Eton, Winchester etc. planning for the future

[WelshParent]

Dear All,

I am new to MN and this is my first post. So please be gentle with me if I do something wrong. I don't have one specific question but a bunch of related questions which I hope I can get some answers to.

OK, so we live in South Wales and DS is in yr3 at the moment at a local indie in Cardiff. It is a very good school but it is a full 3-18 type and produces very good A level results. DS is a bright kid and does lots of extra curricular activities including piano, tennis, swimming and ofcourse football. Teacher thinks that he is very good and is working at a level higher than expected.

Like many other parents we aspire for DS to be able to move to somewhere really good like Eton or Winchester. I have spent months and months reading about the admission procedures of each of those schools and some others like Harrow, Radley, Abingdon etc.

My first question is that if DS takes the pretest at Eton or Harrow and is offered a conditional place when time comes, I imagine they will want him to take CE. Now being in a 3-18 school he will not have been expressly prepared for CE. We do not have any good Prep school in S Wales, so that is not an option for us. Where would that leave us? Both of us spend a lot of time to guide him with his academics and would not have a problem preparing him for CE purely from a syllabus perspective but we do not have CE preparation experience. Would some private tutoring be enough over the normal school work (which is at quite a good level). What about subjects like Latin which may not be part of DS's school curriculum. Is dreaming of KS or Election a dream without being in a very good prep?

Secondly we are managing to afford school fees + other activities + uniform + childcare etc. of about 12k per annum as of now. We might be able to afford another 4-5k by really pushing ourselves. Now our total yearly take home is about 52k (gross of 79k) both working f/t. We do have some other commitments like financially supporting DH's mother, who lives abroad. So even though the 52k looks alright. We don't live too luxuriously at all, we do have a biggish house and pay a mortgage of about 1200. We don't have a huge lot of equity in it though. I know it is a speculative question but based on this are we likely to get a bursary if DS gets an offer or will our income work against us.

I will be ever so grateful for any replies.

And Grovel of course all of that applies to boys from Eton and lots of other schools from all over the place.
Anyhow. - moving on ......

Doubt you'd get a bursary on your income. We didn't get one to a london day school and income is much lower.

Do you mind telling me which school that was.

slkk There's a huge difference in the fees for a London day school and a boarding school of the type being discussed here. Consequently the bursaries available are on a different scale and cover possibly a much wider range of incomes.

Thank you Haggismcbaggis for spelling peteneras correctly. The Petenera is one of many forms of flamenco which is usually sung but can be danced to or simply performed as a solo guitar. Here are some examples of the peteneras as performed by various artistes in a Spanish national competition last year. As you can see, it’s very unlike the Scottish bagpipe music.

Should you be fascinated with it thence, here’s a slower version to get you going.

’ I have my own theory which I’ve suspected for a very long time - the boy was rejected by Eton! . . .’

Relax DarklingJane, please do not take that little paragraph out of context and imagine it was directed at you. It wasn’t!

And further to your comments on Winchester at war, of course, a great many young men from many schools served in the Armed Forces in both World Wars. Sorry to say, but none of the schools sacrificed more in both wars in terms of serving and dying for the country other than Eton.

The number of OE’s who served in the First WW is more than both the number of Winchester and Harrow combined in the same war! Likewise, the number of OE’s who lost their lives in WW1 is greater than both Harrow and Winchester put together!

WW2 broadly tells a similar story.

Floreat Etona!

Edit: Five years ago Eton celebrated the 150th Anniversary of the School’s CCF. It was the first continuous school corps of its kind. And I like the first comment under the clip.

” the food was terrible! if what they served parents is an indication of what they serve boys . . .”; “Judging from the awful smell in the dining room of the house we visited, I assume we were truly given a taste of what the meals are like...”; “Win Coll food is notorious . . .”; “dining room (which reeked of stale food)”; “I asked one boy what he did if he was hungry between meals. He said he never eats between meals”; “I'm not surprised so many looked pale and thin..”; and “while we were having 'lunch" on the lawn outside New Hall . . .”

Those were exactly the things said by both prospective and present parents about Winchester College less than two years ago, summerends. As a proud parent of Win Coll like you claim you are, did you do anything about it? To date, have you done anything about it?

