competitive parents - what exactly does this mean?

[lorna111]

Just that really - it's probably a silly question but if a school is known for its competitive parents, what does this mean? It sounds awful and not my thing at all but I'm curious how what the parents are doing exactly to be competitive. Tutors for their kids every weekend? Ridiculously over the top homework done by dad?
Thanks!!

Who's Judy Murray?

Andy's mum. The only openly pushy Scottish parent. (Not that I do think she is actually pushy, just that is the perception of some folk.)

Looked her up a tennis coach, mother of Andy Murray etc.
As parents we need to be ourselves, to be successful parents our parenting needs reflect our personality. Over the years I've been openly criticised for my approach by so called friends and acquaintances, why? What business of theirs is it how I choose to bring up my children?
I look at my DC's they well adjusted, sociable and happy both have set their own ambitions, uni's etc and we support and encourage them, one could, we've been told, do much better but he chooses not too, it's his life and his decision. We have at times told them what they should do, for example DS1 (who's no mathematician) knew he needed to pass GCSE math but also knew a C was good enough and we celebrated when he got it as if he got an A*.

I think she is one devoted mum. She spotted the talent that Andy has and encouraged him to be the best. I actually admire her dedication. Andy has to have the skill, abilities, drive and hunger to win to be one of the best.
You need to have that competitive drive and motivation to get to the top or achieve your goal.

I think it's parents who aren't encouraging their children to do their best because they want their child to do their best but because they want their child to be better and to be seen to be better than other people's kids. Whose focus is not on their child for their child's sake but who is looking at other people's children and aiming to do better than them. Whose intention is that they, through their child, outdo the other parent through that parent's child.

I mean, if you just wanted your child to be the best that they could be, you'd neither know nor care what other kids are doing, would you?

It's a term used by parents whose children are not bright enough to get into the best schools wrongly to denigrate parents whose children are in those schools.

Most times I have heard it it has been one parent at a school saying it about another parent at that same school.

At our school there is competitive cake baking where the Mums make really fancy cupcakes to out do everyone else for charity cake sales. You are really looked down upon if you buy them ready made from a shop!

They had to ban parent races at sports day as the mothers were so competitve in their lycra and trainers, rather than viewing it as fun! I remember being in a relay team ay one school and our team lost. One Mum was absolutely fuming and starting blaming the rest of her team and ranting! My child was in the Nursery at the time and thought it was supposed to be a fun event, so it was rather a shock!

There are the parents who make a fuss, screaming at swimming teachers as there child hasn't been chosen for a gala, even though their child is clearly a slower swimming (having completed timed trials).

I agree with retropear100%.

Competitive parents are competitive with other pRents about everything to do with school- not just about their children's achievement. I am a self confessed pushy parent- but I really don't care how other kids do just as long as mine do the best they possibly can and don't miss out on anything school can offer- I 'm the one who's always asking for home/school communication to be better, for exAmple. And I want to know how my child is doing- so I will always ask questions about reports and stuff like that. Pushy. Not competitive!

Many years ago at a pushy London prep my children briefly went too we had one of those hideous Easter Bonnet parade competition things. The children were reception to yr 2, many of the the hats were extraordinarily clever and beautiful but not made by the children themselves. The one who won was clever but incredibly simple and was obviously made by the parent and the child, three mothers literally were apoplectic that their own creations hadn't won, ranting and raving about how many hours they'd spent on it and one had even been to on a one day course. The poor mother that won was ignored by the disappointed losers for over a week!

Often it can also be a woman who gave up work (and probably never should have done) and then seeks to live her life and dreams through her children who become a kind of instrument of hers. She would be better just getting a full time job and letting the children get on with their lives.

Erm that's a bit of a sweeping generalisation.

Retropear you are absolutely right that being a slack parent is a luxury available to those who have children in good schools. A caring parent would be forced into being pushy and helicopter-like a if they had to continually try and make up for deficiencies in their child's education.
Not sure where the line is between that and the pushy parenting in China which is also done for the best of reasons.

