Must admit I have not read all of this but to answer the question briefly (or I will try oh no I won't) I very much echo much of what Ghosty (right name?) said. I'll bore you all again as I've replied to posts like this before, however when my mum passed away I became legal guardian for my brother and sister who attended boarding and private day school respectively. Eventually my brother transferred to the boading school where they both had scholarships to significantly help with the fees. Fees were (five or six years ago now) £5500 per term each child - yes thats right over £15k each per year not including uniforms, music tuition and extra curricular activities. As I say they both had scholarships and for me the boarding environment helped as I was effectively a single person looking after two teens - boarding meant full time care by me only in holiday times - a help in way - but to get to the point - just as ghosty said drugs were a very serious issue / problem as the kids had such great sums of money at their disposal - having been brought cars at the stroke of 17 etc some had drink driving scrapes earlier on than many other teens may have had. There were the occassional well turned lovely examples of "good children" but not as many as I'm sure my mum must have thought or hoped there would be in comparison to her more negative thoughts / stereotypes about state school. Incidently I went to a state school, and university and work (manage research), still work, bought my house at the age of 26, had my daughter at the age of thirty - so us state school rotters aren't always an unruly, undesirable, anti-social lot - Honest!
A good percentage of the pupils at the boarding school were absolute riots but did get their work (academic and vocaional ) done and my mum passed away and did not experience the issues that arose when I was in the thick of things. My mum naively thought there would be no peer pressure for boyfrineds girlfriends going out that kind of thing as peers would be well behaved and were at boarding school / safe environment after all? Oh dear - drugs, sex, exclusive night clubs (some taken there by older brothers and sisters) and much more were the norm - my sister tapped into some of it but was pretty much ok - my brother was in his element and joined in at every opportunity. Consequently I along with many other parents / guardians were called in to the school regularly but nothing changed. My sister did really well academically and vocationally but to be honest given the right environment she would have done well anywhere - we just didn't live near any good state schools (London Borough of Southwark - sorry sorry ) and no state schools offered the vocational training alongside academic that this boarding school did. My brother and sister trained at school (as well as pursuing academic route through to A-level) having started dancing early on with a scheme operated by the Royal Opera House. My sister left school three months early to start a west end musical theatre career which she is still sucessuful in to this day and achieved As in all a-levels, my brother was asked not to return following GCSEs effectively expelled, was expelled from six form college after only three months, did really well in his GCSEs but just really lacks confidence at the a-level stage so to date he's not completed any a-levels, doesn't dance anymore but flits form here to there and the other. His confidence can be low sometimes but its not warranted - he has talent and skills and really appreciates his achievements when he knuckles down and does well
The point is same school, same phenomenal private boarding schools fees, same extra costs and two very different results within the same family. We all had to deal with the loss of our mother, a single parent at the time, but my brother was always easily distracted in class, and loves to mess around.
Private does not automatically mean better education - bet everyone has said that - sorry for not reading the posts properly - my brothers experience Ithink would have been the same in state or private and similarly for my sister and the same goes for me - its the child not the school that makes the education better. In this day and age state primary schools are so well managed they offer equivalent and superior services at no where near the private costs. If there are no good state secondary schools in your area opting for the private should be based around whether your child will actually excel and even like that environment - as ghosty says there are different types of peer pressures operating at different levels here.
I only have one daughter so far and I would love for her to go to one of any three state primary schools very near to our house because they are excellent. The same issue remains about the secondary schools and I certainly don't want her to go to my old school (though things may have changed by now) we just want a good state secondary, mixed prefereably and properly mixed not too many boys and not enough girls, and where 50% or more are achieveing a-c grade in GCSE - where I live not one of the state secondaries meet this criteria - not one!!! all the private schools do three or four in total. but that is a whole other conversation - plus see above - they are not always a bonus. Good state schools for us means money and time to offer extra curricular activities without the burden of private schools costs - e.g. tutors, music lessons, sports clubs, HOLIDAYS, more holidays, and holidays - you get me point. With private schools you can and often have to do all these things with the added burden of fees that rise above inflation every year. The boarding school began at 3000 a term and ended at 5500 per term per child.!! And many children were not on scholarships!!
The comments at the antenatal group are tied up with a bit of snobbery. MY dp has a older daughter from a previous relationship and strugled to pay prep school tuition for years following pressure that older daughter was too bright for state school - she failed to pass any entrance exams this year for private secondary but is now going to an excellent non fee paying school because its around the corner- though she insists she is there based on a music scholarship - she failed grade 2 piano after getting into the school and says what's that when you ask her how she did in her musical theory? She's been having piano lessons for four years? but having failed to get into any private secondary schools following years of prep school fees her mother now declares she is a musical genius and attacks my dp if he begs to differ. I started piano and clarinet at state secondary many eons ago and the first grades I did were grade 4 for piano and clarinet and passed with merit, left that school with grade 8 clarinet and that was pretty average for us (the state school motley crew) somewhere along the line these snobbish attitudes about education creep in - and what is even worse than that is when the children start to mimic and spout this nonsense too? Bless him my DP knows nothing about music, has never been trained musically and knows nothing about grades and so forth so was pretty stunned when he realised a music scholarship" had been achieved based on no grades. He told me but she skipped grade one? He was told this is a huge milestone? After four years of piano tuition you are quite entitled to skip grade one but to then fail grade two speaks for itself. At my state secondary we all skipped grade one two and three and started on grade four having learnt to play the insturments of choice - and that was billions of years ago - again the snobbery thing is to say oh they got in based on exceptional abilities - but delve a little and you discover in quite a few cases the genius abilities are non existent, or the parents think the label private school reflects postively on them - meanwhile what is is important is the child and they can be overlooked. Do you want your child to mirror (my experience only) some of the idiots that you can come across at uni (ex private sch.) or to go around spouting scholarship nonsense and exceptional musical abiltiy based on a failed grade 2 piano? I mentioned this to one of my best friends bacuase I thought perhaps I am being unfair and evil. She has a degree in music and teaches piano - she laughed her head off - right off - sorry. evil I know. At state schools now you can choose to specialise in sport or music and so forth if the school itself has specialist status in these or other areas but they don't offer scholarships. If your child is doing well, is talented or otherwise it speaks for itself - no need to back it up with private school endorsement? but thats just what I think? I'll shut up now