Interesting study - state schools still socially segregated but can do well for academic children

[Quattrocento]

www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/education/article3405934.ece

Recogniseed myself in this article, thanks, 400!
Would like to see mine @ Oxbridge in a few years too!

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Oops, does your ds play with children who, not to put too fine a point on it, are not of his class ?

Not trying to be snide, just curious. A close friend of mine has sent her three children to a very mixed inner London primary school, for reasons possibly similar to yours in terms of social mixing, sense of community and so on. But 7 years down the line - they are 11, 9 and 6 - she has been a little disappointed that in spite of trying to be welcoming to any child her children have been friendly with, there have been literally only 2 or 3 occasions when hers have been invited back by a child who is not from a middle class family.

Basically the council estate children stick together, as do those from the Victorian terraces.

Does anyone else have this experience ?

are children at primary schools aware of class or are their parents?

Clearly the parents are. my friend was hoping the youth of the children would override that awareness so that they all could mix regardless of whether home was a council flat or a Victorian artisan's house with pretty garden. But it didn't happen. I was just wondering why.

are they split on racial grounds as well or just class? only round here people stick together racially as well (I think religious reasons may play a part also)

The middle classes of all colours mix, as do the others - mostly - though df says the Bangladeshi families don't really mix at all.

My parents did this to us at primary school and we were all socially excluded in junior because we had nothing in common with the other children. Children are well aware of differences (in fact I think younger children especially so). We all did very well though - I am sure it has been consistently found that the best predictor of educational sucess in children is the level of education of the parents.

My two are at the local school, which has an all right OFSTED (there are two much better performing schools locally, but I don't thin we would have got into them anyway, and didn't like the ethos of either) and is fairly mixed socially. Their frendship groups are also quite mixed, but I guess predominantly middle class. I suppose I probably more liekly to invite children over if I get along with the parents, so that probably has some influence.

nsp, we had the same experience with a large no of vietnamese kids in ds's former class -- they were all perfectly pleasant kids, caught up v. quickly wrt language skills, even though they came in not speaking much English, but stuck together like glue, both in school and out.

I think it's predominantly a cultural thing related to how comfortable parents feel about dealing with white middle-class families. We tended to find that even if you invited the whole class to a birthday party, you could predict pretty much accurately who would turn up vietnamese kids definitely wouldn't, nigerian kids generally not, except possibly the ones with professional parents, bangladeshi kids also not. South american kids often would, contrarily. White kids from even quite tough backgrounds often would, also.

Only v. middle class parents would RSVP, of course, but that's a whole 'nother thread.

NSC, not nsp.

Perhaps the not being invited back is because some of those families live in much smaller, cramped accommodation. Some families don't 'invite people back' - when I was growing up on a council estate, children generally played outside, we didn't spend time in each others' homes, and I think that's still the same today. Amongst my children's friends, generally the more middle class ones invite each other back or go to more organised or paid-for activities, the 'working class' or poor ones hang around on the streets.

The segregation aspect is interesting. I think it probably comes down to who you feel comfortable with. But I still think it's worth it just so you do mix to some degree and are aware of how other people live.

My children's secondary school is totally non-selective, so you get every sort of child and family there is. Children do mix, but I think generally find their friends who have similar interests and often backgrounds to theirs.

In Year 7, my son's friends included a millionaire's son and a boy from one of the poorest, most dysfunctional families going - literally every social problem you could think of was there in that family. Within a short time he was less good friends with both - although still on speaking terms - the millionaire's son because he turned out to be too arrogant and just not very nice, the poor boy because his behaviour deteriorated (largely due to family problems), and he started getting involved in things my son didn't want to be a part of. So now my son's friends are generally those who share the same interests as him and I suppose who come from educated, more professional families. It's not so much an income thing - that varies a lot, and many are much better off than us - but more about attitudes.

I have always believed that parents and home environment are the biggest factor in how well a child will do at school.

Find this article reassuring. We have sent our children to the nearest state school for the reasons above.
Our children do play with children from different economic backgrounds i.e council houses and victorian terraces.
They do however tend to have bright friends with very involved parents regardless of income so I suppose they do segregate in that way.

I suspect there's a natural gravitation towards people of similar ability and interests, simply because we all tend to feel comfortable with people who broadly speaking have abilities/interests/values we identify with. DS, who has just moved from private to state school definitely has teamed up with other bright kids. Also, the fact that schools tend to set by ability during secondary level will reinforce this. DS is aware that there is the full ability range in his comprehensive, but tbh he really only comes across the kids in top sets for the majority of the day. Interestingly, re: the income thing... he has the offspring of two multi millionaires in his tutor group, as well as kids from fairly poor backgrounds and everything in between

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