to think it was a mistake to give a damn about education?

[AbbyLubber]

Ok, I know some will really disagree about this, but I am fed up. Really furious. I earn a solid, not great wage; so too dh. We have two children. We've scrimped and struggled and sweated to pay for them to go to independent schools, because they are both bright and because here in Oxfordshire the local state schools in our area are dreadful, really dreadful. We're almost at the end of our rope financially. My son has a scholarship, but the schools say we earn too much to qualify for a bursary, though they also admit that we don't actually earn enough to pay the fees over the long term.

WTF? AIBU to think that if we don't earn enough to pay the fees then that should BE a benchmark for help? I get that it's political, that they want to keep their charitable status, but surely this is madness? Perhaps I should add that we don't have a fine art collection we can sell, or rich parents... as per the ludicrous inquiry form the school sent around.

Isn't ANYONE else cross that soon unemployed single mums and the rich will be the only ones able to send their dcs to a good school of their choice - unless of course you pay in the other way, by buying a 675k house in the tiny Cherwell catchment area? Not that I'm against unemployed single mums and their kids - the more the merrier - but I wonder now why I worked full-time when my dcs were small to earn a decent wage.

Quite right liongirl! Well said.

Well, no, the sad thing is the illusion of choice.

The emphasis on 'parental choice' is precisely what creates polarity.

I'd much rather everyone just sent their dc to the nearest state school & got stuck in to supporting it.

I accept that it ain't going to happen.

I did that raven, there's a thread all about it on here. I pulled him out after a term and a half as the bullying became too much. Not every school is a good school, it doesn't matter how many parents support them or not, behaviour starts at home.

Yes ravenak, I accept your point about choice. If your ideal were reality then none of us would be moaning.

I think the problem is that too many of us are individualists and you're right, it won't change anytime soon. So I'll go on making choices that are right for me and wrong for society. That's awful but sadly true. Ahhhhh! What on earth has happened to me since my alturistic teacher training days?!!

So has any worked out the income level where paying for education for two dc stops becoming a life-crunching decision?

(forgive me have had a few glasses of Leffe, cavalier)

People are never predictable, when you think you have them sorted something new crops up.

It depends on your standard of living Marsha. If you have a big mortgage, shop in Waitrose, holiday abroad three times a year then it's going to probably hurt to pay 2 times the fees. Mine will cost 1/3 of my income.

The real issue is not people suddenly discovering that fee-paying private schools cost money or that faith-head schools bang on about Gods of various sorts.

The real issue is the disgrace that these things have to exist in the first place, and that people are complicit in keeping them in the system, and in deliberately keeping their own children away from those who have no option other than to use the ordinary state comprehensive schools where almost everybody else goes.

I didn't suddenly discover they would bang on about God UniqueDad.

The system doesn't work for some children. It's a one size fits all system, if you do this with shoes then you'll have a small percentage who's feet won't fit into the shoe at all. Would you squeeze it in? Chop off a few phalanges to make it fit? You can't assume that a state school is right for every child, the private sector fills a void, as do the private hospitals and the private dentists.

UnquietDad, you are being rather extreme. Many, many, many people send thier children to the 'ordinary state comprehensive schools' not because they can't afford to pay private school fees but because they choose to send them to their local comprehensive.

Lots of people wouldn't dream of sending their children to a private school regardless of their income.

I agree that the system sucks, UQD.

Belledechoc, there is no getting away from the problem that independent schools are very difficult to access if you haven't got the means to pay the fees. (Looking back to the OP!)

They do fill a void but unfortunately not everyone can access them so this feels very unfair. It is unfair but until there is an extreme change in the state sector of the sort that raven suggests I will continue to pay my school fees, regardless of the fact that this contriubutes to the situation that both unquietDad and raven find so repellent.

I know, I work XXX hours a week. I can't imagine it's easy for the majority of parents.

Uniquietdad's dw works in a school so he's a tad biased me thinks!

