Who'd send their sprog to Eton now?

[felulageller]

£46k a year for your DS to watch Neighbours at lunchtime, take all the drugs going, have sex with older adults in fields, leave with a B and D at A level.

Learn zero social skills.

Sounds more like a sink comp to me?

@Redebs So you don’t think Eton selects and has great teachers? Of course you pay for tradition and name but you get more than that.

The head of Eton, S Henderson has 4 DCs like me 2 girls and 2 boys. I wonder where his DC are heading…. Co-ed modern school or a more traditional single sex secondary education. He is a Winchester alumni who ended up heading Eton.

If you are rich you have options and choice is always good. It will often boil down to the personality of the child. My alpha female is better off in a co-ed environment rather than just competing with a ton of other alpha females where she cannot win. Better to have some boys thrown in to lessen the pressure these girls put on themselves to be leaders and best at everything. My quiet studious son loves his all boys grammar where he can be nerdy to his hearts content without any pressure to be cool and please girls. I think personality comes into it a lot and there is no one size fits all. It is quite difficult to say when they are 10/11 though what might be best for them. In most European countries you don’t get much of a choice and it is co-ed all the way - personally, I would have preferred that.

Paying for a school has no bearing on how good it is

@Redebs - a lot easier for a school with a budget of 15k-20k per child vs the state school 4-7k average though isn’t it. So unless a private school is really badly managed then the money does buy more teachers per pupil and lots more extra curricular activities and wider curriculum. There are some amazing lean state schools incredibly well run with great teachers, management and supportive parents, of course. However, it is a lot easier for private schools that have a healthier budget. Anecdotally, some old private schools are really struggling to cost cut this year with high energy and food prices etc though - I guess they are not used to having to be lean like the state schools. I doubt Eton has any real issues though given the size of their endowment.
In reality, a lot of private schools are also sitting on a fortune in land value alone that can be sold off, if need be.

‘Paying for a school has no bearing on how good it is’

not only is that true but you don’t even have to have a teaching qualification to teach at a private school!

As if a teaching qualification per se rivals a Phd or Masters from Oxbridge or another highly recognised university, which many of the teachers at Winchester, Westminster and Eton have. If the cohort is not disruptive but interested in further learning more to a uni standard, then the latter teacher will add far more than a standard teaching qualification. It is such a cliche to trot that out for the best private schools in the country which can take their pick of many top teachers. You do realise that eg being head of Maths at Eton or in charge of Divinity at Winchester is a career aspiration in itself? Those interested in headships afterwards (many are not because not the type) - those positions opens doors.
I have plenty of friends teaching at these top schools most do have the PGCE and I can assure you they are far more intelligent than most teachers we have had in the state sector.

Do tutors at Oxford and Cambridge have teaching qualifications?

Having a Phd does not necessarily make you a good teacher.
You can have all the knowledge in the world but if you don’t have the ability to impart your knowledge then you are not a good teacher.
My dd used to struggle with maths. I hired a number of tutors and paid a lot of money out to mediocre teachers some of who had a string of qualifications
The best tutor was a first year engineering undergraduate. He helped dd get an 8 for maths.
Tbh, it really is a matter of luck . You can get some of the best teachers in not so good state schools and not very good teachers in the most expensive private/ public schools

Having a great PhD is good enough to lecture and teach very bright students at Oxford….

A person genuinely passionate about their subject to a great depth who then chooses to go into teaching so highly qualified, does usually make for a good teacher.

Please can I ask little more regarding your experience with Winchester. My sons got an offer and I just want to make the right decision.
you can PM if you’re willing to share your thoughts. Thanks

@Jn27 - are you choosing between Eton and Winchester? Or just Winchester and others?

This

@Jn27 Who was your question directed at ? In my experience most posters are happy to receive messages.

Winchester. My son got offered a sports scholarship but I’m not sure if that’s the right place for him. Any feedback would be much appreciated

What sport or sports is your DS interested in? I would look at the fixtures list and see how Winchester fare… whilst they are trying, it is a relatively small school compared to eg Eton so I can’t really compete. Plus it isn’t the sportiest school. But entirely depends on your DS … for some boys it might be plenty and they might be happy to get into most A teams easily.

@jn27 I think you need to be more specific about why you have concerns about whether it is the right school. (Presumably these are not related to
sport.)

In terms of sport Winchester is quite good at cricket and has a great ground. Hampshire sometimes use it to play county matches. Otherwise not great -
they don’t have depth to play big block rugby/hockey/football/athletics fixtures against other public schools on anything like equal terms. It’s fairly small, too international, and in general geeks and nerds tend to do more individual activities like cross country or shooting or fencing.

You do realise that eg being head of Maths at Eton or in charge of Divinity at Winchester is a career aspiration in itself?

Maybe the other way around. I sincerely doubt that head of maths at ‘humanities Eton’ would be anyone’s ambition 🙂 Agree that it would be a stamp of approval by WinColl, which tends to be one of the strongest schools in maths and sciences.

www.etoncollege.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/2022-Final-Summer-A2.pdf

www.winchestercollege.org/assets/files/uploads/a-level-results-summer-22.pdf

Having checked the above, higher percentage of pupils achieving A star in Further Maths at Eton….

Either way @WEEonline pretty much everyone gossips that it is far harder to get into Eton these days than Winchester which if true, means Eton will have better results simply because it is more selective in the first place.

I think Winchester has lost it's way @Aleaiactaest.My DS is not happy and will be leaving , luckily we have a great day school lined up. I don't think our decision is that unusual these days.

I am not interested in Brighton College type exam factories. Too superficial, too one dimensional. WinColl is regularly on the UK national team when it comes to math and science olympiads. When was the last time Eton had any meaningful results in math or science competitions?

The parents at Winchester would probably like a little more focus on exams /exam technique etc. It would save them having to spend so much on outside tutors, This was certainly an eye opener to us as parents !

I can't say that I have noticed boys regularly representing the UK in the international olympiads in maths or chemistry.

It is fairly easy to bring up the rear as A* at A-levels is not that difficult for a motivated pupil. Winchester’s 13+ entrance papers come very close to A-level maths and sciences already.

We had an offer from both. Eton was ranked 105th in STEM at the time, very little recognition in academic competitions, which was expected when it came to maths and sciences. What surprised us is that Eton also really struggles to show off even in model UN and debating.

Winchester, Harrow and Sevenoaks are much better all rounders when it comes to academics, just look at some national competitions. Even St Pauls, Tonbridge and Merchant Taylors run circles around Eton in STEM subjects when it comes to top achievers.

For me Eton is the academic equivalent of Brighton College: a laser focused exam factory, which tends to focus on bringing up the rear.

Both are also fairly polluted, so thank you but no thank you 😜

Do Winchester do well in debating? They must be keeping very quiet if they do. It's not something DS is involved so it may have gone unnoticed to him..

I know that US universities like debaters .Eton do well at debating so that would explain their good US numbers.

Winchester's A level results were "mildly" disappointing this year according to the HM.
The grade inflation last year didn't help.

For the most part DS is leaving due to the unpleasant atmosphere and poor pastoral care.

Lots of kudos and celebration at WinColl for good academics. In my experience pupils are kind with a special shared camaraderie I haven’t seen at any other school, which is why we picked it over Eton and Sevenoaks.

It is unashamedly academic though, so presumably not the best place to be if a boy is consistently in the bottom third. But I also think that it is very risky for a teenager to board at a non-academic school - too many distractions.