State vs Private and the huge cuts to State

[DonkeyofDoom]

We had planned to use our local state school. We didn't get into any of the six in our neighbourhood and ended up being allocated a dire school two bus journeys away. In the end we have gone private for reception but planned to move to get DC1 and eventually DC2 into a state school as the waitlist has actually gone backwards for us. We are now further down then when we began. The council have been blunt and told us that even though we live less than .3 from our nearest school we are highly unlikely to get a place.

But the announced cuts look really deep for schools that were already stretched. Now I'm left wondering if we are better off downsizing our house and paying for private for both. It would be a huge stretch but it could be done. Have others decided to go private because of the cuts?

Perhaps that was an over-statement Doom, but the trend has been back towards depth not breadth for a while and the take up of IB, in the sense of schools adopting it as their offer, or one of their offers, is not on the increase - I think I'm right in saying that the reverse is true.

The basic reasons why IB is unpopular are because it is very expensive to deliver (virtually no state schools offer it) and it gives absolutely no advantage in UK university entrance. In fact the opposite for the latter - IB offers are high relative to A level offers, reflecting the spread over many subjects and less detailed content. IB gives a definite disadvantage for entry to STEM at top universities as students are expected to get very high IB marks in their HL science subjects to compensate for having less science content than A level.

Some private schools will continue to offer IB but I agree the number of schools offering IB is unlikely to increase. (For kids who are looking to go abroad for university education IB is very useful.)

It just seems backwards to me. Surely to be globally leaders you need people who can see across disciplines and link ideas together. I suppose it depends on whether you after a job as the primary endpoint or if you see education itself as the primary endpoint. Do we really want children to take their last history lesson at age 14? Sorry - off on a tangent but it just seems the cuts to the state system including the inability due to budget constraints to deliver the IB lead you to making narrowly educated workers built to follow orders.

Well that's quite a stretch of a hypothesis Doom. Good username however :)

Even if my DCs' school was awash with money I wouldn't have wanted them to/ want them to take the IB: PreU fine, A levels fine, IB meh, not so much.

You're right - I did stretch it to make the point. It just feels like the state system is dying a death of a thousand cuts. No one demands options like the IB when they can barely get funding to keep the A levels going.

Why would have not wanted your DC to do the IB?

Donkey I think the IB is brilliant especially for the very able allrounder. If we'd been a bit quicker of the mark we would have encouraged DS2 to seriously consider it. From what I had and have seen its ts harder work but its breadth is so important for our children's future and the UK as a whole. But just like the NHS no one is looking too the future.