TES; top grades fall dramatically at private schools

[Bougiebliss]

Yesterday’s TES

www.tes.com/magazine/news/secondary/levels-2022-top-grades-fall-private-schools?amp

Hmmmm… so what changed in their teaching over the last year?
This feels really distasteful not only for the hard working children in schools that didn’t inflate, but also for those children who got on to courses based on the inflated grades and are presumably struggling.
I can’t help feeling that if this was something local comps had done there would be more outrage.

Our new sports centre is being financed entirely by donations, not through fees.

I don't think people appreciate that most private schools aren't swimming with excess cash. The likes of Eton and Harrow may be but they're in the minority. Our grounds cost a lot of money to maintain plus teacher salaries make up a large proportion of overall costs.

Some of these posts smack somewhat of the green-eyed monster. I didn't dwell on the local private school having far better facilities than my state school, or the VAT saving.

If people want to pay for private education, rather than use their state school place, that's their choice.

@hop321 why would you assume jealousy because some posters have different views and principles than you obviously do? No green eyed monster here. My DC are now at Oxford and Cambridge. They have also played their chosen sports at national level. We could easily have afforded private education, had we thought it was worth the investment, but we knew our DC would achieve highly in the widest sense in either sector. We were right.

Agree Sharpies. Just got gcse results could not have been better. Plays her sport for local very well run club. Has lovely friends. Not sure what I’m missing out on by not going private.

For very bright self motivated kids, it doesn't matter not to go private. I went to the local comp, got great grades, went to Oxbridge. What matters is overall that's not the experience of the majority, I was an outliner at my comp and many students didn't get the grades to go on to further study, like for nursing. That's a massive shame for them and the fact I did just great doesn't make that fair.

There is also a huge cultural capital advantage to public school which is hard to quantify but absolutely exists and is hard to replicate outside that sector (even if you go to Oxbridge, for example).

I didn't send my kids private, but I'm not oblivious to why people do.

Outlier (god, why has Mumsnet still not got that much needed edit button!)

What cultural capital? We provide that as a family theatre/travel/discussion. Dh went to Cambridge from a bog standard comp. Still not getting it. How on earth is it worth the massive outlay? My friends privately educated kids are no happier /plummier/better educated than the others!

I would happily scrap bursaries at private schools. I don't think they are important at all. I would rather use the funds generated by charging VAT on private school fees to invest in the state sector.

VAT on fees is unrelated to charitable status.

That's dependent on the EU VAT rules (currently fees are exempt: no taxation on any nurseries, schools or university fees) and that can now be changed.

The VAT on the 'business' side of a school is worth about £200 per pupil per term, and that would be passed on to parents - it's less than the variation of fees between schools in the first place (irrespective of whether a charity or a business). That is in itself unlikely to cause bursaries to vanish

What about the situation where scrapping VAT leads to an increase in net cost for the government (for the reasons mentioned earlier)? And state school budgets are squeezed even further?

Is that still a positive as you've made parents pay an extra 20% in fees?

As I say, I have mixed views about private education as I've done well career-wise from my state school background. It was a marginal decision for us, in fact, I probably wouldn't have bothered had my kids not loved sport and made good use of the facilities and regular match fixtures.

But there's constant sniping about private schools and their pupils on MN and some sweeping comments that would (rightly) be considered offensive were they applied to state-educated kids. But private school kids are fair targets apparently.

Sorry, adding VAT, not scrapping it.

Yes, even if there was a net cost to the state, I would prefer to add the VAT to private school fees. If some private schools close down and kids end up moving from private to state as a result of the change, then overall, that's a good thing in my view.

And that proves my point... Either private schools are better, and confer an advantage, or they're not any better in which case why do people want to get rid of them?

Particularly at the risk of costing taxpayers more money and squeezing funding for state schools. I really don't see who wins in this scenario, it's just a race to the bottom. Anyway, on that note, I've said my piece.

Hope the GCSE results went well today for any parents of Year 11s.

Personally, I think private schools are often (but not always) "better" for kids of relatively average ability. I don't think they're worth it for higher achievers. I am not sure about those at the lower end of the ability range.

I do think it would be better for state education as a whole if those parents who currently pay for private education - ie typically wealthy, educated and likely to place a high value on education - were forced to rely on the state sector instead. Those educated, involved parents would typically contribute to their dc's schools in all manner of different ways. And politically, if they were not able to opt out into the private sector, they would be more likely to support parties that would invest properly in state education, or to put pressure on their MPs to improve what's on offer. So yes, overall, I think it would be beneficial if everyone had a shared interest in improving the state sector, rather than the wealthy elite actually having a vested interest in keeping the state sector down.