Would you take the option of paying say £1000 pa to your 'state school' for smaller classes etc?

[ampere]

Purely a hypothetical, of course!- but if the option was there to make an up-front annual payment to your DC's school to 'improve' things like staff:pupil ratios, or greater small group learning opportunities and so forth, would you?

What about a means-testing of contribution? Please bear in mind this is a hypothetical! I am maybe imagining a Free School of the future which has legally been allowed to fly the governmental clutches in order to do this, say.

I know where I live I believe the reality is most parents could afford £1000, so if there are 60 DC in a year, and say 2/3 of parents pay that sum (or all pay less, whatever) you'd have enough cash to be able to reduce the class sizes to 3 of twenty DC, if not full-time, then much of it!

The only 'rule' I would like to impose is that before you explode at the unfairness and iniquity of this as not all parents can spare any money and that this can only benefit 'the wealthy' I want to ask how vocally you currently oppose private education (where he who pays wins) and grammar schools as they only benefit 'the clever'. Just a thought.

This has gone through my mind as I pay just about that per year to get DS2 tutored as it is!

No.

You can all give money to your DCs schools if you want to. One of my DCs schools asks for £180 per year, but obviously we are free to give more. If all parents gave large amounts regularly the facilities would obviously be even better, but this could only happen in wealthy areas. Schools in poorer areas, where parents just can't give any money to the school are the schools that really need more money. I would rather pay higher tax tbh.

Thank you Pastoral I will :)

I'd pay 'higher tax' if that money were going firstly towards my DC's education, secondly towards all DCs education but sadly it's more likely to go into buying bullets for soldiers- and the reality is, more tax would have to almost immediately be siphoned into the NHS (and would be, way over the educational needs of our DC as 'greys' vote (and are, on balance, more comfortably off and Tory voting and increasingly greater users of the NHS) and our DC can't. Any failures in our DCs education will come home to roost long after Cameron and Gove are a distant memory.

Seeing as the government are heading towards making the NHS the lowest acceptable provision of health care and the rest to be made up in private insurance, do you ever wonder if this is 'the plan' for education, too? That The State will undertake to provide nothing more than a bare-bones, basic education and you'll have to pay for anything more? Hence Free Schools and the 'freeing' of schools from direct governmental control via the Academy system?

I would totally agree that more money would be given in wealthy areas, over all, but isn't that life? It happens right now via the complete removal of 7% of DCs from the 'inadequate, underfunded' state system anyway, doesn't it?

Maybe the state should only provide 'bare bones' (with a commensurate cut in taxes) and we should make up the rest as we see fit?

I always thought that if I happened to be really rich (no chance of that!) I would still send my children to the local state primary that I am very happy with. I would then send them on the local secondary that is also very good. Instead of going private I would give my children's state schools the money I would have paid to do so.

As my only chance of ever becoming rich would be to win the lottery (I believe you have to buy a ticket first though?) the above situation is unlikely to ever arise. It's up there in my imagination with my yacht and convertible though!

DH who went to a really posh private school, has a standing order set up donating money to his old school every month. I have pointed out that this money would be much better spent (in my eyes) donating money to the local school that his own children attend instead of a school that we could never afford to send our children to and is only for the children of millionaires!

This sounds like a terrible idea. I really don't like the sound of the current system in some schools of 'voluntary' contributions that people talk about either. The hounding of peopel for money in the state sector seems wrong.

I just don't get why people are paying any money at all in the state sector. I know people spend a fortune on buying/renting in the cathchment areas of good schools and pay tutors to get through 11+ and this idea of paying £100 for smaller class sizes sounds like another socially divisive way of allocating school places.

My children go to private school but I just think the state school system should be totally free and no money should change hands either 'voluntary or 'mandatory'. If we had a decent state grammar school near us that is where my children would go and we would not expect to pay.

'paying £1000 for smaller class sizes'

My sister went to a super-selective grammar school for her A levels. This particular school is always in the top five state schools whenever the league tables were published. The school sent out a letter to all parents asking for a 'voluntary' £200 annual contribution (and this was 20 years ago), as most of the school's pupils would otherwise have gone to the local public schools... and the £500 should thus be seen as a bit of a bargain.

My sister told my parents in no uncertain terms that they were not to pay the money.

I am sceptical that reducing class sizes below 30 would dramatically improve teaching and learning for most children.

What would improve teaching and learning would be to have a nuture group where all the distruptive/ SEN children could go for full/ part of the day. I would have a nuture group with five to ten children a teacher and TA. That way the SEN kids would get the support that they need and rest of the class could get on with their lesson. I think that SEN children should be included as far as possible in a mainstream school, however NT children have a right to an education as well.

Would I pay 1K to get ADHD Adam out of my son's class, I don't know. £1K is a lot of money. I think it should come through taxation.

"What would improve teaching and learning would be to have a nuture group where all the distruptive/ SEN children could go for full/ part of the day" thats a bit as a sweeping generalisation!

