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Education

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Original poster

Innocent poll: Would you willingly send your DC to a so called poor school for the sake of.....

309 replies

fireflytoo · 01/04/2008 17:45

...improving the standards of that school? There are often threads about all the issues revolving around so called good or bad schools. Many factors are blamed; class sizes, teacher child ratios, the middle class influence, sociological environments etc.

What I would like to know is whether anyone (especially anyone who gets cross at parents who move to good school areas or who pay for tutors etc) would willingly send their DC to a school where they know the DC would not nessecarily (sp?) get the best education....but where the school would benefit from having them there. (Presuming these said DC have supportive parents and the DC are quite capable of doing well.)

Hope I am not stepping on any toes here... I am genuinely interested in this question though.

OP posts:
UnquietDad · 02/04/2008 11:45

Where did we get the idea that sending one's children to the local school - which is, after all, "good enough" for most people - is some sort of social "experiment"?

SixSpotBurnet · 02/04/2008 11:48

good question

even 25 years ago, my mother, who had absolutely no idea that you could do anything other than send your children to the local school, was accused of conducting a social experiment by some middle-class neighbour because we went to the local comprehensive

UnquietDad · 02/04/2008 11:55

And let's be honest, for the vast majority of people there is no option other than the local comprehensive. The whole idea of "choice" is a fiction. I mean people who can't afford private, and have no desire to "get on their knees and avoid the fees" (and may not even have a bible-basher school near them anyway) and for whom the idea of getting to the other good school across town would involve a nightmare journey on two buses with the schoolchild and the toddler...

It's only a small section of the middle-classes who are even bothered about this "right school" thing.

shrinkingsagpuss · 02/04/2008 11:57

haven't read all of thread - but my local school is not supposed to be v good - I want to send DS there as its local - not sure about him "improving" the school - but I think he is bright wnough to get on, and DH and I can help him.

SixSpotBurnet · 02/04/2008 11:58

Well, quite. If you regard the "best" education as being that which is available at a school like, oh I don't know, say Winchester, then it is just pie in the sky to think that any more than a very tiny tiny minority of children are ever going to have the "best" education.

OrmIrian · 02/04/2008 12:00

No I wouldn't.

However I do think that sometimes people panic a little about schools. Often the so-called 'poor schools' have a great deal to offer, they might have to work hard simply to stand still, and that will benefit any child who wants to respond to it. And also quite often reputations, both bad and good, are out of date and undeserved.

OrmIrian · 02/04/2008 12:01

I agree UQD. Most of us have little choice.

UnquietDad · 02/04/2008 12:02

And it really, really, really gets my back up when people say "eeeeeeaaah [braying sound] yuss, we're sending Tilly and Tarquin to St Xavier's you knaaaaiw, because we want them to have the best education. Hee-haw."

What am I supposed to say to that? "Oh, well, I'm sending mine to the state comprehensive because, obviously, I want them to have a mediocre education" ?

cheesesarnie · 02/04/2008 12:02

no.we dont actually get much choice here but if i had choice obviously id send mine to the best school i could find for them-one that meet their needs.

tiredemma · 02/04/2008 12:03

I agree with UQD.

For many there is no choice other than the 'Comp on the rough council estate'

Swedes · 02/04/2008 12:07

UQD - "It's only a small section of the middle-classes who are even bothered about this "right school" thing."

People are only bothered by this because journalists and novelists keep telling us we should be. I'm think you are wrong to think it's confined to the middle-classes to be honest.

ingles2 · 02/04/2008 12:09

I did...
It hasn't worked
we're moving

UnquietDad · 02/04/2008 12:12

not even the rough council estate, tiredemma, to be honest - I think it's more general than that. Local comp in the area... How many people really have the kind of tools for social mobility that going to a school on the other side of town requires - access to a car (or a really good bus service), and being prepared to take your children away from those they went to primary school with? We live in a decent area and I'd say 95% of people in the current Y6 at DD & DS's school are going to the local state school for Y7 - not just because it's good, but because it, well, just what you do.