It's one of those "in the eyes of beholder" things: what you say about other parents if their children's achievements or their aspirations for their kids are higher than yours. It's a purely pejorative term that says practically nothing about their parenting style.

Retropear, I agree with you about competitive parenting.

I have never come across competitive parenting and wonder if it is just another put down of those who are helping their children in their school work by those who have chosen not to.

There is a definite line between being a supportive parent who wants the best for their child and being a parent whose child is another way of increasing their status and living vicariously. In our area of London the private preps are full of the latter. So I can bear witness to the Easter egg and Easter bonnet competitions where the entries are worthy of a St Martins graduate. I can bear witness to the competitive cake baking for the fete and the parents who train for the parents races at sports day and whisk a pair of specially fitted running shoes out of their bag as the egg and spoons are handed out. And yes to all the talking behind hands and bitchiness when your daughter has any success, because obviously it is never on merit, it is always that the parent had pulled strings etc. And yes to the head mistress being besieged after prize giving by parents who consider their child was wronged, including the father who broke down in her office because he was so sure his daughter was going to be Head Girl and the other parents who were equally sure and immediately fired off a letter starting "Our daughter is a failure. Where do we go from here?"

And sadly yes to all the young people whose self esteem is damaged by feeling that parental love is conditional on them being Head Boy/Girl, the best swimmer, the winner of the Easter egg competition, getting to the "best school in the world" giving them only a narrow target for success and a gaping chasm labelled failure.

When my DS was in the Int'l school, he was in Grade 7(year 8) they had an In't maths tournament and school could choose students from Grade 6 to 8 to take part in this event, and some pre-match training was provided before they selected the team. My Dc was chosen to be in 1st team with two other Grade 8 boys, and 2nd team was also all boys from Grade 8. The next thing I knew was the girls' mums were so unhappy that only boys were chosen and also one from a year younger, they marched straight to the Headteacher office to complain. The Headteacher eventually gave in and they had to field a girl team for the event too. They all travelled to an European city. The tournament had over 100 teams from various Int'l schools all over the world. And this girl team came last. The girls felt humiliated, and the mums complained to the teacher again saying they should have spread the teams evenly, and how her DD had lost confident in Maths after that. Now that is what I call competitive parents.
My DS team came top 10, they had done well, but he said most of the other teams that came ahead were full of Chinese, Korean, Asian students.

So in that school, the 6 top maths pupils in grade 8 were all boys and all the girls in grade 8 were not as good at maths as one boy from the year below?

Has the headmaster looked into the problems of gender bias in maths attainment in his school?

I thought the same - very odd gender bias...

I think it is not gender bias, the girls chosen were able girls too, may not be as good as some boys, they were in the same top set? I think the girls' mums believed they were able too and were annoyed that they were not chosen. It's the head of maths made the final list based on the final testing. And the Headteacher was pressurised to send one more girl team to show the school was not gender bias.

Soveryupset and S4Worries, so very true.

There are countries where on schools' websites are names and achievements of children (music competition/sport awards). It is another mindset to be proud of, happy for your child's friends' achievements.

There are many topics discussing the ranking of the British education system. To learn to congratulate our friend's child will be the first step to improve it.

My understanding was that they put together a team made up with girls whose mothers complained. They might've not been the keenest or the best maths students. They might've not had any interest in taking part until their mothers intervened.

Something wrong with the teaching if the gender disparity was so huge. I would have had questions to put to the Head......

I think the mothers should have been asking why the top attainment for the girls was so far behind that of the boys. Not because the girls team did badly, but because in year 8 and below the top attaining students were all boys.

Having two top teams of boys does reinforce the stereotype of "girls can't do maths". If it was done on results it was fair, but I think some questions should be asked as to why they are not getting high achieving girls.

Perhaps rather than spending their resources on extra lessons for the already high achieving boys, they should have provided extra tuition on addressing the problems of the mismatch.