If you can afford private education but remain in the state sector...

[TheseJeansHaveShrunk]

It's going to be hard to avoid this becoming another state v private thread, but what I'm interested in is a slightly different take on that debate. It's not "which is better?" but "if you think state school is better even though you could afford private education, then why is that?"

The question is based on the assumptions that the DC in question is/are reasonably bright (so might benefit academically from academically selective education), that the state school is non-selective (as most people don't have access to grammar schools), and that you hope for your DC to go to a good university (to make the £££££ fees worthwhile!)

I've been mulling this over ever since I heard some maths professor from Cambridge talking on the radio about the age-old private v state inequality of Oxbridge admissions. He was all for improving access for state school applicants but said that the simple fact was that for maths, even the best state schools generally teach only to the A-level syllabus, whereas the best private schools take their maths/further maths A-level candidates well beyond the syllabus and so the state school applicants are at a huge disadvantage - they simply don't have the starting level of knowledge required for the course.

This made me wonder: with this sort of unequal playing field, if you have the choice of private education, what reasons might you have not to take it?

Would be interested to hear from those who've made this choice - how it's working out, or if your DC have finished school now, how did it work out? Did they go to good universities/get good jobs, etc? On the other side of things, if you paid for private schooling but now regret it, why?

My DC go to a state school by the way.

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UCAS requires a PS and the PS is difficult for many pupils (read last month's Sutton Trust report for some recent research and talk to university guidance staff at secondary schools if you don't know this).

But the PS is only seen as difficult because people make it out to be more important than it is.

By telling people honestly it is not going to make a lot of difference, it reduces the worry about it.

This is especially true when you tell potential applicants that it doesn't matter if they did their work experience in McDonalds and we really don't care that their extra-curricular activities are mainly hanging out in the park and playing on the Xbox.....

I think personal statements can be very useful in a negative way.

I also think they can be useful to indicate a real interest in a subject, which is a very important adjunct to aptitude. I don't mean a declaration of 'passion', but a demonstration of engagement with the subject in question.

I have never seen any official guidance on UCAS PSs that advises applicants should devote a lot of words to either work experience or extra-curricular activities.

And actually I disagree, creamteas. It is highly stress-inducing to be told that you must jump through a hoop (that is difficult to jump for many pupils, however much you might like to believe otherwise) but that that hoop isn't going to count.

If you ask applicants to do something, you need to give it due weight or else you risk confusing and discrediting the whole process. And you certainly make it less transparent, not more.

But, to repeat myself endlessly, if you have any contact with us before you apply you will be told not that it is not that important..... If any of their teachers come to our admissions conferences, they will also know.

The whole process is not discredited, because all applicants are advised to seek specific guidance from the institutions they are applying to. If they choose to ignore this, that is not my problem.

Obviously different subjects need different information and so a single form will be a compromise. The alternative would be to have to apply separately for each degree course, which would be a pain for everyone.....

The issue of a single application for five courses/institutions is a real one. Universities frequently give guidelines along the lines of: "we will be looking for evidence of [some particular experience/characteristic/motivation] in your PS" and it is quite possible for an applicant to struggle with contradictory requirements. This is one of the reasons why the PS is a very difficult genre - it is hard for Y13 pupils to reconcile the brevity of the PS with the multiple and often conflicting information they wish to impart about themselves.

Creamteas your point is very clear and helpful. it puzzles me that on one hand people make unwarranted assumptions about what is expected of it (agonising' hours and hours') and then get angry when you reasonably point out that it is a simple document which will not weigh heavily against more important factors - ie grades, and that there is no stipulation that it should be onerous... Seems very straightforward and helpful to me- thanks!

"People" do not make unwarranted assumptions, *MrsSalvoMontalbano". I wonder whether you have a child who has been through the UCAS process recently and whether you have spoken to UCAS or to secondary school university guidance staff or even to university departments (many of which most certainly do not take a cavalier attitude to any part of a student's application)?

and an admissions tutor at a london college did tell me a couple of years ago that she was put off by those that had climbed kilmanjaro, hand built hospitals etc as she wanted students who would not find it too mundane to knuckle down and concentrate on working at her subject...

