Does private automatically mean "better"?

[sandyballs]

Not trying to be controversial just genuinely interested in your views. The reason being, one of the 6 children in my ante-natal group is being privately educated and her mother is constantly going on about her daughter receiving a "better" education than the rest of them. I disagree. Views please but keep it calm

in my area i'm left with a choice of going to an evangelical christian church every two weeks for the next 3 years to get ds into a v good state school or private....not a fantastic choice is it?

i went to pretty rough state primary school and was bullied a bit there, but nothing compared to my experiences at an extremely well thought of girls secondary school with an excellent academic reputation....came out of that with really great grades (that have had nothing to do with my careers to date) and pretty poor self esteem and a deep mistrust of women....nice!

so i would agree that all schools are different and that you can't make blanket statements about the state vs private sector...

i'd go for a good state co-ed education over any other given the choice tbh....but that isn't always an option.

have just scrolled down a bit and harpsichordcarrier that was a great post....i was definitely of the not up to scratch variety in my secondary school (was assisted place girl)

again i suppose it does depend on the school. The majority of my schooling was in the state system and my history and grammar were both non existent before i went to university - there i had to frantically cram to be up the the`level of my privately educated peers. the only history and grammar i di learn, again, was the year and a half in prep school. if there was a high performing state school in the area then i's consider it for my son, but would be still be concerned about standard of music, etc.

who's made blanket statements? isn't everyone just sharing their own experiences?

I don't think Private always mean 'better'. Same as 'Privete' healthcare isn't always better than NHS.

However, some parents do think that they/their kids are somehow better if they attend a private school.

paolosgirl...I agree with the mixing bit, up to a point. If you can get your children into a good state school where the majority of the children are reasonably well behaved and come from 'normal' families, then fine, but how would any of us feel if our children could only get into the local sink school that was awash with drugs, behavioural problems etc etc.

Tired emma, I also went to a large comp but it was failry awful tbh and I was badly bullied there for bein gthe sort of kid who wanted to work!

The overwhelming feeling I have got from this thread is that you just can't make generalisations.

Nothener, and some people think that all parents who send their kids to private schools are snobs, and that isn't true either!

Well if my DS doesn't pass the 11+, that's the scenario I'll be facing HMB. I'll let you know how I feel when I get there.

I think lots of people who can afford it choose private school, not so much for the grades (lots of decent comps get good grades) but for the behavioural standards and possibly, depending on the school, the wider curriculum.

Totally agree hmb

Glad we agree! For me Caligula it is realy what would worry me most. If your child is in a poor quality school you can fill in lots of gaps if the teaching is patchy, but if the ethos is crap, and the kids out of control it is a whole new ball game.

I once taght a girl who propositioned a builder in the school site and offerend him sex. She was a very rare case in the school I was working in. Imagine if that was more the norm [shudder emoticon needed]. Or if you had to send your child to tat school that alloed the kids to say Fuck up to 5 times a day without getting punished. Dreadful! Your heart bleeds for these kids and their parents

It's something I'm dreading, tbh. I just know that if they don't pass the 11+, my job of parenting is going to be much, much harder than it will be if they do. And that's nothing to do with academic achievement, it's about behavioural norms.

Depends on the school and the child.
I went to a state school - and hated it, was badly bullied and still bear the scars now. Husband likewise had a rough time - no recognition of his Dyslexia and despite now having an MBA and lecutring at our university he left school with only an A level in art.
I strongly believe in smaller class sizes - and generally this is one thing that private schools nearly guarentee. I think its at secondary level that the differences become so big, round here there's no way i'd send my child to one of the state school at 11.
Oh and the point someone made earlier abotu 'scoial mixing' this is the line my parents fed me all the time i was suffering - now as an adult i can point out to them that the logic behind teaching me how to deal (or not deal) with vicous, stupid, teenaged bullies wasn't at all useful in teaching me any social skills i use as an adult. In fact it has left me with a set of reactions to aggresive behaviuos, loud voices and 'estate' accents based on my 14yr old fear.

I can't see any point in making your child suffer because of your principles - which is what my middle class left wing parents did in sending their daughter to a local 'sink' school where it wasn't only the kids who were bullies or drunk it was half the teachers too.

ria

Hear hear riab!

I was lucky (irony) enough to go to a secondary modern at 11. Was very badly bullied. Went on, very much against the odds to do A-levels and a law degree.

I can cook and sew though so I suppose it wasn't a total waste of time

Hey, I learnt to cook and sew at my independent school, in addition to academic achievement. It's very handy to be able to make superlative costumes for prep school plays!

Well the private school my kids went to wasn't single-sex but all the local state grammar schools are.

Sunnyside, we applied for a place at our local school (can see from our house, 2 mins walk) having moved house, to be told they wouldn't take our kids. The LEA offered us the local sink school where on teaching practice I had overheard 2 dear little girls aged 7 say "my dad says he's gonna come up the school and sort them teachers out"- not somewhere I was prepared to send my children. We ended up with a 22 mile each way trip to another state primary because no schools in our town would take the youngest and I wasn't going to leave him where he was.

As for playing with locals- until next door moved in 3 years ago our kids had never played out. Never a problem and highly over-rated!

Oh and we did run out of money. An Assisted place is on a sliding scale so that when your pay goes up a little bit the fees go up a lot. We couldn't afford to keep DD there for 6th form so she went to grammar instead. From A*s at GCSE she dropped to DDDD at AS level. With hindsight I wouldn't have moved her

Ameriscott what I meant was that was all they taught me!!! Had kids that couldn't read at all in my GCSE group.

