So Eton, everything I expected and more

[JoanBias]

My DS is at a private school, so I have experience of private schooling, but my word Eton was like another world.

Not just the school, but the people there.

There was one prep school being shown around, all in tweed jackets, and to a boy the spitting image of Draco Malfoy (well there was one Chinese boy, but otherwise....).

One of the mothers doing the tour was not quite right in some respect, I'm not sure how but something wasn't wired up correctly or something. She was immacuately dressed, 6-inch heels (pretty daft considering the confirmation letter warns about having a long walk), but she was just bizarre. The admissions tutor said 'we have a waiting list of 80 boys and typically 35% of these will make it through', and she asked afterwards 'so 80% of the boys from the waiting list make it through?', and it was then explained again, but you could kind of hear the cogs going round and she clearly didn't get it. She had asked several other similar questions; e.g., it was explained that some Houses are catering and others go to a central cafeteria, so she then asked 'so they all eat in the cafeteria'? She pointed at the Fives Court and asked me 'what do they play here?' I said 'Fives' 'Is it squash?', she said. 'No, Eton Fives.' 'So is it squash?' It seemed as if this woman had had the benefit of the 'Finishing School for the Terminally Dim', because she was otherwise every inch the presentable upper middle-class wife.

Another family had a son who looked the prototypical pre-Etonian, and sure enough Daddy spent the tour braying on about his House when he had been there.

The facilities were extremely impressive, although they didn't bother to show us any of the academic parts, and basically the impression was 'if your son is incredibly pushy and self-motivated, send him here and we will teach him to be entitled'. They said 'every year we reject about a third of the highest performers on the test', essentially because they aren't pushy enough. (The House Mistresses seemed quite nice though.)

Fantastic training for future managing directors and whatever, but not for us.....

Well worth it to sign up for a tour, very illuminating. They take about 100 a day from what I can see, so obligation at all....

Is it surprising that Im being 'silly" when I have to read endless guff like this from the likes of Seeker Xenia et al :
My family have had a lot of psychiatric patients terribly scared by boarding school and not just those sent away at 6 or 7, older ones too. Even Nigella Lawson in today's papers who is my age writes that her father sent her away having asked her if she wanted to go ,
Is your influence so bad that you want your chidl removed from it from much of the year and to develop a remoteness of connection?
I have not invented that there is a Boarding School Survivor's AssociationI I have never met a boarder who wasn't a little more detached from his or her family than I like.
All of my friends that were sent away to school have huge gaps in their bonding,
Every child should have the opportunity of a daily hug with someone who isn't paid to do!
It is not funny that countless children have been psychologically damaged by boarding school.
I can only think of one child that I have ever met, who may have been ok at boarding scholl for prolonged periods of time.
And the icing on the cake from Xenia; I am being pretty neutral on the subject.
Seeker Im very sorry if your God son is unhappy at W* Im not sure if that Winchester, Wellington ( a few hours in the presence of that positively ghastly Anthony Seddon is enough to make even Mary Poppins unhappy) or Wellesely (maybe if its Kent its the later) but here's a revolutionary thought maybe its the school not boarding. My DS was very unhappy at his so called outstanding state day primary schools. Im not pretending boarding is the answer for all and there are some crap schools out there but will not accept that in the 21st century that boarding at schools like Eton and Im not its greatest fan or any of the other reputable schools are full of unhappy children.

Are the tours for Eton just for making money as far as Im aware the tours are free at least we didn't pay and we went during the term time.

The facts are a good few chidlren are fine at boarding school. Others are damages and on results they speak for themselves - Eton top 20 if not top 5 and Millfield may be add a lot of value to intellectually challenged children but they only drag themselves up to about 650th in the country in league tables but pretty good at swimming.

I think that we are talking at cross purposes- I wasn't a prospective parent. In the holidays you can just buy a ticket and go on a tour. You are shown around by a volunteer who knows the school well.

It is a way of making money.

You d

You don't pay to visit if you are a prospective parent/pupil.

You wouldn't - it is completely different.

There was an interesting article in Sunday Times saying that schools should be educating the whole child, not instructing them for tests. I would say that Eton does that, which is why they don't have to measure their worth by league tables.

"Others are damages and on results they speak for themselves"
I have no idea what you do for a living Xenia but I do know your not in my profession because even if I hadn't taken time out of work to be a SAHM I would not be on £100 000+ a year. I have worked with children who are actually know what it means to be "damaged" and it is insulting to them to describe children who've boarded as "damaged."

Seriously Happy, don't get wound up. As one who has been there and realised that Xenia has her views and won't be changing them for any amount of evidence you bring to the discussion.

Shipwrecked you're right normally I can let Xenia's completely ridiculous comments wash over me!
We've just received a flood warning from the environment agency so far more important things too worry about.

Good luck with the rising water!

A Xenia flood warning?

Fantastic.

And it did seem that Eton were about educating the whole child. I don't think they even bothered to discuss such trivia as academic lessons.

Happygardening: Xenia is just as ghastly and exasperating about state schools and I have had many a run in with her (under another name). Really, don't take any notice.As you say, flood warnings much more important.

( BTW My older DCs went to the same universities as Xenia's offspring, she has named them on many a thread about private v state, so no secret, and it's not Oxbridge... if that makes you feel any better, I know it shouldn't but.......:))

I have just wasted spent the last fifteen minutes googling Xenia on mumsnet. Such a laugh

(not sure why Millfield is being picked on particularly btw. There are tonnes of school for the affluent (or effluent?) but dim, and as I have alluded to in this thread, the idea that simply because your (thick) DC has ended up with 5 Cs after 12 years/£300k worth of education, whereas someone else's (bright) DC got 10A*s at the local comp, doesn't tell the full story.

googling 'Xenia on Mumsnet' I mean.

BTW I don't think you can get value-added scores for independent schools.

Also don't the FT rankings look at A-Level and equivalent, which is not necessarily the same set of pupils as at GCSE?

Some say she never blinks, and that she roams around the woods at night foraging for wolves. All we know is she?s called the Stig Xenia.

Some say she naturally faces magnetic north, and all her legs are hydraulic. All we know is she?s called the Stig. Xenia.

Some say she can swim 7 lengths underwater, and she has webbed buttocks. All we know is she?s called the Stig. Xenia.

Some say she is a construct of MNHQ, trolling for hits. All we know is she's called Xenia.

[Grin]

, even!!

too much Shipwrecked?

happygardening, one of my DSs makes flood maps. Take care.

Serious question: the parents (colleger, peteneras, ingrid...) who really know Eton, what would you say are the downsides of Eton?