What is going on at Winchester College, anyone know why they are considering co-ed?!!!

[flourandeggs]

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/winchester-one-of-the-last-boys-boarding-schools-may-admit-girls-m792dck68

@sendsummer

I suspect it is not a shortage of boys who want to board especially at sixth form entry but rather a dwindling number in the UK who can pay £41,709 fees. By providing cheaper day places the school expands their pool of fee paying UK pupils whilst avoiding the upfront capital expenditure of a new boarding house.

Likely that cheaper and needs blind attracts more and more diverse applicants too. Great.

Although, Winchester isn't stand out expensive v other notable boarding options for boys, girls and co-Ed ...

I think more significantly today many many many UK parents also choose day schools because they want a day school not because it's cheaper than boarding !!! So Winchester is never on the list.

@YouokHun Remember you (current parents) are one of several of their key 'audiences'. They might have felt that by leaking through the press they could engender some positive feedback and then use that to put a positive spin on their messaging for current parents who would be considered their most difficult audience to spin this new information to (signed up to school before all these changes). It's all very cloak and dagger the world of PR. Or maybe it was just a good old fashioned slip that led to the press getting hold of it. I'd love to know. Pretty dynamic communications if it is the former, hats off to the Wincoll PR team!

Yes, interesting @flourandeggs! Certainly among those I’ve spoken to (admittedly a fairly small sample size) who are parents both ends of the school (those who signed up for an all boys school and those who will be present when the changes happen) there seems to be an untroubled response. The boys have had a whinge mainly because they don’t like change and could do without any more education-based surprises right now! My son is worryingly enthusiastic about the girls’ arrival . There are a number of parents who are also journalists of course ...

I spotted this on Twitter - petition to stop the change! www.change.org/p/winchester-college-governing-body-prevent-winchester-from-breaking-639-years-of-tradition-by-allowing-girls-and-day-boys?utm_content=cl_sharecopy_27279088_en-GB%3A6&recruited_by_id=4ac868a0-6acd-11eb-ae0d-95214595812f&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=copylink&utm_campaign=psf_combo_share_initial&utm_term=psf_combo_share_initial

Hmmm - as a woman I take a bit of offence to the second last sentence from the lead comment on the petition. I might have misread it but it appears to suggest that such a special intellectual atmosphere could only be male? And written by a woman too - albeit one who appears to be a Tory Councillor. Ah well, won't make a jot of difference having a little petition, the times they are a'changing.....
"This change of direction puts WinColl in the same space as a large number of public schools - Repton, Marlborough, Uppingham, Oundle, Rossall, Rugby, Stowe - to name but a few. Along with these proposed changes will, necessarily, come others to the school day and the curriculum. Of course, the College has to stay relevant in the 21st century, but a slight randomness, eccentricity and a refusal to look over their shoulders at the others, created a very special intellectual and social atmosphere that was intrinsically male. It is interesting that there are a plethora of girls’ schools, but august boys’ institutions are dying out apace."

@flourandeggs Wow I agree! Many of the comments make for depressing reading, IMO the attitudes are not a positive advertisement for Winchester! The special quirky line is wearing thin. Of course ALL schools are unique and have their own special culture!! Shock horror - many co-Ed's even have an exceptional and special environment for nurturing academic and independent thought!

I suspect their lead PR person has a fat file named 'rebranding' on her desk. For a start young people don't think so much in terms of 'sex' as 'gender' these days, so you can't really sell yourself as a 'single sex' school to young adults who increasingly don't believe in such limiting terms.

I wonder if Eton would follow - why do I get a feeling they are so entrenched in their old ways, they would not.

Perhaps because you know naff all about Eton?

They have experimented with girls in the sixth form (ooh matron!) on and off since the 1970/80s. A friend of mine, daughter of a housemaster, was part of the experiment and gets very annoyed when people don't believe that she went to Eton for part of her schooling.

Ultimately they decided against it, but I know they do regularly review the situation. Tony Little put forward a very good argument for continuing as single sex, and I have to say I agree with him, although when my son was there girls did come to the school for certain lessons in the sixth form, as well as for drama and music, and he is still good friends with one of them!

As someone whose brother is an Old

Wykehamist, and who is eager to send my own DS there, I think it will be a sad development if they do allow girls in.

Hopefully this isn’t another case of giving into the lowest common denominator.

@Justanotherworkingmom

As someone whose brother is an Old Wykehamist, and who is eager to send my own DS there, I think it will be a sad development if they do allow girls in.

Hopefully this isn’t another case of giving into the lowest common denominator.

"...giving into the lowest common denominator."

Just wow.

@TonTonMacoute

I wonder if Eton would follow - why do I get a feeling they are so entrenched in their old ways, they would not.

Perhaps because you know naff all about Eton?

They have experimented with girls in the sixth form (ooh matron!) on and off since the 1970/80s. A friend of mine, daughter of a housemaster, was part of the experiment and gets very annoyed when people don't believe that she went to Eton for part of her schooling.

Ultimately they decided against it, but I know they do regularly review the situation. Tony Little put forward a very good argument for continuing as single sex, and I have to say I agree with him, although when my son was there girls did come to the school for certain lessons in the sixth form, as well as for drama and music, and he is still good friends with one of them!

How are you disproving my point if the 'experiments' did not work?

Considering that for a lot of boarding schools, the 'experiment' did work, what is the reason that it did not for Eton?

Someone asked if Wincoll leaked the news? Remember how in December Eton was involved with the masculinity workshop / sacked teacher thing. At the time, there were all these reports about how Williamson / Bojo etc. were supporting a co-ed for Eton. I just wonder if some reporters went around asking all the major boys schools if they would consider co-ed. WinColl, certainly have not been giving a straight yes or no answer, more like it's something we consider every time we talk about evaluations/ ways forward.

