If you can afford it, would you send your children to an independent school?

[Fiona2011231]

This is a hypothetical question, and I would greatly appreciate your insight.

My question is based on this assumption: In England, if you want your children to have a better chance in life (great success, joining the elites, etc), a good independent school is a requirement. Of course, few have enough money to afford it.

But suppose you have enough money, would you send your children to an independent school? Or would a grammar or a comprehensive school be good enough?

Thank you.

happygardening
but the fact that a school is oversubscribed just means that Vladimir's daddy has enough money to pay the deposits at lots of schools and see which one pans out
it does not mean that there is actually an excess of people with the funds for such schools
especially boarding schools where the daily journey is not an issue

I genuinely do not believe London is a "different continent" because lots and lots of people move OUT of London when their kids hit year 3
( I have family and frinds in and around Nappy Valley BTW)

the fact that you have mentioned Vladimir, confirms London is unlike anywhere else in the U.K. London has over 500,000 foreign nationals most of them wealthy or rich, London has also sucked the life out of the rest of the country ( maybe not the 25 miles North or South of it) but everywhere else . It is the only place in the Uk where demand out strips supply in everything including private education.

soul
Be careful.
I'm a foreign national who grew up in London and went to private schools.

And actually the tax revenues of London and the uber rich significantly subsidise the rest of the country even with the offensive tax gap.

For that matter Southampton - with a population of under 300,000 has over 30,000 Poles

Eh, there's been a couple of small school closures/mergers over the past decade, but the demand in Edinburgh definitely outstrips the supply - and we're not full of Russion oligarchs!

Or Russian ones either

Talkin I'm unconvinced that Eton et al are struggling to fill their vacancies. If they were why did 5 boys in DS2 prep fail to get places at Eton, 4 failed to get places at Win Coll (not a Russian amongst them by the way), why are there frequent postings on here about getting Henry of Etons waiting list? There's a mum on here hoping to get off the Win Coll waiting list and we know quite a few who weren't even called for an interview at SPS despite having paid the deposit.
I suspect there about another 50-60 (maybe even 100 but I doubt it's that high) in the UK that are similarly over subscribed. The rest I agree are probably struggling especially the boarding schools and inevitably taking more students from abroad.

Well, yes, I seriously doubt Eton is at risk of going bust.

Happy
I quite agree with you that well known academic schools will never have a problem filling places
BUT
I've got friends locally who got their kids into Winchester with minimal stress (and the parents are not intellectual giants or famous) so I do genuinely think that when it comes to the crunch, the applicants to places ratio is probably nearer 2:1 than 4:1

Its a bit like the superselectives making huge kudos out of 20 applicants per place. How many of those kids sit the test "on spec" and then go to their perfectly decent local school or the fee paying school that yummy mummy always had lined up as a backstop

Where have i said anything offensive about foreign people in the UK?.

I have stated that most, if not all the growth in the country is centralized around London and the South (Excluding Cornwall) they just have their houses taken by London people. The United Kingdom with the exception of London, the South and tiny areas of affluence around the country is in dire trouble. I am aware the country needs foreign money and expertise , but that does not mean that we let them run roughshod over us by paying little tax on earnings.

I like the thought of a school full of Russions.
Talkinpeace - now tell me, when these people move out of London, where do they carry on working?...

rabbit
London
They commute.
From as far away as Yeovil and Lincoln
The nearest ones send their kids to schools like Bohunt (which is significantly larger than its feeder primaries)

Great way to kill off a place, to live there but work (and do a lot of your shopping) elsewhere.

rabbitstew
had you really never come aross "dormitory towns" before ?

Funnily enough, yes I have. Great way to kill off a place.

Or do you think Yeovil and Lincoln were originally built as dormitory towns?!

Rabbitstew. you are right the United Kingdom is just becoming one big Housing estate for London.....I know people who live In Lancaster and travel
2hrs 45 or more on the train 3 times a week.

Talkin we also got our DS into a Win Coll with minimal stress and we certainly aren't intellectual giants or famous, SPS ditto, all seemed remarkably easy to us but the parents of the children I mentioned above some who are intellectual giants and even vaguely famous in a sort of aristocracy type of way would perhaps tell a different story.
A friend staying with me the other day was telling me how her DS has just been offered a place at MIT, all achieved with minimal stress, she was not overly excited or proud of her DS's achievements stating that he was "nothing special". I on the other hand was seriously impressed as there are over 30 000 applicants for just over 2000 places!