We have one child with Sen in DS's class (purely a guess I don't know this, but a fairly well educated guess) who needs some additional support from what I've seen but isn't at all disruptive to DS's learning there are two more children who are obviously harder to control (possibly with ADHD but quite possibly not) but again seem pretty well controlled by the school behavior policy and the class teacher and doesn't seem to cause a particular problem within the class.

DS went through a phase in reception of talking incessantly - I'll bet that was a great deal more disruptive. He learnt to control it with help from me, teacher and teaching staff and small group time (don;t know what its called) which happens within the classroom.

Don;t know what my point is, I just dislike the idea that all children don;t deserve to learn within a classroom setting along with everyone else, if they are deemed capable of doing so.

No, state education should be free to all. A payment like this would only benefit those schools within wealthy middle class catchment areas and they tend to do very well as it is.

ReallyTired, I do hope that's a good hard hat you have there.

My 'SEN kid' has benefited hugely from being included with the rest of his peers as far as possible (and indeed from time out with decent extra support). Bunging him in a random, poorly supported group of 5-10 of the most difficult kids, however, is a really crap idea. Supporting him to be in top sets with the well-behaved ones has proved to be a much better plan.

lance if its any consolation (I mean wrt to Really's ideas about SEN) my son has also benefited (IMO) from being in a class with his friend who has SEN.

No doubt I would feel differently if the teacher couldn't control some of the children. However feeling that an individual teacher needs more training or support or that individual children might need additional support or a different educational setting is very far from feeling that whole categories of children should be ring-fenced from the mainstream.

No to a 2-tier state education system where you can buy a better option.

I feel the same about the NHS.

This undermines the principle of free for everyone and everyone being treated the same.

If parents are providing additional funding for schools in "nice" areas then what do you think is going to happen to funding for schools in deprived areas.

People don't like paying for others to have stuff generally. If some people had to pay £1000 and some people nothing at all then I could see how it would grate. Mind you, PTAs raise money for individual schools and I'm assuming that most people who contribute to fund raising are parents of pupils at that school. Would it be more effective or fairer if all money raised had to be shared between all schools in the LEA?

If you did your weekly food shopping, would you come home and share it out amongst all the houses on your street on the understanding that they did so too? Even if some people didn't go shopping and still expected the food?

Thanks, Kew. I hope that some of the kids in DS's sets have at least come away with the knowledge that children like DS are real, human people, rather than the sum of their problems, if you know what I mean.

cokefan what you are talking about in your post is the whole point of taxation and public services.

True, Sardine, but taxation applies to everyone, regardless of whether they have children. Fund raising for schools (perhaps unless it's a village school and there's a community spirit) only really takes money from the parents of those at the school now.

lancelottie,

In some parts of the counrty there are still special schools where children with normal intelligence, but have behaviour problems are sent. These children often have no opportunity to do a good range of GCSEs. Even if the special school does a good job of ironing out behavioural problems it is next to impossible to transfer the child back to mainstream.

Some children simply cannot cope with being in a large class of thirty for the entire day. A tiny nuture group would equip kids with the skills to cope with a big class. I am not suggesting that they spend the entire day in a small nuture group, unless their behaviour is truely awful. Many secondary schools already have such provision. It would be good to have it in primary school so that children with behavioural SEN get help sooner.

The other 29 kids in a class have a right to an education as well. Many schools will suspend a really distruptive kid. Surely there needs to be a middle way between special school and mainstream.

I suppose there is an argument for banning schools fundraising / accepting gifts etc.
You would need to do the same re. hospitals and things too.

The current situation is illogical, that is true.

Good god no, what a bloody stupid idea.

Any child who isn't capable of being taught in a classroom shouldn't be there or should have additional support.

That isn't what you said Really, you said "all the distruptive/ SEN children could go" not all SEN children are disruptive and plenty of children are disruptive at some point (like my DS).

Our class has a nuture group (as you put it) on a weekly basis (not daily) for any child who is deemed to need it in any particular period. There is no sweeping category of child who must go.

IME the most disruptive children at the lower end of school are those who chat to their friends and distract them. Perhaps they should be segregated. Would help my DS more.

Beta Q: "This sounds like a terrible idea. I really don't like the sound of the current system in some schools of 'voluntary' contributions that people talk about either. The hounding of peopel for money in the state sector seems wrong.

I just don't get why people are paying any money at all in the state sector. I know people spend a fortune on buying/renting in the cathchment areas of good schools and pay tutors to get through 11+ and this idea of paying £100 for smaller class sizes sounds like another socially divisive way of allocating school places.

My children go to private school but I just think the state school system should be totally free and no money should change hands either 'voluntary or 'mandatory'. If we had a decent state grammar school near us that is where my children would go and we would not expect to pay."

The highlighted bit tells me all I need to know about your views on the subject. You are completely comfortable with the advantage and social division incurred when you 'go private' but think allowing anyone else to use their muscle to advantage their own DCs ('don't get why people are paying money at all in the state sector??!) like you have is 'terrible'.

Wot, worried one might take your privately educated DC's place at a RG university?!

(PS Don't make that mistake of believing that 'being able to afford private' automatically equates with 'state grammar shoo-in'.)