As for the girls who studied there before, I was not aware of Eton having full girl cohorts, I thought it was just staff children as I was reminded of this Housemaster article.

www.newsweek.com/teen-girl-eton-college-sexism-england-1109224

toadsandtrumpet
Day pupils from the Winchester area are hardly going to be representative of a diverse community.
As I said this is a purely financial decision. The headmaster’s previous school in Oxford which he also changed to co-ed did not become needs-blind despite the extra income from the expansion. The aspiration is worthy but I suspect a panacea to excuse the change. I imagine the house prices in Winchester will go up as well with an influx of wealthy families from London and elsewhere.

@sendsummer

toadsandtrumpet Day pupils from the Winchester area are hardly going to be representative of a diverse community. As I said this is a purely financial decision. The headmaster’s previous school in Oxford which he also changed to co-ed did not become needs-blind despite the extra income from the expansion. The aspiration is worthy but I suspect a panacea to excuse the change. I imagine the house prices in Winchester will go up as well with an influx of wealthy families from London and elsewhere.

I didn't say it would! I also didn't say it was going to be needs blind, I just meant that needs blind would be good too - it would increase the application pool in a good way.

My point was / is that Winchester just isn't on the list for many people whose children would otherwise have a good chance of being accepted - simply because a) it's not co-Ed and 2) it's only boarding with no day option.

Co-Ed and day option means more, far more applicants - not just from girls from boys that would otherwise not bother - so a far bigger pool to chose from. Affordability is down the list for a good number of people who pay the same (or more) elsewhere! That's not to say I think it should just be accessible to those that can afford it!!

Anyway. Good for him for starting to get girls into these establishments ... (I may be wrong but understand he was also house master at Kings Cant when it went co-Ed and a lecturer at Oriel when it did) surely Winchester had a good inkling this would be on his agenda when they hired him...🤔 can you tell I am not a fan of discrimination based on single sex education :-)

A preference for single sex education by some parents for some DCs is hardly discrimination. There are a large number of remaining single sex girls’ schools.

The governors may well have appointed the headmaster with this agenda in mind but it will have been to increase revenue and possibly grades. Otherwise they could have joined up with the private girls’ school in Winchester and achieved the same aim of co-ed education

@sendsummer

A preference for single sex education by some parents for some DCs is hardly discrimination. There are a large number of remaining single sex girls’ schools. The governors may well have appointed the headmaster with this agenda in mind but it will have been to increase revenue and possibly grades. Otherwise they could have joined up with the private girls’ school in Winchester and achieved the same aim of co-ed education

I'm not bothered nor arguing about their reasoning! You're also of course right they could have merged with the girls school (brand diluting in the mid term so I imagine not ideal) - they could have said 50:50 from year 9. They could have done any number of things! Only they really know why they have decided on the strategy they have taken... and no doubt /of course it then will likely serve several purposes.

My point is just about the pool of applications and so choice of cohort being much larger - by becoming open to girls, and so attracting parents with girls and boys who want co-Ed and admitting day students attracting parents who don't want a full boarding environment!

On single sex education (and in my opinion it's implications for an equal society) we'll just have to agree to disagree

I don’t have a predilection for single sec versus co-ed. Toadsandtrumpet of course there is a sector of wealthy Hampshire parents who will be pleased to have the lifestyle choice of an elite private selective day co-ed in Winchester resembling those in London. Nothing to do with reducing discrimination or fighting for an equal society and to pretend otherwise is hypocrisy.

I am starting to wonder if you are part of the school PR team.

@sendsummer PR or something worse. Just rambling around sounds an insider. And invested insider trying to justify the new positioning, above all

@sendsummer

I am starting to wonder if you are part of the school PR team.

Ha! I'm not defending Winchester in any way at all! The opposite if anything! I think to stay relevant they need to widen the net! I think all schools should be open to both sexes. I think all schools with charitable status have a duty to up their game in terms of needs blind access, big time!

My point was just that these days they are missing out on lots of suitable applicants who instead pay handsomely to go to fabulous co-Ed boarding or co-Ed day schools and that plenty of wealthy parents shortlist schools
on those criteria from the outset and not because the fees are too high for them! ....Obviously they are also missing out on wonderful potential applicants from families who can't or don't want to spend £££ on school fees!l!

[quote Coronateachingagain]@sendsummer PR or something worse. Just rambling around sounds an insider. And invested insider trying to justify the new positioning, above all[/quote]
What a peculiar comment! @coronateachingagain I'm not sure how you can interpret any of my comments on this thread to seem like I am PR, or worse or justifying new positioning etc?! If anything I am championing the existing brilliant co-Ed schools that in reality quite frankly already compete very well indeed with the educational journey Winchester has to offer!! And that perhaps that is why they are changing?!

I think there are so few male single sex schools left, this development narrows the choice for parents and students.

Winchester was our ideal for our DS, but we want single sex. Will be watching with interest to see what happens.

@toadsandtrumpets you sound like a broken record. You are still not denying that you have some investment in all of this - although still that would be difficult to believe.

[quote Coronateachingagain]@toadsandtrumpets you sound like a broken record. You are still not denying that you have some investment in all of this - although still that would be difficult to believe.

[/quote]
I have no vested interest

toadsandtrumpets if you have no vested interest why should this thread be your first to post on or alternatively name change to post on it. I don’t usually engage in searches but I have this time.
You seem to be championing the headmaster from the PR bio you provided.

@toadsandtrumpets you are making a very sensible argument very well but I fear it is falling on deaf, rather cross, ears. People are going to struggle to come to terms with the change but you are absolutely right it is long overdue and will probably be the making of the school.