Is this the truth about independent schools?

[madonmushrooms]

I am thinking of sending my 7yr old DD to an independent school and am starting to look, as I am not happy with her current school.

I came across this today.

Is it right do you think?

www.parentdish.co.uk/teen/why-private-schools-are-better-than-state/

The absolute best thing about private education is choice. You the fee paying parent gets to choose the school.

So if you think an academic day school is the best fit for your child, you can choose one. If that is anathama to you, you can choose somewhere much lower key. If you fancy boarding then Robert's your Dad's brother. Ditto single sex. Or co-ed. Big. Small...

Choice in the state system is illusory. For real, meaningful choice, you have to pay.

wordfactory surely this choice is very dependent on your location yes if you live in London there is an enormous choice but for those who live in a rural areas choice is still limited even in the independent sector. It is only when you have the courage to board your children does choice really become a factor in your decision.

I agree with the list and would also swap lazy with busy although I do agree with the sentiment. If we could afford it we'd send our children private MAINLY because we wouldn't have to cart them to violin, piano, swimming, ballet, etc....it would be a huge help!!!

In the last 10 years, only 17 out of 400,000 teachers in state schools were dismissed due to incompetence.

Are you kidding? This fact is the basis for a good and interesting article about the NUT, but it is wasted in this article most of which is opinion and hearsay.

In my own experience, the benefits that an independent school at the inexpensive end of the fee scale (a good £2k less than that article says is the minimum) was

• better discipline - bad behaviour was stomped on, which in turn allowed the others to learn.
• high expectations, which the pupils rose to
• motivated pupils and supportive parents
• smaller class sizes, particularly in the sixth form
• greater range of subjects on offer
• selective - albeit not very selective - so the academic dross was weeded out and the whole class could move on at an altogether speedier pace
• the school was able to attract more teachers, so they were able to pick and choose. As a result, most of the teachers were older and more experienced (often ex-state school) and there wasn't an NQT in sight.

Beagling, horse riding and shooting lessons were not on offer I might add, but if your offspring want to do something like that, then it can always be done outside of school.

Downsides included the fact that it was single sex - I'd never send my offspring to a single sex school, in retrospect.

"so the academic dross was weeded out"

What an extremely unpleasant turn of phrase.

Oh please - sighs. rolls eyes in desperation.

I am totally fed up with comments similar to this:
"so the academic dross was weeded out"

What an extremely unpleasant turn of phrase. ( AChickenCalledKorma)

What do you want people to say? That all our little darlings are smart and shiney pins? That all are academic bright sparks? That all deserve a chance and should be in class regardless and its fine, OK, doesnt do any harm?

Well , lets not beat around the bush. Children who are not suited to examination classes are about as welcome and as useful in them as a headless chicken - and as disruptive.

Yes I do consider it important that children are at some point ( preferably sooner) released from having to deal with all this diversity of ability and are allowed to get on with being with others who are like them rather than so different from them.

Dross does have a purpose. It is very useful in its place, but that isnt in the furnace of where fine strong metals are being forged. There is is a bi product and has to be skimmed off in a manufacturing process.

The same applies in the funace of education.

When we all get over this desire to wail " oh thats so unpleasant" at every turn when someone mentions the unwanted bi product, we might start to have a world class education system again.

A weed is a plant that is in the wrong place - so weeding is a good activity in a garden , if you want your vvegetables to grow and not be stifled and strangled by those plants you dont need. If you dont do it, the crop yeild goes down and you will quickly end up not being able to deed your family.

The same goes for our DC's in education. You might be happy to let your DC stuggle to flower in the weed patch. Me, I want to see the lovely blooms that my DC can mature into. Sorry if your DC is a bit of a weed there. There is a place for weeds, and a place where they are useful too, best they go there.

Jabed, and that place is...where?

As a teacher, who teaches a class of extraordinarily mixed ability (spread of c. 6 years in ability between the most and least able in Maths, for example) where all are making at least good progress and where behaviour is exemplary, I find the assumption that bright children and children who find learning more difficult cannot be educated effectively in the same classroom deeply offensive...

(And it is not, in the school where I teach, the children from the most disadvantaged homes, and from the ethnic group that many people would cross the road to avoid, who cause disruption. The very occasional disruption we do get is from children from much more privileged backgrounds who have been encouraged by their parents to believe that they are 'above the rules' because 'they are so special')

Also, surely, a 'world class education system' educates EVERYONE.

It does not, and should not, discard some (as you describe it) 'dross' as a by-product. It should educate EVERYONE to the absolute maximum to which they are capable - that would be the hallmark of a world class education system. Not a system which educates the elite to a fantastically high standard while ignoring the rest.

(My own children, educated in a perfectly normal state primary, have not 'struggled to flower in a weed patch' just because they have been taught in very mixed ability classes. Both have very greatly exceeded the expected levels for their age.... and both also possess the respect and empathy for others of all abilities and backgrounds which you conspicuously lack)

Also, surely, a 'world class education system' educates EVERYONE

Indeed it does, but it doesnt put them all in the same classroom.