I do find it unfair, life's not fair though, everyone does their best as it's all they can do.

"My point is that private schools aren't all they're cracked up to be. People who haven't been to private schools themselves but send their kids because they think it must be better are naiive. I know this first hand. I'm just trying to say don't bust a gut trying to pay school fees, don't fool yourselves that it's some golden key to life you are giving your kids."

So did you also attend state school too Bobbalina because I did and that was crap too so maybe school as a concept just doesn't work either and the whole system needs to start over again.
There's no right or wrong answers, I've not come across any parent in either sector who is deliberately trying to fuck their kid up, but I do look at the professions and careers that my primary school friends have ended up in and the difference between those who went to the comp and those who went to the grammar and private is very predictable.

Oh for goodness sake, I have three DCs and two nephews who all have been/are at excellent state schools and who now are all at Russell Group universities and Oxford! They are all 'very bright'

Oxfordshire is hardly the hotbed of terrible schools plus if push comes to shove, you can move. Theresa May went to Wheatley Park School, albeit from Holton Park Girls Grammar school (as did I, many years ago )

If one is going to perpetuate the system whereby one can pay to get a 'better' education then I am afraid one has to take the rough with the smooth.

It would be far better if there were NO fee paying schools and everyone had to support the state system, thus making an even playing field for university entrance.

Then only the genuinely clever children would get the places, not those whose parents have paid for exam results 'a decent education'and state schools would hhave to step up to the mark to provide an education that most middle class parents demand.

belle, all analogies like shoes, etc,. are flawed because shoes are consumer items everyone pays for in a shop - there are no "state shoes".

The fact that my DW works in a school as a teacher has nothing to do with it. I am coming from this as a parent like everybody else.

All analogies are flawed as they are analogies and not the thing itself. It's easy to get caught up in details of the analogy that have nothing to do with the matter in hand.

liongirl - what kind of changes in the state system would you like to see, specifically?

And do you think these could be effectively implemented without everyone being "on board"?

You see, for you, if I understand correctly, the existence of a flawed state system is what keeps you using the private sector.

But for me, any system will always be flawed, and so you are holding out for something you know is never going to happen - that fact gives you total insurance.

Because I think the biggest change that could be made for the better would be simply for everyone to go to their local school. All in together. And then within the school for particular needs and talents and abilities, etc., to be addressed. Maybe that is idealistic.

You pay for state education through your taxes unquietDad.

You are a parent, some schools are not easy to work in though, it really can be like crowd control rather then teaching. It was like this when I was at school. It would be nice to say that times have changed, it would be untrue though.

oojimaflip - exactly, so this can't be discussed using an analogy.

'Choice' is a concept used by politicians to shift responibilities from them onto us. I shouldn't have a 'choice' of schools or hospitals - I should just have good ones. Once I'm given 'choice' then the fact that the school my child goes to is partly my fault as I should have 'picked' a better school.

At some point in these threads someone will always say "You pay for state education through your taxes" with varying degrees of smugness, as if I am a seven-year-old child and gently have to have pointed out to me something that I haven't realised. Can we take it as read that I do actually know this and try and address the actual discussion?

After all, there are plenty of things we all pay for through our taxes and we don't have the option of picking and choosing which bits go where. That's a bit of a non-argument.

oojimaflip - yes, the whole "choice" nonsense is exactly that - an attempt to shirk responsibility for improving all schools. Who wants "choice" between a good school, a bad one and a mediocre one? It's insane.

UQD - Aye - you only need analogies to make rhetorical points or to deal with concepts outside one of the participants experience. Quantum Mecahnics - Analogies help. Education Policy - Analogies not so helpful.

Not really, it's your smugness in assuming that the one size fits all approach to education is right for every child.

belle, I suggest that you read my posts correctly, and when you have done so you will see that I have nowhere argued for what people conveniently call, when dismissing it, a "one size fits all" education policy.