Education superclass?

[Amber2]

blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/iainmartin1/100245274/it-is-much-worse-than-sir-john-major-says-a-new-superclass-is-being-created-in-london/

This is interesting coming from John Major ...sounds like more lobbying along the lines of the Sutton Trust but do people really think it's much worse than it ever has been..? and this is do with with the inexorable rise of London...and the global money flowing in there...and so to creating an elite superclass of private schools also ...not just any old private school but a small handful of elite ones, applications to which have reached record numbers, presumably more and more from London and from overseas with over inflation rises in fees pricing out the traditional middle classes that used to be able to afford these schools.

Had we been able to afford it both my DDs would have liked to apply to US universities but it was simply because they preferred the flexibility and structure of US degree programmes. It wasn't the "push" of any aspect of UK universities, it was the pull of degree programmes that would have enabled them to keep up their broader interests and possibly the influence of too much crap American telly / films It is also a mistake to focus on Oxbridge, it was always a bit of a lottery but now more than ever there are plenty of other courses at other UK universities that will meet the needs of clever students and give them the opportunities. Certainly at DDs' "elite" school the girls make their uni decisions based on rational criteria and sometimes the selection process and bells and whistles of Oxford just don't appeal even for the brightest students. When DD2 was encouraged to apply she just didn't see the point since she just didn't want it enough to put herself through it, and other courses appealed to her more.

I hate the term "elite" too rabbit stew because I do not equate extremely selective to "elite" , I really don't think my DDs' school is more "elite" than the local outstanding comps who are able to provide the opportunities both for equally clever pupils and the less able, with a more balanced experience of society. Actually they are in a sense, also elite in their own way, just it is in terms of being a postcode elite, or worse, a religious elite, all the more so since we all pay for it but what is delivered is so unequal. That is why I put it in inverted commas, it seems to me "elite" is a subjective term conferred by those who want it or those who resent it and I do resent deeply that my DDs were denied a good state education

i think you missed the point - which is about better funding for poorer students to access higher education.....if you keep bringing back the argument to the politics of envy I think that is unconstructive...people will always have more money, and they will always be able to pay for tutors or private schools here or overseas - the point is not to try and remedy a bad situation with quotas to dumb down by rejecting the best candidates be they private or state or by abolishing private schools ....the state education on offer is just not good enough for many to be happy with it ...if it were then so many would not be opting for private. I am sure many middle class people do so as a big financial sacrifice because they feel they have no choice.

my post was addressed to rabbit's last comment

The size of the population is irrelevant here.

I know of students applying to university in the US who make 20 applications.

of course it's relevant to any statistics...and the point is if you apply there you are still up against that many more candidates in terms of % chance of success

Goldigga but that old boys network has disappeared in accountancy, banking, journalism. Friends who are in those professions (actually from working class backgrounds and a fairly average RG university) can no longer give our offspring the advantage of us knowing them with internships etc. Law maybe, advertising if you are a client, maybe, PR, fashion, definitely but us middle and working classes who have worked so hard to break into the old boy's networks haven't been able to set some up of our own, most annoying........

And as rabbitstew has pointed out the trouble with meritocracy is it becomes an arms race. Students now actually have to work really hard to get 2.1s and Firsts because without them they won't get considered by employers (and please no one say 2.1s and Firsts are easier to come by, there are more of them but I can assure you students work much harder now than I did for my 2.1 ) Frankly I am not entirely sure that not getting a 2.1 precludes you from having the qualities to succeed in a career, and doubtless the ones with those qualities will succeed by other means but it is going to be harder.

www.theguardian.com/education/2012/dec/17/american-universities-lure-british-students

Here's another article on the topic...in that well known journal read by bankers everywhere

"I know of students applying to universities in the US who make 20 applications"
As someone who is seriously looking into this from what I understand (it is very complicated) and having listened to admissions tutors from some of the Ivy leagues I think in some instances you can't make multiple applications. For most courses it is definitely more competitive than Oxbridge but frankly we were bowled over by the education on offer so it's not hard to see why. It's also eye wateringly expensive although a handful (the really really oversubscribed ones) do offer bursaries to international students.
I personally believe that more and more of the wealthy Elite who've got their DC's in the super selectives are going to go down this road frankly if you've got the money and you get the opportunity you'd be mad not too.