”C-mon Win Coll, precious little boys given to you in your care at a vital stage of their growth, a time when they morph from a giggling child to a (hopefully) young, strong and healthy adult, need the best nourishments under the sun to lay the foundation for such. The damage done to health due to malnourishment at this delicate stage of growth could be irreversible. As it stands, from what I’ve learnt, I wouldn?t send my dog to Win Coll.”

That was posted by myself on the same day when the above damning comments about Win Coll food first came to my knowledge. You may not know it, but I can assure you MumsNet is read worldwide, not least the senior politicians of the UK including the Prime Minister himself. You can bet your mortgage, one way or another, Win Coll will have come to know about it being posted on MN Education forum.

Lo and behold, and 18 months later, I hear from everywhere that Win Coll food had improved tremendously. Presumably for the previous 18 years, the situation was dire and nothing was done about it until it was highlighted 18 months ago.

I didn’t and I am not saying that I was directly responsible for this change - all I said was that I might have a hand in the improvement because it had seemed to me that it was too much of a co-incidence. So, instead of thanking me for posting the message in August 2013 that ultimately (one way or another) led to your DS benefiting from Win Coll’s improvement, you were more interested in scoring cheap political points by suggesting I have narcissistic traits.

You should be ashamed of yourself especially when you have not done anything about the previous Win Coll food situation yourself leaving complete strangers who had absolutely nothing to do with Win Coll to sound the alarm.

You are a disservice to your child!

peteneras, could you please turn your attention to NHS food next?

Install me as the Prime Minister and I'll do that for you, grovel.

As someone who never considered E, rejected WinColl ( or whose Ds did), and went to an overpriced overhyped famous school herself, I am torn between rage and hysteria at this thread.

Eton had a give number in the services, of course. The usual first option for a second son was the army, followed by the church then the law. Waterloo was won as its Field Marshall said on the playing fields if Eton.

And in general for the nobility, once the private tutor had been junked, was a choice beyween Eton and Harrow. Winchester was founded with a concept of service , by what was in effect a civil servant.

That does not undermine eg other schools'contribution, eg Churchill, Wavell, a rare general in that he also produced a best selling poetry authority.

But all that is in the past. Schools' attributes come and go. Eton is indubitably far more academic than it was in my generation, and even then it was more academic than in my parents'.

Do think about your child. Eg, the dorm experience is important. I was indifferent to it until secondary when I detested it and single rooms would have changed my life, my DH hated it all through, and it is not good for sensitive children. On the other hand I reckon that I could survive in prison, which might stabs me in good stead, you never know.

Food, food, glorious food... It doesn't matter that much. There will be quite a lot and it will conform to nutritional standards. If nice that's a bonus, if not it hardens you up for prison, see above, and gives you wowonderful anecdotes for the future.
At WinColl it's often dependent, as it was at my school, upon the house.

The best thingd about these sorts of schools are

They teach you the basics to a high standard
They help you find out what you are interested in
They help you find out what you are good at
They have all the facilities to do all of those well
And they have very high aspiration.

You then need to decide where your Ds will thrive. In fruit terms, does he like apples, pears, or oranges? wine, Champagne, burgundy or claret?

It's not a question of one size fits all.

Once again, and thanks for the re mention, make really really sure where you see the clear blue water. Both between these schools and these and his existing one.

BTW, sorry about spelling etc, always on phone.

For give read huge.. sorry

And read stand instead of stab

Has anyone noticed how it is always E & W bashing/whinging on MN - I was brought up to know that if you don't have anything nice to say, then don't say it at all.
None of the other parents of the 'top schools' behave like this and it is frankly, quite embarrassing. You don't see parents from Harrow, Radley, Kings, Westminster & Oundle all scragging with each other on here.
Please could we get back to supporting the OP in her quest and query and quit the bickering. Handbags back in the cupboard!! Live & let live. xx

Bloody autocorrect,

Anthology. Other Men's Flowers. Still an outstanding book, imv.

The best things about these sorts of schools are

They teach you the basics to a high standard
They help you find out what you are interested in
They help you find out what you are good at
They have all the facilities to do all of those well
And they have very high aspiration.