Talkin, I too question your belief that it really is not that difficult to get into the superselective London independents. Although I don't have experience of the senior level, I do have experience of getting into the feeding preps for the big Senior Schools and can tell you that at this level, which indicates what is occurring further down the pipeline) and although my son was accepted by both superselctives he applied to without any additional tutoring, the percentage accepted of his classmates has dramatically decreased from a decade ago. Even just over the past five years, the competition has become ever more fierce with number applying being record breaking each year. This has resulted in pre-preps having to up the academic pushiness of their schools to ensure that they have a handful each year getting accepted into the big schools. !0 years ago, my sons' pre-prep would get a third of their leaving class going onto WUS or CC, now it is averaging 10-15%, and the amount of work DS2 is being given is much more and harder than DS1 was given at the same time. The schools's rationale is precisely that the competition has really ramped up to get into the top London Day schools, which then increase the difficulty in schools further down the selective scale (e.g., Hampton, Harrodian). There is a flight to quality amongst the "Squeezed Middle" and the thinking is that if we are going to pay for school, it better be a good one, and although some dodgy privates may be under pressure, this is the reverse at the schools which are academically successful.

It would depend on the independent school in the area, like everything else they are the good,bad and indifferent.

On a side note Eton are not struggling to fill places! They are having massive building work done at the moment.

We have two pretty well known independent day schools near where I work, one super selective, one nearly a super selective. Friends I work with DS's have applied to both recently and were saying it's becoming so difficult to get into the super selective and nearly as difficult to get into the other, one friend was stunned at the numbers sitting the pre test for the latter. Having failed at both they are now looking at what is considered locally to be a non selective but have been advised by their prep that it's becoming increasingly difficult to get into there as well because the above mentioned are so over subscribed that this having a knock on effect.
I also think the decline in the numbers wanting to send their DC's to a full boarding school probably has an impact (we've also got one of those in the same city). Many parents are what is frequently described on MN as "first time buyers" of independent ed and are not keen on the concept of boarding or just simply don't have the kind of money needed to pay boarding fees.

It's difficult to measure the demand for the Etons and Winchesters. There's the crude of measurement of how many sit the tests etc but there is a preliminary filtering system. Prep school heads up and down the country put parents off applying on a daily basis if they don't think the boy has got a chance.

A very good point grovel.
From my prep school days schools also seem to go in phases of popularity Eton was of course always popular but as it's become harder for even the very able to get a place, Harrow started to become everyone's favourite. Win Coll has a reputation amongst parents and prep school heads for being exceptionally academic and also taking the more eccentric, a couple of parents we knew who were very keen on Eton felt their DS wasn't bright enough for Win Coll despite being in the top 4-5 in the top class another felt their DS was a bit "too normal".
When looking at SPS we were told that in general a boy who was bright enough to thrive at Eton was likely to bright enough for SPS, Westminster and Win Coll which you choose to go for was just down to personal preference.

Grovel

Do you think prep school heads do that or does it differ from head to head ...if parents tell them they are set on a particular school...or is it only when a child has virtually no chance at all vs a say only a 10% chance? I wondered how "diplomatic" heads are these days to parents...it must be hard, but presumably a child will only really have a chance if a prep head supports them in the (confidential) reference..I guess they can say things like well you really have to be in top 5% or 10% to even be applying to these schools to stand a chance...because that is an objective measure ...I do wonder how much pre-filtering does in fact go on as we keep hearing about the record rise in applications to the top schools.

Amber - prep school heads definitely do this. The more serious the prep school, the more likely the head will carefully steer parental expectations as their own reputation, as well as the credibility of the school, will be at stake. They have a disincentive to encourage candidates who will not be successful, or be a misfit at the target school.

Mominatrix, that's right. Our prep head had a terrific track record in getting Eton B list boys onto the A list. Why? Because Eton trusted him and he could "special plead" for a boy who might have under-performed on the day and be believed.

I should add that his main motive for steering some parents away from Eton, Winchester, Westminster etc was "the good of the boy". He wanted his boys thriving, not struggling, at their secondary schools.

It's not only prep heads but some parents who are filtering. I know a couple (the DH was an old Wykhamist) who would have loved their DS to go to Winchester but decided he would not be up to it. Our prep head persuaded them otherwise on the grounds that the boy had thought/learning processes that weren't particularly suited to Common Entrance work but would be well-suited to a Winchester-style education. He was right.