to think many parents who send their children to the lower quality independent schools are so pretentious it is cringeworthy?

[Barrelofloves]

Is it due to insecurity? Because I have found the seriously loaded/titled folk are not like that at all.

rollmops- I haven't decided whether or not to send my children to a private school in the future. At present, they attend a very good state primary. We cannot afford private education for the children at the moment but, even if we could, I would choose to keep them at their current school. At senior school level, I would visit the local schools and make a comparison between what was available in the state and private sector. For example, one advantage of the independent selective schools (and the state grammars) is that the children generally want to learn and are expected to do well academically. The teachers probably have more time to concentrate on teaching rather than having to constantly deal with other issues such as discipline problems. Also, if your peers are motivated, you are more likely to be too. Another advantage is that independent tend to have better facilities because state school are often lacking in funds. I am not anti private education but I do find some of the reasoning on this thread ridiculous.

Come on Xenia, what would you do?

Private or state if your child were 'thick'?

I always thought that one of the advantage of a private school education was supposed to be good manners. In my real life experience this is not the case at all. By using words such a 'thick', Xenia has only shown that she has poor manners and a complete lack of empathy for others who may be less fortunate.

Surely private for thick offspring so at least they can excel at team games or whatever?

Whereas a bright kid might just do ok at a state grammar, one is lead to believe. Some of them are even single sex, y'know.

Oh yes, and acquire moral fibre.

Don't forget the shiny hair.

What is so utterly depressing is that there are a lot of 'thick' children in private schools who somehow end up at top universities. One of my DCs' lecturers wrote an open letter to them on retirement saying just that, he basically couldn't stand it any more.

Let's face it if Prince Harry can only get 2 A levels with not v good grades at Eton, just imagine what he would have got at Bog St Comp.

Anyway am leaving this thread now. Have been fuming all night about it and its not good for me. Have decided to go the way of many other posters over the years and not even engage in debate with Xenia. It really isn't worth it. I don't think it's funny or amusing or rather clever, I think its depressing and ghastly and unfortunately reinforces the stereotype of the thick private school brigade.

Lordy, musn't forget the shiny hair. (Can Xenia actually see that far down into the road from Ivory Towers, NW3?)

You are right. The world is marvellous place which changes all the time. Those with power and money do whatever they can to keep control of the status quo, but inevitably they become stagnant and innovation has to come from outside the glittering circle. Change is inevitable. If you only train your children in establishment prejudices they will be unable to function once things change.

And yes, Poor old Xenia, not exactly a poster girl for private education, is she?

LOL MadameDefarge

I too am giving up on this thread - it was interesting but has turned into a pointless circular discussion.

Indeed Drayford. It does become a bit tiresome ...

Xenia : outrageous generalisation
Poster: How can you say something so vile?
Xenia: outrageous generalisation
A N Other poster: How can you say something so vile?
Xenia: Outrageous generalisaton
A N Yeta Nother Poster: How can you say something so vile?

Ad infininitum.....

It's not exactly hitting the debating high notes.

Poor old Xenia, not exactly a poster girl for private education, is she?

I think she's an anti-private schools agent in deep disguise.

Xenia STILL hasn't explained what 'moral fibre' is! Perhaps it is one of those things that you only understand if you actually have it!

However crudely Xenia puts it, she makes many valid points. Like it or not. Vast majority around here quite obviously do not.

Rollmops, Xenia's only valid point is that if you pay for education there is more chance of your dcs getting into top unis. Nothing more, nothing less. The rest is just nonsense.

Rollmops- could you expand on what you feel are Xenia's valid points?

Have not read the whole thread, but Le Queen and Dilemma, totally agree about the conning of students that a 2:2 in media studies from the 'university' of Weatherfield or Albert Square is a passport to a cushy well paid creative job at the bbc is utterly scandalous and just so obvious that anyone who falls for it is evidently not the brghtest bicuit in the barrel to start with.
Like Mr LQ, and Mr D, MrGofG recruits graduates, and most of the cvs go straight in the bin. Not snobbishness ('accent' is irrelevant) but when you are getting hundreds, the first pass has to be to go for the firsts in 'proper subjects' ( Xenia ) from serious universities, and nowadays that is increasingly US universities and UCL, Imperial, then Cambridge, then the rest. Oxford even is starting to be a bit of an also-ran when there are Harvard, MIT, Stanford...etc cvs on offer.

(Somehow don't think any of Xenia's DCs went to Oxbridge, think would have been mentioned somewhere along the line).

And should have added - academic schools in the UK are increasingly encouraging the brightest to apply to US universities rather than Oxbridge - so there are likely to be lots more places at UK 'Unis' for the 'thicker' student in the future. (BTW - would love to know what euphemism the lower leagiue of indies use to describe the thicker population - resume there is circumlocutive worsing in the prospectus to convey that? )

SM

MrsG, they say that they believe its as important that their students become 'fully-rounded individuals" as well as academic successes.

I read that today, actually,

Thx! Some of us less well informed parents need a lexicon for this... And a way of cross-referencing with the lakes and accent provision...

Actually, if I considered my children thick not as able as the majority, I'd be more likely to privately educate them.

The irony is that whilst we/you all laugh over such a notion, there's no doubting the fact that middling or lower ability children do achieve better at good independents than they would at the local comp. Bright kids from supportive homes will do well wherever they are.

Why are we being snide about the fact that less able kids are managing to get to uni via private ed? Surely that is proving the point that their parents have made the right decision? They've made the best of themselves due to the education they have received. It's almost more important for them than for the bright ones.

The argument would be that they are taking the places of those in the state system who are brighter, and therefore more able to contribute at that level of education than the spoon-fed indy kid of average ability, who often fails quite badly at uni level.

BR - I think you have made am excellent point that normally does not get made on MN, where everyone appears to think their child is 'bright' (which is a cringeworthy adjective that drives me demented). If Indie education can help a child to fulfil, or even exceed its apparent potential, whereas it would flounder in a a class of 30 in a bog-standard comp - surely that is a good thing, and increasing the population of well-educated people?
The trouble is, the prevailing mentality appears to be like Caroline(?) Blower of one of the teachers' unions who expressed the illogical opinion that 'independent education should be abolished becasue theresults are too good' .