Thank you ancientbuchanan - those are indeed some of the biggest factors that are driving us. I hope we can see the clear blue waters as you say.

Just a couple of other questions:

1. Do both E and W make a decision on bursaries soon after the conditional offer (assuming bursary application is made straight away) or do they wait until the boy is 13 and sits CE.

1. Are bursaries always yes/no or is there a middle area with a two way discussion process - for instance if on the bursary application we request a 40% bursary, is there any chance that either may come back and say that they can only offer us 30% or does it just say a simple no.

Reason I ask this is that Eton's website says that if a bursary is not given, the conditional offer is withdrawn. What I am trying to know is that if they come back and offer a slightly lower percentage, would we have the opportunity to try to make up the shortfall by say releasing some equity in our house etc. Similarly how does that side of things work for Winchester?

Thanks again.

Don't know about Eton but Wincoll bursar will tell you via a phone what you can expect, given details of your family, your assets (if any) and your mortgage etc. Not a definite offer, of course, but pretty accurate.

... website says that if a bursary is not given, the conditional offer is withdrawn.

OP Could you link or copy and paste that? I don't ever remember reading it.

Can answer q1) Yes. For E anyway. (And I guess they could choose to do otherwise if the circumstances demand so it's not a definitive answer. But as far as I know it's fairly immediate.)

Does that mean that we will need to pay the commitment amount based on a verbal phone answer and risk losing the money (and place as we can't afford full fees) if the bursary is not offered later.

Welsh I think that there is breathing space between receiving the offer and having to stump up any money, and in our day I think it was about £1500. If you do have to pay it, I think most schools would be understanding about refunds in these circumstances. This is really the sort of question that Francesca Moultrie, the Access Advisor will be able to give the best answer to.

ZeroFunDame,

From page 5 of Eton's admission booklet which is at www.etoncollege.com/userfiles/files/Eton%20FInfo%202014-2015.pdf

Eton is needs blind at the point of the offer of a conditional place but does not have sufficient funds to satisfy all bursary applications. If your bursary application is turned down, your sons conditional place will be withdrawn.

Thank you OP - can't think how I missed that. Withdrawal of a conditional offer would be utterly horrendous for a boy still celebrating his pre-test success.

I wonder what the thinking process is.

Well said Pepperpot!! I really admire you WelshParent for your nerve and tenacity, go for it and good luck!! I have PMd you with some info!!

PETE - I would readily vote for you as PM if you could do something about NHS food.
I was in a hospital in SW England for nearly a month and the food would have provoked a riot in a Victorian Workhouse. I'd had a major stomach op so I wasn't very hungry, but I retched when I tried to force down the unidentifiable and revolting gunk.
I was nearly 10 stone when I went into hospital and I weighed 7 and a half when I left.
Sorry, seriously off topic.

The food in my ds's house at Eton was poor. During his GCSE year he and some other boys led a deputation to the house master complaining about the fare. The hm said, "myself and my family eat it and we are perfectly happy" and that was that.
That, however, is the only complaint my DS had about an otherwise fantastic school

My DH went to his Goddaughter's Confirmation at St.Mary's Calne and at tea afterwards in the dining hall ( which smelt revolting) he wondered if the cook was very old as she seemed to be cooking within the restrictions of war time rationing.

ANCIENT - Other Men's Flowers is a marvellous anthology, especially as he knew all the poems by heart. Or anyway said he did. I always take a copy with me when I go away.

That should be 'St. Mary's Calne'.

Dapple, thrilled to meet anothet OMF fan...

There is anothet nice one put together by a friend of mine, called Set the Echoes Voting, with line cuts by his wife. I am parti prise here but I still think it's good, though not so good.

The smell of my prep school almost beats description. Once you got indoors away from the smell of the pig farm next door, there was a peculiar and distinctive overpowering aroma of

Long boiled cabbage and milk
Aged bits if marmite toast thrust behind the radiators.

Yet it was and is one of the best girls prep schools in the kingdom and if we had had a daughter I would have moved heaven and earth to send her there. ( some went to Calne thereafter.)