I want to be slightly controversial here

A lot of people have mentioned that at state schools, your children get to mix with everyone and that being able to do this is an important lifeskill.

But is it?

Is it important for our children to mix with thugs, other than having the skills to avoid them. Do we as a society mix with everyone regardless of where we fit on the socio-economic scale? Aren't you doing your child a much bigger favour by putting them in a situation where they feel comfortable dealing with more affluent and smarter people? Is there any evidence that privately-educated adults cannot live in harmony with everyone else, given that lots of high achievers will go on to manage a team in their working life, and will hire plenty of tradesmen in their domestic life.

You have to remember that not all state-schools are socially balance, and that within all schools, 'birds of a feather flock together'.

I don't know the answers but I feel a little uneasy when I read about mixing ability being a state-school acquired skill.

Obviously the people who have chosen (been able to choose) private education on this thread have chosen schools they are happy with, and that suit their children. So that leaves out the less good private schools!

I spent 15 years running arts projects in schools, either sustained residencies, or repeat visits, which gave me pretty good ongoing understanding of many many different schools.

Often, education in the private sector seems far more 'conformist', and goal (exam) orientated than in the state sector. The students are far more conformist in outlook, and are attuned to the academic vision mapped out by their parents. Of course this contibutes to good results, but brings the wider disadvantage of conformist thinking, living etc.

Private schools can be set up by a head who has been offered a golden handshake to resign from the state sector (following a bad ofsted for e.g)- who buys a big victorian house with the money, employs some recent graduates on short term teaching contracts (my brother worked for a private school that offered contracts just for sept-june so that they never paid staff over the holidays!) and hey presto.

I saw many many brighht, motivated kids do very well even in difficult sink schols where the averages were brought down by less able/motivated kids. I saw bright children given average unimaginative education in the private sector - and some less bright children be supported to do surprisingly well, in both sectors. And clearly we have heard from people who were allowed to fail and suffere in state education. Friends of mine have just removed a (very bright) child from a highly renowned S London independent school because of high pressure academic competetiveness (extending to bullying) and because of bullying due to not being able to keep up with the ski-ing trips and designer clothing.

Ameriscot says: "The two closest independent schools to me are always right at the bottom of the league tables (close to 0% A-C) and that with fees of £20k a year. Yet they are good enough schools, sending most of their pupils onto top universities - far more than the local (heavily-oversubscribed) comprehensive (35% A-C) could ever dream of. " Doesn't that imply that middle-calss kids brought up to have the confidence to aspire and perform well in a university interview are being supported by average (as in Amerisct's e.g) schools to snap up university places, etc, or that it IS social class that counts, rather than academic results, just as we pinko-whingers have always suspected?

I went to a Direct grant School - an independent school which had 50% of the places paid for by the local authority as scholarship places. The fee-paying places were selective. It worked brilliantly within the school, but embarrasingly we were all totally snobby about anyone who went to a non-selective independent school (we assumed they were thick), but not about anyone who went to a state school!

I am in favour of small classes for all, and would certainly not criticise anyone for sending a child to a private school, but to say private education is better per se is not supportable.

Skeptic, in my experience children don't mix that much is schools. Most of the kids who get 9A*s have mates who also do well. Cause or effect? I don't know.

good post blu. But again lots of people saying that those who are in favour of private ed are saying it is better per se. I don't see anyone saying that, just talking about their own experience. That's ultimately what we are going to base our expectations on.
Agree there must be many poor private schools, and i quite like the idea of an entry requirement for every school, tho that of course throws up other massive probs.

I went to a pretty crappy comp which used to be a secondary modern. The teaching was, on the whole, very poor. But I somehow survived and was never bullied or anything. I don't think bullying was a big thing. But I have to say, if someone offered to pay for ds to go to a really good private school with small class sizes, I would certainly consider it very carefully.

Happymerryberries- I was trying to say that I DON'T think its ok to choose one state school over another. If people choose to pay for a private education then I hope that its is money well spent for them. What I personally disagree with is that SOME parents choose one state school over another, when outward evidence ie. SATS and ofsted reports, suggets that there is no difference between them. Its that sort of snobbery I object to. The irony of the thing locally is that the children will all go to the same secondary! We live in a rural area and its the only accessible one!

BUT I'm a primary teacher and I don't think it would sit well with me if I sent my own kids to a private school. The schools I have taught at have all offered good education IMO (2 had beacon status and most recent was in special measures but for poor management; teaching and learning were said to be good and very good)I believe it IS personal chioce therefore my scruples tell me that if the education I am offering is good enough for the children I teach then it is good enough for my children. I guess for me it's about equal opportunity.

Well, I'm a secondary teacher and I will not sacrifice my children's education on the alter of equal ops policy. I know I teach well if I didn't send them to the school I do, I would seriously consider home edding, and that would be helping anyone's science education.

I do my bit for the state sector,and then some. I don't feel my children have to suffer for equal ops.

I have no qualms at all. As I said, you don't know me, my kids or my circumstances.

HMB,

Do you get any grief from your colleagues about 'jumping ship'?

There are obviously as many views as there are people. What are we educating our children for? What skills should they have in this world ? What is right for 1 sibling may be inappapropriate for another. I would just make the point that we are all far more discerning customers as regards education than perhaps most parents were when we were growing up. Because we have more choice now, we give ourselves more decisions to make and we will constantly question and re-evaluate many of those decisions.