Swedes · 02/04/2008 12:19

If we are talking about high school children, nobody should need to take their child to school. My sons (12 and 16)walk to the station catch the train to the nearest City then walk some more to school . Then they do the whole thing in reverse on the way home, even if it's raining and they've got 3 large bags.

UQD - Don't they have public transport in Sheffield?

UnquietDad · 02/04/2008 12:21

Of course they do, but it's a big place - and if someone wanted to send their child out of a school on an estate, say Manor in the east of the city, to a decent secondary, say Bradfield right out in the west, it would involve (does a quick estimate) maybe two buses, plus a tram.

Swedes · 02/04/2008 12:29

@ tram

Swedes · 02/04/2008 12:31

UQD And how long might that single journey take - the two buses and tram?

sitdownpleasegeorge · 02/04/2008 12:32

I'd like to Balls & Cooper do the same at secondary level (without extra tutoring on the side) before I'm convinced of their total commitment to the ideal. It ain't dragging the school up from the jaws of special measures so far is it, just having their middle class children as pupils ?

I possibly would send my kids to a local poorly performing primary school as I know I could support their learning pretty well at the 4-11 age range but I would pull them out if bullying wasn't tackled properly or they were unhappy there.

I very much doubt I would do the same at secondary school level.

With reference to Balls & Cooper, there are far more politicians manipulating their children into more acceptable/good schools rather than using their local one and these are people ultimately responsible for the quality of education in this country so I do not feel remotely guilty in saying school A is not the best suited to my child, so I will do my utmost to get them a place at school B. I am their parent I know them better than the government responsible for allocating them a school place does.

UnquietDad · 02/04/2008 12:43

Why's a tram funny?

I don't know, to be honest - in the morning rush-hour it could take ages.

UnquietDad · 02/04/2008 12:45

For every Balls & Cooper, there is an Abbott (local schools don't meet the needs of black boys so I'm sending mine elsewhere, oh, but they're good enough for everyone else)...

sitdownpleasegeorge · 02/04/2008 12:48

I'd say the ratio was higher than 1:1 unquietdad.

I'd say Balls & Cooper were significantly in the minority.

UnquietDad · 02/04/2008 13:20

Oh, indeed, I wasn't implying a strict ratio - it was just a figure of speech.

I wouldn't stop at MPs either. Our LA recently appointed a new Head of Education, a 40-ish woman who, the paper proudly informs us, lives in the city with her two children. So there's a good chance these kids are school age. Wonder if she puts them where her mouth is?

BellaDonna79 · 02/04/2008 16:12

Oh God, absolutely no way. I am my children's advocate. If I don't go out of my way to make sure they have the best possible education I can provide for them I have failed them. If that means forking out five sets of private school fees per year then so be it, you only get one shot at an education and it is one of the most precious gifts you can give your children. While in an ideal world all children would recieve a fantastic education that isn't happening. I can't change the education other children get but I can control the education my own children get.

Swedes · 02/04/2008 17:39

UQD I have only ever been on a tram in Germany, in spite of living all over the UK for over 40 years. Sorry if me finding the idea of a tram amusing was offensive.

cory · 02/04/2008 17:41

Well, I see sending them to the local comp as part of providing them with the best possible education. I can always teach them more irregular Latin verbs at home, but I cannot on my own provide them with the invaluable experience of being able to get on and relate to people with different backgrounds.

I myself went to a local comp and did masses of extra reading at home. I have worked in a donkey jacket and I have given seminars at Cambridge. I have friends from widely different sectors of society and it is something that enriches my life.
That's what I want for my children.
That, and a genuine sense of respect for the different members of society and their contribution.

I also don't want them used to always "having the best" in the form of being overladen with extra-curricular activities. I want them to have time to develop their own ability to entertain themselves, and I want them to appreciate what they are given without believing that they must be able to do or have whatever they want. Which is just as well- as I can't pay for more than a limited number of activities anyway.