to find it incredibly irritating when in certain circles school fees are talked about as if they are a necessity, not a choice?

[emkana]

Like Emma Thomson currently on the Women programme on BBC 4, or very often in the "Style" section of the Sunday Times.

TTM - that's about normal IMO for a non-boarding school. Boarding schools are fabulously expensive but pretty useful for farming out unreasonable adolescents ...

ttm, I think for that kind of income level it's impossible.

Eton's 26k a year so it's not for the paupers like me . There's a range of private schools, the cheapest one I have found is £50 a week (it's dire, ofsted slated it, we went to look around, there's nothing, all of 12 children and I don't know how it's still going), for the parents who just want the prestige of sending their child to a private school I imagine (uniform looks smart )/ It's hard to say what motivates people to send their children to a specific private school, everyone has their reasons.

Its just a question of choice. On a TV documentary this evening about gender roles in the home, one couple, (with working Mother and SAHD) cited; mortgage, school fees and pensions as their priorities above all else...they might choose to drive crappy cars (who knows), or live in a shed (they didn't) to compromise...just as you often see top of the range, Range Rover Sports parked outside a terrace on a council estate. Freedom of choice...

Oxford Admissions works like this; three tutors, probably 2 subject tutors plus the admissions tutor meet the candidates (all straight a types). Out of the bunch they are looking for the potential firsts (the fabulously talented ones who will end up in academia or 'go far'. There won't be many but the most important job is to identify these prodigies. The next most important job is to get rid off any dross. These are normally public school attempts to overcoach kids to get good grades but they just aren't bright enough. The rest of the places, they fill on the basis of personal liking; after all they are going to have quite a close relationship with them. They used to have one to one tutorials when I was there. It's not right, but prettiness does help a lot.

I got that from an admissions tutor at Balliol.

Probably not the same now. What with equality and political correctness and all.

I don't think it's a question of choice

Families earning £30k or £40k a year don't have the choice to send their children to private schools. They just don't. It would be financially impossible.

If private school education is a priority and there is no family money, then you have to make choices about careers and work very pragmatically and very early.

For cheap private schools look at Cognitas.

Anyone who thinks they are doing the state system by going private needs a special education on account of their self-justifying stupidity.

Anyone scrimping to get their child an education because they might get stabbed at their local comp has all my sympathies.

Does anyone else get as cross as I do?

What's classed as a cheap private school though? 5k? 10k? 15k?? (a year, not a term)

I don't think ds would get stabbed, he sounds like the young sherlock holmes when he speaks though so his life would be a misery! He's small, doesn't do PE, can't run so he's the perfect bully magnet. Being very bright has given him nothing but problems.

Not quite as cross as you Balliol cos I think my kids are getting a pretty great education at state schools. I too went "state" and feel I got an Ok education, which I topped up pretty heavily at home on my own initiative. But theirs is definitely even better than mine was. We don't live in the home counties though so we're spared a lot of the "Oh dear, really?" crap.
I remember mixing with some kids from westminster school when I was about 18 and when I told one of them I went to a comprehensive he literally reeled with shock, It was like telling him I went to Borstal.
I think the class system in this country totally sucks and the state/private education divide exacerbates it, though I do think it is getting better and much less of a stigma to being state educated. But how can we ever have a more equal society when opportunities are closed to kids so early on?

Quattro - it is a question of choice... I know of a family when I was growing up who sent one child to the Royal Ballet on a scholarship (okay) and paid for the other to go to a lesser (cheap) private school in the town. These kids lived a very spare existence, with hand me downs (from my own family), no holidays, and their parents working long hours ...Their 'stuff' was alwys naff, old and decrepit, poor things...Goodness knows what happened to either of them...anyway, they could probably have had a better lifestyle if their parents hadn't decided that they wanted their little ones to go to private schools...and scrimped and saved for this purpose.

P.S I also have friends who have decided that they are only going to have one child because they want him to have a 'decent education', which in their eyes, means, private!!

Belle, I feel for him? It is possible to get scholarships. Is he in the maths olympiad and all that jazz. It must be awful for him. I agree that being bright in the wrong environment must be awful. Can't you home educate? Tbh, my school was crap and I used to go home to study. My parents didn't mind, and my school was no place of learning. Tbh, with the internet, I don't know why people need schools.