I too have taught mixed ability classes. I do know what I am talking about. I guess my view as a teacher is that I will teach anyone who I am given and I will do the best I can for them in my classroom. I do not ever throw anyone out of my classes. I dont have discipline problems and I do quite well if I say it myself.

However..... I know, if I could remove some of those students from my class, the ones left would do far better. Its a fact. I cannot get away from that at the end of the day.

On the other hand, as a father, I am fiercely defensive of my DC. I want the best for him. I want him in a class where he can do better.

I will not continue the analogy about furnaces because you obvioulsy do not understand smelting processes in metal manufacture. Dross is not an "unwanted" product. Its a product that is not wanted in a particular place ( ie a steel furnace for example). However, the dross is often useful in other manufacuring processes. Everything has a place. Dross is useful in the right place. Indeed essential.

Likewise, weeds are not welocme in my onion patch or my bean patch. The stop my beans growing. But they can be put in one of a number of places on the garden where they can be made into something very useful. The best place for something is where it is most useful. Its that simple.

"However..... I know, if I could remove some of those students from my class, the ones left would do far better. Its a fact. I cannot get away from that at the end of the day."

Hmm - of course, yes, the most able and well-behaved should be removed from your class and taught elsewhere, so that you can concentrate all your efforts on those who really need you, those who have the most difficulty. Then those children who have the most difficulty will really be able to fly with such personalised teaching? That would be fabulous, wouldn't it?

However, I suspect that's not what you mean, is it? You would like the 'difficult' ones removed, to make your life easier, and you disguise that under your discussion about 'letting the weeds grow better elsewhere'.

Hmm - of course, yes, the most able and well-behaved should be removed from your class and taught elsewhere, so that you can concentrate all your efforts on those who really need you, those who have the most difficulty. Then those children who have the most difficulty will really be able to fly with such personalised teaching? That would be fabulous, wouldn't it?

Indeed that would be one solution to the problem. Indeed those young people would be better placed to achieve their potential in that situation. Several years ago I would have been able to do that and it worked quite well. The fact is one size classrooms do not suite all. Indeed they suit no one in my experience - and all suffer - the very able and the more challenged.

By the way I also find your comments about my assumed lack of empathy and understanding for those from disadvantageed or alternative backgrounds/cultures deeply unpleasant and offensive. You do not know the half of what I do or whom I teach.

So what do you do with the weedy dross, in your utopia, Jabed?

Hint: people might be less likely to assume lack of empathy if you didn't make crass analogies between children and weeds.

Most private schools do have an entrance exam- but very few are really challenging. IME as a teacher in both sectors, the only children who were potentially excluded were those with a learning difficulty where the echool thought they did not have the resources to cope. This has improved hugely over the years.

So unless your child is taking Common Entrance exams, most prep and a lot of the more minor public schools will take most children.

If you read you will find I was not the poster who used the term dross and weed in the same sentence initially. I just furthered it as an analogy.

I think we all want the best for our own children , no matter how politically correct we want to appear or how we want to express that we have sympathy etc for those who are less fortunate.

Unfortunately its a truth that cannot speak its name here on mumsnet.

So ladies, I will be diplomatic and a gentleman and withdraw from this debate.

Never assume. Take every school on their merits. There are excellent state schools and dire ones, and everything between. Same for private.

How repellent. On every level

And yes I know you didn't say dross first but you defended it and furthered it and went on about weeds. Hope your carrots get blight. I do indeed 'not know the half of what you do and teach' but I bloody well hope it's never one of my children.

And yes I know you didn't say dross first but you defended it and furthered it and went on about weeds. Hope your carrots get blight. I do indeed 'not know the half of what you do and teach' but I bloody well hope it's never one of my children.

I similarly hope that my DS never has the misfortune of crossing your path.

I will not continue to trade insults.

If my carrots get blight, I will take the appropriate action. What would you do with your blighted carrots?

Bugger only knows, I'm not a gardener and neither would I make the mistake of confusing children with vegetables.

carrots getting blight
hmmm
keep away from my veg garden

Pmsl at this thread. Should go in MN classics!

Mrsamcam you obviously aren't talking about my local private schools. The boys school which frequently rejects boys from its associated prep, and where I know the pass mark has been steadily creeping up over the past few years. The academic girls schools which are all highly selective, although there are alternatives for girls which are less difficult to get into. Actually the boys schools which select from common entrance are often back up for the boys school which admits at 11.
Admittedly I have know parents be very pleased that their sons have got into a local prep, when I have yet to know of a son who didn't get in (it's not so true for the girls schools junior departments).

Carrots don't get blight they get carrot fly. Potatoes get blight.

But where are the number of places on the garden where they [weeds] can be made into something very useful.?

I think when a school becomes the place that children want to be, want to spend their time, the good behaviour naturally follows. Children that still have behaviour problems despite that, need specialist support, not in order to 'fix' them, but to find the cause of the problem. The cause can sometimes be the school, but the root cause should always be sought, never assumed. A good school will always do this, whether private or state.