But Indy5, not many are opting for private, given that it's largely unaffordable. Those who do opt for it are definitely doing it by choice. The issue is whether it can in any way be said that UK universities have "quotas." I think not. If there is a mass stampede towards US universities, it has nothing to do with quotas and pretending it does is just silly.

UK universities, like any other, are looking for potential. The candidate with the most potential is not necessarily the one with the best qualifications to date. To say that a better qualified public school candidate was unfairly treated because they were rejected in favour of a state school candidate with a less immediately impressive CV is thus being discriminated against is to confuse the identification of potential with the identification of the finished article. Where I find the argument interesting is where you get to the point of concluding that a candidate is already prevented from reaching their potential because they have had too long being let down already, so you might as well give up on them. Some people think this already happened at birth, some people by the age of 5, some by 11, some by 16, some by 18, and some say you should never give up...

Happy it can be a very strategic process, as you say it is complicated and some universities offer incentives to accept them early. However though it is demanding in terms of researching the process, the additional essays, sitting SATS and individual papers for particular programmes, interviews etc. I get the impression it is a process that enables a student to show more of themselves since it is not just a matter of grades and a possible cursory glance at the personal statement and reference. But here we are swapping global elite insider information that you can find out easily on the web or just start a thread on higher education

I have been the beneficiary of positive discrimination in education at pg level. Potential is a very subjective notion. This subject is very tricky.

happy, I also think more and more of the superbright but not so elite will go down this route provide they win bursaries of course and places like Harvard are needs blind because they can afford to be.

rabbit...I also know a lot of parents who are at private because they think the state education on offer is not close to acceptable...it may depend on your area of course, but they would rather save the fees if they felt it was feasible, but are making huge sacrifices to go private .

We're still only talking about

rabbit And the point about all the evidence that has been accumulated by universities to help them develop fair access strategies is that the untapped potential is not found in candidates from good state schools. They get to the universities and generally perform on parr with private school pupils, "elite" or otherwise. The students who arrive having experienced real disadvantage are the ones who exceed the achievements of those students which is why the Fair access programmes are being so carefully targeted at a particular group of students defined by their contextual evidence of real disadvantage. Few of those will be middle class though (unless problems with home life, poor schooling, SpLDs etc. ) . The access programmes are aimed at getting those pupils to apply, equipping them to apply and facilitating successful applications recognising a B or C from such a pupil has probably required greater ability and motivation than an A* from a good school /college.

I agree more and more super bright will look increasingly to the US but only about five are completely needs blind to international students and we mustn't forget that super bright UK students aren't the only ones increasingly turning to the Ivy League.
More I suspect will also turn to the Canadian universities (which are less expensive) and also European universities.

pickled the article was referring to so called elite London super schools, a handful of them, a tiny proportion of even the 7%. But let's let hyperbole get in the way of perspective......

Pity Oxford and Cambridge aren't in London .

Interestingly the sub culture of pupils in these schools (in amongst the usual geeks, inbetweeners etc. ) who most conform to the stereotypes in this article, wealthy parents, brought up to be exclusive serial networkers etc. don't go to Oxford or Cambridge, or even London unis. They are styled "sloanes" by their peers but they are very different to the sloanes of our day, the girls are orange with peroxide nests on their head and the boys are the Jack Whitehall character in fresh meat, they bantar, and go on gap yeahs, (and are the mysogynists who perpetrate ridiculous hazing rituals for sports clubs etc. ) And they are to be found attending lectures in their pyjama bottoms, at Exeter (memories of such fun family sailing hols in Salcombe) Nottingham, possibly Leeds.....

