will someone scold and spank me and remined me I am a stubborn socialist guardianista?

[twinsetandpearls]

I have always made my feelings clear about private schools but the family has been working on me again and have ordered a proespectus for a private school that I have been idly flicking through and I have fallen in love with it and even - and this is a big deal for me - looked at the website.

For me this is a huge step and I am feeling sick with guilt, so guilty in fact that I have just re planned all my lessons tomorrow for my classes as some kind of penenance.

I need other socialist guardianistas to take me in hand.

Quattro - surely the point is that educating some children privately does not disadvantage others - if you had enough to send yours to fee paying, I wouldn't feel my children were disadvantaged by that choice. It is just that, choice. socialists don't think people should have that, but I do

How will a fee paying school give her more choices.

I was a clever state educated child and had all the choices I wanted, I could go to nay university and pursue any career.

But I think it does disadvantage others. Indeed in the long run I think it will disadvantage yours.

policywonk I think that is the first time I have ever been called reasonable.

I'm a bit at those who are implying that any state comp will provide a below-par education. Twinset said several times further down the thread that the alternative was a decent state school, not a sink.

I am interested in the Guardianistas. Policywonk et al. So many people have reiterated ideas about social ideas in the abstract on this thread.

The trouble with the abstract is that it has nothing to do with the here and now. Where education is decided by postcode. Where there have been cases of parents pretending to faiths that they really do not feel in order to finagle a halfway decent education for their children.

It's all very well having lofty ideas in the abstract.

any universtity not nay!

Things have moved on since you were at school tsap. Not all clever children going through state system will have those opportunities.

I am not a guardianista. I think the Guardian is a paper for handwringing liberals in fact.

Twinset, you are being a devil's avocado par excellence on this thread. You must have a shred of reasonableness to be keeping up both sides of the argument so well!

I agree with localgirl.

Fee paying schools usually offer a broader curriculum, my work collegue's daughter went private and she took Greek, Latin and other subjects not on offer at the local school. Not everyone would want these, but her dd was very academic and has gone onto to study the classics, at degree and masters level she wouldn't have found it so easy if she had gone to state school as they didn't offer this in the curriculum. Anyway if you don't feel it will offer her a better experience, you really don't have a worry, send her to the local comp

Fee paying schools can push and stretch the children further and provide more help for them to realise their potential. They also offer a broader range of subjects and more extracurricular activities.

now that your dd has seen teh school and believes she is going there, I don't really see how you're going t stop it happening

meandmy - lol

Well, I can only deal with the situation I'm in, Quattro. DS1 is about to start at the local primary, which is decidedly average. Our local secondary is currently failing, but we're seven years off that.

My situation is easier than Twinset's in that I couldn't afford private education even if we wanted it. However, our ILs have hinted that they might be willing to pay, and I've always demurred so far.

I do think that it would be preferable to have lottery systems throughout, to avoid the house-buying method of school placement, which is so evidently unfair and pretty much equivalent to paying for private schooling in a lot of places.

What would you do about siblings policywonk - with the lottery?

really Ladymuck so why is the Daily Mail always whinging that it is impossible for privately educated people to get into Bristol university?

I managed to get offered a place at Oxford despite the fact that I moved schools every few year, my parents made me miss lots of schooling so I could work in their shop, I often had to miss days at a time so no one would see my bruises after a good beating,my homelife was bad enough to be a severe distraction and I had no support from home - I can remember my mum burning my homework once when my room was untidy. I went throught the state sector and dealt with all that shit but still had universities falling over themselves to offer me a place, for dd will have every advantage a loving home and educated parents can give should find it a breeze my comparison.

pointydog I can stop it by saying no!

To me the bottom line is that I do what I think is best for my child. If you think that your child will be better off going to the state school then just send her there. The main problem here is that whichever option you choose you will never really know if it was the best route to take since you can't go back and try the other route. It does seem to me 'I have been idly flicking through and I have fallen in love with it' that actually you believe in your heart of hearts that that is the education you want for her and if you do it then at least when she finished school,whatever the outcome, you can look her straight in the eye and say 'I did what I thought was best for you' rather than 'I had my principles you know and I just had to stick with them......'

Lastly I do agree with other posters that her father should have a say however this is only if he is going to pay part or all of the fees. If he can't do this then he can hardly insist on you paying.

only read op. stick to your guns. private schools are only in it to make money.

That's exactly it, Policywonk! We all of us can only deal with the situations we are in. We can't make government policy. If we became REALLY politically active and spent all our time campaigning for decent education and sweating blood there's a chance we might change things.

But only by the time our DS's have left home. There's the rub.

So we just have to do the best we can, don't we?

Well, I guess siblings would have to follow each other. Either that or introduce mass bussing.

Hey! Am I Ed Balls now or wot?

mamfm,

How can going to a school where above average achievement, if a child is academic and/or intelligent, be damaging to said child?

Private schools are for the most part not-for-profit organisations.