I chose private because I worked out that the hours I would have to drop to get ds to and from state school were the equivalent of school fees. Benefit is good wraparound care and holiday provision, smaller class sizes and, most importantly, ds's learning difficulties have been picked up at a young age.

Not major problems at his current age but most definitely will be if they continue as he gets older. He is one of those middling children who neither shines or fails at school and would most likely not be noticed in a class of 30+ (36 in our local state school).

No family money here and a single income single parent household.

YANBU - I'm glad you raised it emkana - this particular assumption makes me want to puke up. I was state educated. I went to Cambridge University and found it full of people who assumed that I must be a freak of nature to have 'acheived' getting a place there - what they didn't realise was that state schools (and I went to a rough one) are full of bright, potentially high acheivers who have not been spoon fed and that ability has NOTHING to do with class. My daughter will be state educated and I will expect her to expect the best for herself out of life. Shame on Emma Thompson.

I think there are some fantastic state schools around...we have some fab ones around us here (home counties I'm afraid!!! _ smirk)...but what really irritates me is when parents do just send their kids for the so-called prestige effect...mostly when they feel they are 'living the dream' through their kids...We all care about what our children can do with their lives, and want to assist them in getting and achieving whatever they want, but mindless bloody snobbery about how to do it is irksome.

Our children will be state educated (it didn't do us any harm)...but I do have my eye on the local Grammar schools for secondary education! Years off yet though!!!

Oh, and I think actually that quite a few 'grandparents' are footing the bill of their offsprings, offsprings education nowadays...off to bed...baby to feed..

TTM; Really glad yours are going good at comprehensives, mine too, but we are lucky.
And good point on 'topping up' at home. I assume you mean help with homework, educational visits, educational environment and all that support that makes all the difference. And labour have thrown so much money at education that there must be something to show for it.

A Class Thing? Is it not a money thing? It's like saying middle class, when you mean middle income. Any criminal who has made a packet will buy their children's education. I've just been reading about the blokes behind a big cannabis smuggling ring. They lived comfortable but deliberately unostentatious lives and sent their children to public schools and pony club.

I'm not a Jordan knocker but if you live in Sussex you're children may be classmates of hers and Jades. It's money, not class.

Of course private school is a choice. And one that can only be made if the money is available.

I moved ds from state to private last year because he was failing so badly and his SN were being completely ignored.

BUT I could only do it because I sold our home, and went into rented accomodation. The equity I am using for his school.

If I had not sold it, or had been unable to sell it, or if I did not have a flat to sell, then ds would have just carried on failing. But there would have been NO choice.

So while I do not come into the category of really rather well off folk who are deluded about their choices, I do realise that as a parent with a one off opportunity to get my son back on track I was extremely lucky. And prepared to make my choice about giving up having a stable home of our own for his future.

And surely, now, it is better to save to help with the university fees?

Well yes okay but it doesn't have to be an either-private-school-or-university scenario.

Mme D - you are brave. Did you get namechecked in the Sunday Times? I think you did. Slapper.

Balliol I tried for a week to home ed him, he's just too quick. He picks things up within minutes so he ended up teaching me maths whilst I tried to mark some of his work. Even his teacher admits that he knows alot more then her (poor woman, I buy her wine on a regular basis). The schools he's been at just leave him to it which isn't the greatest plan as he does his work in 15 minutes and has nothing to do for the rest of the lesson. The current one isn't too bad, in certain areas they can cope with him but he's still bored. It's a very small church school though so he's not 100% happy about being preached to when he has so many questions about god/faith/theology. He's moving to do year 7 in a new school in September, they have assured me he won't be bored and will be stimulated (I have told them he's a bit bright), they have all his interests on the curriculum and he can take his pick of the after school clubs (debating/latin/reading group etc), he will have the chance to do the maths olympiad there as none of his previous schools have offered this, there's also a chess club which plays competitively which he'll love (I can't play him any more as he beats me every time, ).

If you raise your child to see the talents of everyone then they won't care what sort of school they went to kitty.