Of course I am trading stereotype for stereotype but just to reflect the diversity of stereotypes.......

Shootingatpigeons - what makes you think I would think those with tonnes of unfulfilled potential would be found among the middle classes? I'm not talking about my own personal interests here - if I want to benefit my own children, I should shut my mouth and hope the status quo remains, because that would provide maximum benefit to my own offspring. I have sufficient means and education of my own to muddy the waters so that it is harder to tell where polish ends and true potential begins. In other words, I can ensure my children are seen in the absolute best possible light and are thus given maximum opportunity to prove they have potential.

Perhaps a good indicator of potential is to look at how far an individual has already come. Hence your disadvantaged underprivileged ended up at Oxford/Cambridge is likely to have bags of the stuff versus the offspring of the super rich who have merely absorbed the opportunity to practise as yet unidentified global elite super duper skills. The more I think about this the crosser it makes me...

rabbit I didn't think that, quite the opposite. I really don't think my DDs had to go to one of these schools to acquire some sort of necessary polish. If they did it hasn't worked because I have only ever brought them up to have empathy and respect for others, to be curious and interested in the world, to have a social conscience and to do what makes them happy (for sufficient moments in time) and fulfilled. I don't suppose either will ever make a lot of money but I have every reason to hope they will use the privilege of their education to make a difference. And those are actually the values you will find pushed at these schools. They don't have assemblies on "Loadsamoney" and what it takes to be a ruthless *anker. I am sure there are plenty of London parents who don't need any help with that even if they don't get their offspring into these schools.

The point I was making really is unis really are working hard to seek out genuine underprivileged as opposed to pandering to the stereotypes put forward in articles like this in the Telegraph and Daily Mail.

"Perhaps a good indicator of potential is to look at how far an individual has already come. Hence your disadvantaged underprivileged ended up at Oxford/Cambridge is likely to have bags of the stuff versus the offspring of the super rich who have merely absorbed the opportunity to practise as yet unidentified global elite super duper skills."

We all come from the point of knowing nothing. It is totally wrong to blame children for the advantages their parents helped them acquire.

"Perhaps a good indicator of potential is to look at how far an individual has already come. Hence your disadvantaged underprivileged ended up at Oxford/Cambridge is likely to have bags of the stuff versus the offspring of the super rich who have merely absorbed the opportunity to practise as yet unidentified global elite super duper skills."
Life is never black and white we're an average MC family with a super bright DS jis intellectual needs were not being met in our excellent state schools so he has been is receipt of bursaries from schools tat educate the super elite for over 9 years. These schools have given him these bursaries because they recognise his academic ability. He has had to prove himself and has come along way ok not underprivaledged and disadvantaged but still prove himself worthy of a schools generosity.

I personally wouldn't encourage either of my children to apply to any of the Ivies for undergrad. If they want to study in the US I'd strongly encourage them to get their degree here and then apply to the Ivies for grad school.

I say that as a Harvard legacy and little Ivy alum who applied to my " dream" school, 3 possibly achievable and one safety school.

It is complicated, isn't it? When it comes down to it, clever or not, there are some experiences and opportunities I would like more rather than less people to be given the opportunity to experience. Elitism seeks to identify a tiny proportion of people to get the best experiences and opportunities, because they are deemed to be more useful to society than the rest, and it doesn't seem to really know what to do with the rest. If it lived up to its promise of getting the best for society, it would also put an awful lot of pressure on the supposed "elites" to perform, and I'm not sure many parents would really want to view their children as performing seals educated to the nth degree solely for the benefit of society, they would rather just enjoy the benefits and opportunities without any of the pressure of expected returns. Thus, their children not only get the best, but don't have to do anything useful with that if they don't want to. Yet we all gain from experience and opportunity at our different levels. You don't have to be a genius to benefit from a trip to a museum, or learn a musical instrument, nor do you have to be a genius to pass your gratitude for the opportunity on to others. So what to do?