Is boarding school only for the wealthy?

[bigyellowballoon]

I am looking at secondary schools and would really like my only dc to board. She's confident outgoing intelligent all the things I wasn't and also being an only she does get lonely and I think it would suit her spending extra time with friends.
The thing is they seem to be absolutely out of bounds financially. Do 'normal' families go? We are at a prep at the moment but not at application stage for secondary yet.

A lot of councils use boarding schools (even really posh ones) as glorified children’s homes. These kids can be segregated or not depending on the school and why they are being housed there.

Sorry OP, comments about my experience aren’t helpful. I’m sure things have moved on a lot! It is important to budget for more than the fees though

No @courderoy. You can send your DC to any state secondary school. You don't have to live near it. As long as they meet the admissions criteria. If it is boarding, they'll take your DC regardless of where you live.

A lot of councils use boarding schools (even really posh ones) as glorified children’s homes

Private boarding schools do not have to take children into care. They are not beholden to the council.

There is a state boarding school near me, they allocate boarding places according to boarding need. It is oversubscribed though, I suppose if it wasn’t that wouldn’t be an issue

@minipie ok so not simply hanging out with friends. It's the all round opportunity that I think it will give dd. As well as the possibility that perhaps there's light at the end of the tunnel for me being able to work before my career is in the bin if dd not having to be dropped in and picked up each evening with someone there for her etc. Feel like that sounds awful but it is what it is. I obviously will be there for her if necessary but if boarding was a good thing (and a possibility) for dd I'd be happy to let her go.

@GrumpyHoonMain Where do you people get these info from. What you've written is completelt false. These schools get £5000 per pupil. Not from the council but from the DfE. They are regularly inspected. This isn't the 1950s. Please stop spreading lies about schools that are giving a great deal of children better opportunities.

@courderoy no they are helpful. I also thought maybe state only take those with a requirement to board over someone with my circumstances.

I think you working might be seem as a boarding need ... parents work commitments seem to be listed as a possible reason.

@bigyellowballoon I know exactly how you feel about going back to work. I feel like life is passing me by even though I run my own business and do the odd consulting. I feel I could be earning a great deal more than I am if I didn't have to build my hours around the children. But apart from perhaps earning more money, I wouldn't change a thing.

At Christ’s hospital is an awesome one. I grew up around there. My parents were going to send me. But things happened and we had to move away

However it’s well regarded as one of the best schools. It also takes the highest number of poor parents in. Due to its ethos.

Well worth a look

Again, I’m not convinced boarding school offers more opportunities than a good private day school? (Unless you don’t have one of those nearby)

Also boarding school seems a slightly disproportionate way of facilitating a return to work? Why not use an au pair or after school nanny? You’ll need to use childcare when she’s back for the (realllly long) holidays anyway.

@Joerev yes I remember knowing someone from that school and they were extraordinarily down to earth. Dd of a vicar if I recall. I think back then clergy had a discount because of the Christian ethos she openly admitted she had attended on a bursary.
I will take a look thanks.

Is christs hospital an excellent school? I used to live near it growing up and it didnt have a very good reputation then.

@minipie a nanny can cost along the lines of the fees. I paid mine £27k pa when dd was younger and even then the nanny was terrible at helping dd with homework and music practise etc so I left my job to help dd as I felt was the best thing to do at the time & I don't regret that but I worked long hours so I have to have sufficient solid childcare in place. If you don't live right in London good childcare can be very difficult to acquire as well. I don't want an au pair at all either, just wouldn't suit our family.

Right now we do a combination of summer camps, myself is off and dh annual leave. If I worked would either get a summer babysitter as dd in senior school or some kind of summer thing around me and dh annual leave.

A lot of councils use boarding schools (even really posh ones) as glorified children’s homes

Can you please give us the names of these schools, please,Grumpy.

There are a lot of traumatised adults who went through the British boarding school system.

Please do some thorough research:

boardingrecovery.com/articles.html

www.joyschaverien.com/boarding-school-syndrome/

Most people I know who went weren’t from fabulously wealthy backgrounds. Many had parents with very working class jobs.

Are you talking about people of your generation who went to school decades ago? Boarding was far cheaper back when I was a kid.

Since that time, what has happened is that the cost of education "in general" has spiraled, and the expectations surrounding boarding in particular have really gone up. It used to be possible to board on the cheap back in the days when fairly spartan facilities were considered normal. Nowadays, it's expected that children are housed in "nice" facilities with individual or paired rooms etc., warm clean bathrooms and lots of extras.

The growth of international boarding has had an effect as well. There are lots and lots of wealthy people from other countries (China et al) who are eager to send their kids over here to board, and boarding schools can easily fill their places up with these---there is no longer any incentive to keep costs down, and swanky facilities are a way to catch the eye of wealthy overseas families.

OP, why not look into summer camps instead? A bit of the boarding experience, and a lot more affordable (though still hardly cheap). You can even find some camps which are located on the premises of boarding schools during the summer holidays.

OP, I would keep her at prep till 13+, saving fees. It wi also allow you to go back to work then, as a 13 year old will cope on her own during holidays. You could easily earn the difference between her prep fees and her boarding fees. Most parents of pupils at private school work, and most don't have much left after paying the fees ( remember that you only have 1 DC. In my experience, the majority of parents at boarding schools are not oligarchs but barristers, partners at law firms or banks, executives etc. making about 500k/ year combined (after repayment of equity loans/chamber rents/ indemnityinsurance, partner' pension contributions etc which are all very high for top earning professionals). But on 500k you pay more tax, and these people usually have 2 and often even 3 or 4 DC to send through boarding school, so are about on a net income of £250k and having to pay fees and extras of £110k for 3. While relatively wealthy, they will also think twice about the skiing trip etc and won't feel incredibly flush). If your dd is at prep now, I don't think the profile of families is going to change dramatically at boarding school, especially if it is a boarding school that also has day pupils.

I have direct experience of sending several children to some of the top Independent schools in the country. They all attended as day pupils and they all mixed magnificently with boarders. I entertained alot during various exeat weekends. All children are now adults and are still firm friends-honestly peoples bank balances never affected how the children saw each other. At least that was our journey and I did have the same worries as you. My situation was a little different, they were not my children but children within my family who I ended up raising and sending to the best schools I could for them. The reason I explain my setup, is simply that it was a little unconventional but no one batted an eyelid!
The parental backgrounds varied substantially but everyone got on. Generally we all pulled together, especially during freezing cold rugby matches. I found we all had a lot in common, teenage angst, drinking, drugs and lost love issues!
The schools were absolutely brilliant for my lot and really they loved each day.

I can see the merits of boarding if you are super wealthy and can just throw money away on "nice to haves", OR if it is the only way you and your partner can work (if you both work in the armed forces for example).

I really really can't see the point of paying those awful fees on the grounds that "well, my daughter seems independent and might enjoy it." By the time she is secondary age, she won't need wraparound childcare on school days---and even if she boards, you will have to pay for some sort of solution during the summer holidays anyway. And boarding schools usually have really long summer holidays!

Every parent I know with a child at boarding school drives a battered old Volvo and saves up tax credits to pay the fees.

To be honest if she's really independent she wiĺl probably find boarding quite restrictive.

Look, normal people don't go to fee-paying schools fullstop. So no, normal people don't send their kids away to board. If that is what you decide to do, that's what you decide to do, but don't kid yourself it's normal.

@Redsheep73 I am very much normal!! As stated above I went to private school.. not boarding, my dad worked in a factory as a maintenance engineer and my mum was a nurse. Extremely Normal!! And I’m not an only child. 👋