There seems to be a lot of anecdotal prejudice towards pupils who may have ever done something that is not mundane and boring and unrelated to their course .

as a parent I rely on the school to give advice to my DC - and have no intention of second-guessing them or contacting UCAS myself! If my DC are applying, they will do the leg-work - Bonsoir are you one of those parents who carry on nannying your children even as far as tertiary education?

I live in Paris where few schools give reliable guidance for British university applications, MrsSalvoMontalbano, and most schools both give none and are against it.

I happen to have been very involved in UCAS applications at many levels in the last few years for applicants coming from France, so I do know quite a bit about what UCAS does and how it communicates with universities as well as with schools.

Bonsoir My kids have not climbed Kilimanjaro or built any hospitals single handed. And nor will they. That notwithstanding, I do not believe (and neither do they) that the things they do do are mundane or boring. Did you really mean to sound so snobbish and unimaginative?

What is your point, MordionAgenos? I did not dream up those examples!

Bonsoir Do you, I wonder, provide a PS advisory servicefor these French would-be students? That would explain your consternation at several individuals involved in admissions stating that the PS isn't that crucial.

My kids are some years off UCAS/CUKAS right now but I must admit I am cheered mightily by the news that the PS is, as I had hoped, not all that vital.

Bonsoir actually UCAS does very little, nor is it supposed to. It is just a processing place for applications. Just like UPS is not expected to give detailed comment on the contents of parcels, UCAS is not a key organisation in relation to university entrance.

Oh and I have nothing against climbing mountains, but it will not make a bit of difference when you are applying to my university. I hope that people going to so much trouble are doing it because they want to rather than thinking that they should do it to impress someone....

I have done many things, principally be on the board of an association that has made presentations to UCAS on behalf of a prestigious school leaving examination that some pupils hailing from France take and that is little known in the UK.

It is always recommended, in our dealings with UCAS, that the PS be used to shed light on a pupil's particular circumstances and motivation. In particular, the reliability of French grading is very poor, so if pupils believed that their PS was being ignored that would create huge extra anxiety among an already anxious population.

My point is that your post sounded extremely snobbish and unimaginative. I find the activities of some kids completely inexplicable (horsey stuff, for example) but I would never dismiss them as either mundane nor boring. That's just rude. And obviously ignorant.

"Bonsoir actually UCAS does very little, nor is it supposed to."

I disagree. UCAS is very knowledgeable about different school leaving examinations and very good at disseminating the information to universities (push and pull).

Mordio and Creamteas well said.

Prestigious yet little known by the UK academic community (which is multi national, rather than Anglo-centric)? That's a surprising combination.

Where I work students have it impressed upon them that how they present themselves in the ps is very important. The school sends a high percentage to O and C every year and most others go to decent universities too so I assume that they are not doing anything wrong? It is very interesting that it is not really viewed as that important.

I find it a bit worrying that a course tutor might be put off by a student who has done a lot of things and maybe had a rich extra-curricular life - the implication being that they may not be able to 'knuckle down' and work on the course. Is an applicant who has shown no initiative, adventurous spirit or charitable awareness going to be a better student somehow? Doubtful.

Perhaps slightly off topic now this has inevitably morphed into a university entrance debate as theses threads always seem to, but the school my DC are at is highly sought after and so there are a lot of parents who apply thinking their DC need to be grade xx on several instruments etc, and the poor kids are drilled in endless music practice. Our own dc never showed any interest in music, cannot play a note of anything,and the head actually mentioned it when we first met him and chuckled saying it made DS1 stand out from the crowd so yes, climb kili etc if its what the dc really wants to do fr some reason, but not just to second-guess what might impress someone on a cv...

Bonsoir if you bothered to read my posts I have said that the PS is only really used in non-standard applications - any student coming from abroad with a little-known qualification would be non-standard......