WHY the general assumption that private schools are better?

[tootsietoo]

I know this is similar to other recent threads, but slightly different!

I know very little about education - never worked in the sector, don't have many friends working in it, never been interested til children arrived! However, in my limited experience (DDs 6&7 at local primary school) the level of professionalism of the teachers is impressive! There seems to be such a comprehensive structure for planning progression and for assessing children's attainment, whilst the teachers seem to have the freedom to work with the children to inspire them in that they choose topics which interest them and can tailor classes and working groups to match children's abilities.

Yet within my group of friends there seems to be this inbuilt assumption that if you ever can pull enough cash in then off to private school your children will go. I also frequently read on here that the existence of private schools is unfair because it means only a few children will have the best opportunities. Which seems to assume that all private schools offer the best opportunities.

Is this a hangover from the 70s and 80s when we all grew up? Were state schools much worse then? Why is it just assumed that private schools offer the best education? I know private schools have more money therefore usually have the glitzy facilities, but surely it is down to the person standing in front of the children day in day out who is the really important part? I recall that at my small private girls day school I experienced the most inept teaching methods imaginable and I am told that at private schools today there is no requirement for teachers to be qualified! I do appreciate that my children are at a good school (that is, classified by ofsted as "good"), but are they all that unusual?

[rabbitstew]

You could be a stealthlecturer, though, stealthsquiggle. No need to admit to your lecturing past...

I wonder whether we are at risk from the tyranny of a "meritocracy" in a society where the establishment has decided what is worthy of merit.

[stealthsquiggle]

Herc now has me wondering where I can apply for my "neither one thing nor the other" badge - no way I would qualify as WC, but equally definitely not posh enough for the posh badge

[HercShipwright]

Rabbit That's essentially what we have now.

[rabbitstew]

So, pushing highly academic people through highly academic and competitive schools to help them get to the top of the establishment is creating another type of tyranny.

stealthsquiggle - well, you're either a middle laner, a drunken swerver, or a skilful lane swapper.

[TheOriginalSteamingNit]

It's not word who I think is being provoking/proactive, it is bonsoir with her lecturers-as-nannies utopia!

[TheOriginalSteamingNit]

Provocative, not proactive!

[Martorana]

Nit- bonsoir is taking the piss. She seems to enjoy toying with those she regards as her intellectual inferiors. I do they to ignore- but I get sucked in.

Word- you said "
I'd divert resources to the highest ability including a super selective grammar school in every LEA."

How would you select and what would you do with everyone else?

[stealthsquiggle]

Martorana - "those she considers her intellectual inferiors" ...that would be everyone, IME.

[Bonsoir]

I'm not taking the piss - I'm deadly serious.

Why as a society are we subsidising piss-poor "education" for 18 year olds when we know that more value can be added to children's life chances in the 0-5 slot than in any other?

[Dapplegrey]

Hercshipwright - do you use the word 'posh' in real life as much as you do on these forums?

[Martorana]

I never use the work "posh" in real life- except to describe myself in a self deprecating way..........

[HercShipwright]

I expect I do use it sometimes. Certainly when talking about cruise ships. Possibly in other contexts too. I don't use it as much as 'scepticism' or 'non compliance' or 'yellow car' or 'davros' or 'liberator' or 'Targ' or 'Pale Mare' or any of my vast panoply of interesting swear words. I have a brobdingnagian vocabulary. However this is a thread ABOUT posh schools. I probably don't use the words 'school' or 'education' as much in real life as I do in this thread either. Unsurprisingly.

[pippiLS]

Bonsoir, do we know that more value can be added to children's life chances in the 0-5 slot?

Sure, we know that those DC with the better early years profile do 'best' but I'm not sure you can extrapolate...

[Bonsoir]

There is plenty of evidence of the extra skills that DC from more privileged and interactive environments acquire in the early years. Hence all the fuss about DC who are already so behind when they enter primary school that they can never hope to catch up.

Fewer years in better quality educational environments with, crucially, better qualified instructors would be a better educational spend.

[TheWordFactory]

My DD says posh to indicate swanky. So Ketlles are 'posh crisps'. The Ivy is a 'posh restaurant'.

I must admit that in Casa Wordfactory we use the term 'MC' to mean middle class tomfoolery with which we will not comply .

[Bonsoir]

MC = BCBG = old-fashioned crap codes

[TheOriginalSteamingNit]

I'm with that definition of posh. Posh chocs etc.
Don't use MC but do use 'worthy' about a certain kind of mc.

[HercShipwright]

Up with which you will not put, surely word

[HercShipwright]

I often pretend to be Barbara Good when bemoaning my lack of a posh frock. Until DH points out that if I had a posh frock I wouldn't wear it and if I wanted a posh frock I'd just go and buy one like the hundreds (he exaggerates) of cabin pressure, GoT and DW Tee shirts that form a never ending pile of loveliness in our hall as they arrive with the post on a regular basis. I can't think what he is getting at, though. Not a clue.

[Martorana]

In our family we use middle class to describe very stereotyped things we say and do- as, for example, when dd was frantically grabbing rice to dunk her wet phone in, Dp said in anguished tones "noooo- don't use the carnaroli!

Oh, and Maldon salt is middle class salt.

[hench]

the thread is about private schools not posh schools Herc. Round here the school that is known as the posh school is the ex grammar state school (now a well regarded comp), so your terminology is rather confusing.

[AmberTheCat]

We have a collection of 'things our children say that prove without doubt they're growing up as middle class southern shandies'. My favourite is my dd's surprised discovery that 'oh - peas in pods are quite like edamame, aren't they?'

[stealthsquiggle]

LOL Amber - by way of contrast, I treasure my DC's horrified (but just about politely so) reaction to the discovery that vegetable sticks and hummus were considered valid party food in Cambridge

[AmberTheCat]

You're clearly bringing them up properly, stealth!

[MariaJenny]

(On the example of the meeting where only 2 weren't posh, isn't it also that some people choose to move class and manage it and others don't? I've worked with people in the City in both categories. You can keep your accent, your slightly not right clothes and interests or you can become what might make you fit in better in certain environments which applies both ways to posh people working in less poss careers as well as the other way around.)