No offence intended if any supply teachers are here, but I think it's quite safe to say that in the vast majority of cases students do better with a full time permanent teacher qualified in the subject who plans their lessons.

Actually, MIFLAW, the place is not there. I made enquiries recently with my LEA and they have no places at all. So if I do not pay for them privately my DCs would sit at home for the next year unless an occasional vacancy arises.

"Of course, if you want to pay more tax just to make an ideological point, that is up to you."

Yes please.

In fact, I already pay huge amounts of tax to make ideological points.

I pay a big chunk to the NHS so the poor don't die of treatable diseases, but also so that road-accident vehicles get picked up by ambulances and taken to emergency rooms.

I pay for everyone - yes, even you! - to have street lighting to discourage a return to medieval levels of safety.

I pay for a police force and an army because, though they have their faults, and the ministries in charge of them have even more, I have an ideological belief that lawlessness and vulnerability are poor choices for a developed society.

Perhaps you make different ideological choices and keep your tax bill low?

MIFLAW it must be that the teachers in our school are so brilliant that they make it look effortless.
Just out of interest though, I would actually qualify to act as cover for up to three days within the state sector, quite a frightening thought with my spelling.

What - nowhere in your area?

Or just at the school of your choice?

Tough lesson of life - choice is something you pay for.

Quite so, Apple. You must tell me where it is and I will move to the area. Is it in Lourdes or Mecca?

Actually, what makes the thought of you supply teaching frightening to me has nothing to do with your spelling.

Bathtime - I am not complaining about paying the taxes, the OP is. I am pointing out that in fact this charitable status thing saves everyone tax in the end as it enables a significant number of parents to just about afford the fees. I have never had any problem in doing my bit to educate the nation's children!

I am beginning to wonder if anyone is actually bothering to read what I said.